Azuchi Castle (1576): Oda Nobunaga's Lost Fortress Palace

Azuchi Castle was the fortress palace of the Japanese warlord Oda Nobunaga, begun in 1576 on a hill above Lake Biwa, east of Kyoto. With its towering keep, stone ramparts and lavishly painted interiors, it set the pattern for the great castles of the following decades. It stood for only six years, burning in 1582 shortly after Nobunaga’s death, but it gave its name to an entire period of Japanese history.

Background: a new kind of capital

By 1576 Oda Nobunaga controlled much of central Japan. He had driven the last Ashikaga shogun from Kyoto in 1573 and defeated the Takeda at Nagashino in 1575. He needed a headquarters that was close to the capital but secure, and that would display his power.

Mount Azuchi, a hill rising about 100 metres above the eastern shore of Lake Biwa, met these needs. It lay on the main road from Kyoto to eastern Japan, and the lake gave access by water to Kyoto and to the north. In early 1576 Nobunaga ordered construction to begin, with his retainer Niwa Nagahide overseeing the work.

Design and the great tower

The hill was terraced with high walls of dry stone, a technique that became standard in later castles. A broad, straight stone staircase led up from the foot of the hill towards the summit, where Nobunaga’s residence and the main tower stood.

The tower, which Nobunaga called the tenshu, was completed in 1579. Based on Ota Gyuichi’s chronicle, historians reconstruct it as having five external roofs and six floors above a stone base, with a basement. Estimates of its height vary, but it was among the tallest structures in Japan at the time.

The interiors were decorated by the painter Kano Eitoku and his workshop with paintings of Chinese sages, Buddhist scenes, birds and flowers on gold backgrounds. According to the chronicle, one floor was octagonal, and the top floor was lacquered and gilded inside and out.

Below the castle, Nobunaga laid out a castle town. In 1577 he issued regulations making Azuchi a free market, removing tolls and guild monopolies to attract merchants.

Nobunaga ordered many of his leading vassals to build residences on the slopes and in the town, keeping them close to him and away from their own domains. This concentration of warriors around the lord’s castle anticipated the castle towns of the Edo period, where samurai were required to live near their lord rather than on their lands.

Visitors and the Azuchi screens

The Jesuit missionary Luis Frois and other Europeans visited Azuchi and wrote admiring descriptions of it. Nobunaga allowed the Jesuits to build a seminary in the town.

He also had a pair of folding screens painted with views of the castle and town. In 1581 he gave them to the Jesuit visitor Alessandro Valignano, and they were later presented to Pope Gregory XIII in Rome by the Japanese embassy that arrived in 1585. The screens are now lost.

Destruction in 1582

On 21 June 1582 Nobunaga was killed in Kyoto in the Honno-ji Incident, the coup of his general Akechi Mitsuhide. Akechi’s forces occupied Azuchi Castle. After Mitsuhide was defeated at the Battle of Yamazaki on 2 July 1582, the tower and main palace burned.

Who set the fire is not known. Traditional accounts blamed Mitsuhide’s kinsman Akechi Hidemitsu, but he had already left the castle. Others have suggested Nobunaga’s son Oda Nobukatsu, looters, or an accidental fire. Parts of the castle remained in use for a few years, but it was abandoned by 1585, when the new castle at nearby Hachiman replaced it.

Archaeology and the site today

The ruins were designated a Special Historic Site of Japan in 1952. From 1989 Shiga Prefecture carried out about twenty years of excavation and restoration, uncovering the main staircase, residences and the stone base of the tower.

The foundations of the tower survive at the summit, including the arrangement of stones that once supported its pillars. Sokenji, a temple founded within the castle grounds in Nobunaga’s time, still stands on the hillside. Nearby, a museum displays a full-size reconstruction of the top two floors of the tower.

Key people

• Oda Nobunaga (1534–1582): the warlord who commissioned the castle and lived there from 1579.
• Niwa Nagahide (1535–1585): the senior retainer who supervised construction.
• Kano Eitoku (1543–1590): the leading painter of the age, who decorated the interiors.
• Luis Frois (1532–1597): the Portuguese Jesuit whose writings preserve European impressions of Azuchi.

Timeline

• 1576, early: Construction begins on Mount Azuchi.
• 1577: Nobunaga issues free-market regulations for the castle town.
• 1579: Nobunaga moves into the completed tower.
• 1581: The Azuchi screens are given to Alessandro Valignano.
• 1582, 21 June: Nobunaga dies at Honno-ji.
• 1582, early July: The tower and palace burn after the Battle of Yamazaki.
• 1585: The castle is abandoned in favour of Hachiman.
• 1952: The ruins become a Special Historic Site.

Why it matters

Azuchi Castle changed Japanese architecture. Its tall tower on high stone walls inspired the castles of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, including Osaka, and of the Tokugawa period, such as Himeji. As a symbol of one man’s power over a reunited centre of Japan, it also gave its name to the Azuchi-Momoyama period.