Yoshitsune Shin-Takadachi (義経新高館), or
Yoshitsune and the New Takadachi, is a Japanese
jōruri, also known as Ningyō jōruri , is a form of traditional Japanese puppet theater, founded in Osaka in 1684.Three kinds of performers take part in a bunraku performance:* Ningyōtsukai or Ningyōzukai - Puppeteers* Tayū - the chanters* Shamisen players...
(puppet) play which centers on the conflict between
Minamoto no Yoshitsunewas a general of the Minamoto clan of Japan in the late Heian and early Kamakura period. Yoshitsune was the ninth son of Minamoto no Yoshitomo. Yoshitsune's older brother Minamoto no Yoritomo founded the Kamakura shogunate...
and his brother,
Shogun is a military rank and historical title for Hereditary Commanders in Chief of the Armed Forces of Japan. The modern rank is equivalent to a Generalissimo...
Minamoto no Yoritomowas the founder and the first shogun of the Kamakura Shogunate of Japan. He ruled from 1192 until 1199.-Early life and exile :Yoritomo was the third son of Minamoto no Yoshitomo, the heir of the Minamoto clan, and his official wife, a daughter of Fujiwara no Suenori, who was a member of the...
. Though set in the 12th century, and drawing upon previous versions of the story of this conflict, the play alludes strongly to the 1615
siege of OsakaThe was a series of battles undertaken by the Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in that clan's destruction. Divided into two stages , and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege put an end to the last major armed opposition to the shogunate's establishment...
, in which the forces of the
Tokugawa shogunateThe Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the and the , was a feudal regime of Japan established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family. This period is known as the Edo period and gets its name from the capital city, Edo, which now is called Tokyo...
defeated those of the
Toyotomi clanDuring the Sengoku period in 16th century Japan, the began to thrive. Originating in Owari Province, the Toyotomi served as retainers to the Oda clan throughout the Sengoku period...
.
References to the shogunate, and especially to the campaigns of
Tokugawa Ieyasu
, were banned from the stage for much of the
Edo periodThe , or , is a division of Japanese history running from 1603 to 1868 and is the premodern era. The period marks the governance of the Edo or Tokugawa shogunate, which was officially established in 1603 by the first Edo shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu. The period ended with the Meiji Restoration, the...
(1603-1868) in which the Tokugawa ruled.
Yoshitsune Shin-Takadachi (義経新高館), or
Yoshitsune and the New Takadachi, is a Japanese
jōruri, also known as Ningyō jōruri , is a form of traditional Japanese puppet theater, founded in Osaka in 1684.Three kinds of performers take part in a bunraku performance:* Ningyōtsukai or Ningyōzukai - Puppeteers* Tayū - the chanters* Shamisen players...
(puppet) play which centers on the conflict between
Minamoto no Yoshitsunewas a general of the Minamoto clan of Japan in the late Heian and early Kamakura period. Yoshitsune was the ninth son of Minamoto no Yoshitomo. Yoshitsune's older brother Minamoto no Yoritomo founded the Kamakura shogunate...
and his brother,
Shogun is a military rank and historical title for Hereditary Commanders in Chief of the Armed Forces of Japan. The modern rank is equivalent to a Generalissimo...
Minamoto no Yoritomowas the founder and the first shogun of the Kamakura Shogunate of Japan. He ruled from 1192 until 1199.-Early life and exile :Yoritomo was the third son of Minamoto no Yoshitomo, the heir of the Minamoto clan, and his official wife, a daughter of Fujiwara no Suenori, who was a member of the...
. Though set in the 12th century, and drawing upon previous versions of the story of this conflict, the play alludes strongly to the 1615
siege of OsakaThe was a series of battles undertaken by the Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in that clan's destruction. Divided into two stages , and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege put an end to the last major armed opposition to the shogunate's establishment...
, in which the forces of the
Tokugawa shogunateThe Tokugawa shogunate, also known as the and the , was a feudal regime of Japan established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family. This period is known as the Edo period and gets its name from the capital city, Edo, which now is called Tokyo...
defeated those of the
Toyotomi clanDuring the Sengoku period in 16th century Japan, the began to thrive. Originating in Owari Province, the Toyotomi served as retainers to the Oda clan throughout the Sengoku period...
.
References to the shogunate, and especially to the campaigns of
Tokugawa Ieyasu
, were banned from the stage for much of the
Edo periodThe , or , is a division of Japanese history running from 1603 to 1868 and is the premodern era. The period marks the governance of the Edo or Tokugawa shogunate, which was officially established in 1603 by the first Edo shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu. The period ended with the Meiji Restoration, the...
(1603-1868) in which the Tokugawa ruled.
Yoshitsune Shin-Takadachi, written by Ki no Kaion and first performed in 1719, over a century after the events of the siege of Osaka, is said to have been the first play to successfully allude to these events without being ended by the official censors.
Background
Like many
jōruri and
kabukiis the highly stylized classical Japanese dance-drama. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate make-up worn by some of its performers....
plays,
Yoshitsune Shin-Takadachi was not an original narrative, but rather was based on an established series of stories, situations and characters already familiar to the audience, known as a
sekai (lit. "world"). It is one of a great many stories and plays centering on the 12th century samurai commander Minamoto no Yoshitsune, younger brother of Shogun Minamoto no Yoritomo. A conflict arose between the brothers over suspicions that Yoshitsune, who led the
Minamoto clanwas one of the honorary surnames bestowed by the Emperors of Japan of the Heian Period on those of their sons and grandsons who were not considered eligible for the throne. The Taira were another such offshoot of the imperial dynasty...
to victory in the
Genpei WarThe was a conflict between the Taira and Minamoto clans and in late-Heian period Japan. It resulted in the fall of the Taira clan and establishment of the Kamakura shogunate under Minamoto Yoritomo in 1192....
and thus allowed Yoritomo to gain power and become shogun, sought to overthrow his brother. The former was forced to flee
Kyotois a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area....
, and sought refuge in the Takadachi fortress in
Hiraizumiis a town located in Nishiiwai District, Iwate, Japan. It was the home of the Hiraizumi Fujiwaras for about 100 years in the late Heian era and most of the following Kamakura period. At the same time it served as the de facto capital of Oshu, an area containing nearly a third of the Japanese land...
, far to the north. He was soon attacked there by his brother's shogunal forces, defeated, and forced to commit
seppukuis a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. Seppuku was originally reserved only for samurai. Part of the samurai honor code, seppuku was used voluntarily by samurai to die with honor rather than fall into the hands of their enemies, as a form of capital punishment for samurai who have...
.
Allusions are made in the play to the 1615 siege of Osaka, in which
Tokugawa Ieyasu
led shogunal forces against
Toyotomi HideyoriToyotomi Hideyori , 1593 - June 5, 1615, was the son and designated successor of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the general who first united all of Japan. His mother, Yodo-dono, was the niece of Oda Nobunaga....
, who had been gathering forces to oppose the shogunate, and who represented the last major opposition to Tokugawa supremacy. Several decades earlier, prior to the end of the 16th century, Ieyasu had been a vassal of Hideyori's father
Toyotomi Hideyoshiwas a daimyo in the Sengoku period who unified Japan. He succeeded his former liege lord, Oda Nobunaga, and brought an end to the Sengoku period. The period of his rule is often called the Momoyama period, named after Hideyoshi's castle. He is noted for a number of cultural legacies, including the...
, and had sworn oaths to serve the Toyotomi and to ensure Hideyori's succession to power. Following Hideyoshi's death in 1598, however, he betrayed his oaths and seized power for himself. The ban on relating these events onstage therefore derived not only from a general aversion to depictions of the honorable, high-class shogunate in the low-class world of the theatres, but also from a fear of the threat posed to the shogunate's power and stability by accusations of Ieyasu's disloyalty and betrayal.
Characters
Strong allusions are made throughout the play to comparisons between the 12th century figures of the tale and those (absent from the play) who took part in the siege of Osaka. Each character is given here with their 17th century counterpart in parentheses.
- Minamoto no Yoritomo
was the founder and the first shogun of the Kamakura Shogunate of Japan. He ruled from 1192 until 1199.-Early life and exile :Yoritomo was the third son of Minamoto no Yoshitomo, the heir of the Minamoto clan, and his official wife, a daughter of Fujiwara no Suenori, who was a member of the...
(Tokugawa Ieyasu
)
- Minamoto no Hideyori (Toyotomi Hideyori
Toyotomi Hideyori , 1593 - June 5, 1615, was the son and designated successor of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the general who first united all of Japan. His mother, Yodo-dono, was the niece of Oda Nobunaga....
)
- Gonnotō Kanefusa (Katagiri Katsumoto
' was a Japanese samurai of the Azuchi–Momoyama period through early Edo period who was famed as one of the Seven Spears of Shizugatake. By the start of the Edo period, his family's holdings had settled around Tatsuta han in Yamato Province.. Katagiri served under Toyotomi Hideyori, later betrayed...
)
- Izumi no Saburō (Sanada Yukimura
was a Japanese samurai, second son of the Sengoku period daimyo Sanada Masayuki . His proper name was Sanada Nobushige , named after Takeda Shingen's younger brother Takeda Nobushige , who was a brave and respected warrior. He and his father were known as being excellent military tacticians...
)
- Kamei no Rokurō (Kimura Shigenari
' was a Japanese samurai of the early Edo period. A retainer of the Toyotomi clan, Shigenari fought at the Siege of Osaka and died in battle.-References:...
)
- Kataoka no Hachirō (Gotō Mototsugu
, also known as , was a samurai of the late Sengoku through early Edo periods. He served Kuroda Yoshitaka but retired from the Kuroda clan after Kuroda Yoshitaku had died...
)
- Kyō no Kimi/Shizuka Gozen
Shizuka Gozen , or Lady Shizuka, one of the most famous women in Japanese history and literature, was a shirabyōshi of the 12th century, and a mistress of Minamoto no Yoshitsune...
(Yodo-Donoor was a prominently-placed figure in late-Sengoku period. She was a concubine and second wife of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who was then the most powerful man in Japan. She also became the mother of his son and successor, Hideyori. She was also known as Lady Chacha （茶々）. After the death of...
)
Summary
The plot of the play, while making reference to the actual 12th century historical events, and to a number of other narratives in the Yoshitsune
sekai, also parallels in many ways aspects of the historical events of the siege of Osaka.
After arriving at Takadachi, Yoshitsune sends three messengers to his brother, to seek reconciliation. These parallel the three envoys sent to Ieyasu from Osaka in 1614. Yoshitsune's envoys explain that he and his followers are guilty of three crimes, and wish to seek forgiveness.
The first crime refers to an event in which Yoshitsune and his loyal retainer, the monk Benkei, disguise themselves as monks gathering alms for the rebuilding of the
Tōdai-ji, is a Buddhist temple complex located in the city of Nara, Japan. Its Great Buddha Hall , the largest wooden building in the world, houses the world's largest statue of the Buddha Vairocana, known in Japanese simply as Daibutsu . The temple also serves as the Japanese headquarters of the Kegon...
, destroyed in the 1180
siege of NaraThe Siege of Nara was a battle of the Genpei War in which the former Japanese imperial capital of Nara was attacked, and much of it destroyed, by samurai of the Taira clan....
, in order to sneak past the guard barrier at Ataka. To prove their identities as monks, the pair are asked to show a subscription list of those who have already donated. Benkei's improvisation of a false list is claimed as the second crime. This event is also depicted in the
Noh, or is a major form of classical Japanese musical drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Many characters are masked, with men playing both the male and female roles. The repertoire is normally limited to a specific set of historical plays...
play
AtakaAtaka is a Noh play written in 1465, during the Muromachi Era of Japan by playwright Kanze Nobumitsu.It has been remade into a Kabuki play called Kanjinchō and a movie called Tora no o wo fumu otokotachi by Kurosawa Akira.-Synopsis:...
, and the later
kabukiis the highly stylized classical Japanese dance-drama. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate make-up worn by some of its performers....
play
KanjinchōKanjinchō is a Japanese kabuki play by Namiki Gohei III, based on the Noh play Ataka. It is one of the most popular plays in the modern kabuki repertory....
.
Benkei's reading of the blank scroll includes the phrase "We request the help of many people to bring virtue to our country's court," a reference to the army Yoshitsune seeks to raise against his brother, and also in parallel to the forces gathered by Hideyori against the Tokugawa. The inclusion of the
charactersare the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana , katakana , Arabic numerals, and the occasional use of the Latin alphabet . The Japanese term kanji literally means "Han characters".- History :Chinese characters first came to Japan on...
yori (頼, "request") and
tomo (朝, "court"), that is, the characters of the shogun's name, Yoritomo, in this phrase also alludes to an incident between Hideyori and Ieyasu. Hideyori commissioned the casting of a temple bell for the
Hōkō-jiis a temple in Kyoto, Japan, dating from the 16th century. Toyotomi Hideyoshi determined that the capital city should have a Daibutsu temple to surpass that of Nara. He is reputed to have claimed at the outset that he would complete construction in half the time it took Emperor Shōmu to complete...
which included the characters
Ie and
yasu, split apart, in its inscription in a phrase which was said by the shogunate to have been treasonous. The third crime cited by the messengers is related: that of seeking to gather an army against the shogunate.
Yoritomo offers to reconcile with his brother if Yoshitsune fulfills one of three conditions; these conditions closely parallel those offered by Ieyasu to Hideyori. The first is that Yoshitsune (Hideyori) abandon his fortress to become lord of the western provinces. The second is that he submit to the shogunate as the other lords have done. The third is that Yoshitsune send his mistress to the capital as a hostage. In the original play, this was Kyō no Kimi, though other versions name Shizuka Gozen as the potential hostage; Hideyori was asked to surrender his mother,
Lady Yodoor was a prominently-placed figure in late-Sengoku period. She was a concubine and second wife of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who was then the most powerful man in Japan. She also became the mother of his son and successor, Hideyori. She was also known as Lady Chacha （茶々）. After the death of...
.
In the end, Yoritomo's shogunal army attacks Yoshitsune's fortress at Takadachi, paralleling the siege of Osaka by diverting the nearby Koromo River to flood the fortifications, and by inclusion of a temporary truce in the middle of the fighting. At Osaka, the Yodo River was diverted, and a significant break occurred in the fighting between winter and summer.
Success and spin-offs
Kaion's production was successfully performed without incident in 1719. In addition to employing the device known as
mitate, of substituting earlier figures and events for later ones, Kaion ensured that the play would be satisfactory to the censors by portraying Yoritomo, who represents Ieyasu, in a positive light. While Yoshitsune is indecisive, and his men disunited, Yoritomo is portrayed as a military genius, dedicated and noble.
The play was reworked and reproduced under a number of different titles over the ensuing decades, to varying levels of success.
Nanbantetsu Gotō Menuki, which changed the
sekai of the play from that of Yoshitsune to that of the 14th century
TaiheikiThe is a Japanese historical epic , written in the late 14th century. It deals primarily with the Nanboku-chō, the period of war between the [Northern Court]] of Ashikaga Takauji in Kyoto, and the Southern Court of Emperor Go-Daigo in Yoshino.-Original Work:The latest English translation consists...
(
Nanboku-chōThe , spanning from 1336 to 1392, was a period that occurred during the formative years of the Muromachi bakufu of Japan's history.During this period, there existed a Northern Imperial Court, established by Ashikaga Takauji in Kyoto, and a Southern Imperial Court, established by Emperor Go-Daigo in...
Wars), was written in 1735, but was never allowed to be published or performed. This was due in part to a scene in which an assassination attempt is made upon
Ashikaga Takaujiwas the founder and first shogun of the Ashikaga shogunate. His rule began in 1338, beginning the Muromachi period of Japan, and ended with his death in 1358. He was a descendant of the samurai of the Seiwa Genji line who had settled in the Ashikaga area of Shimotsuke Province, in present day...
, who represents Ieyasu.
Yoshitsune Shin-fukumi-jō (Yoshitsune's New Veiled Letter), created in 1744, was based very much on the original, but ended in a reconciliation between the brothers, dropping the siege scenes.
Yoshitsune Koshigoe-jō (Yoshitsune's Letter from Koshigoe), was produced ten years later in 1754, and incorporated elements of
Nanbantetsu, including the assassination scene of Act IV. This act was forbidden to be performed, and was not seen until 1770; the play was published in its entirely shortly afterwards, implying that it was also performed in its entirely on at least a few occasions.
External links
- The complete text of an 1891 printing can be seen at the National Diet Library
Established in 1948 for the purpose of assisting members of the in researching matters of public policy, the is the only national library in Japan. The library is similar in purpose and scope to the U.S...
Digital library: ttp://kindai.ndl.go.jp/BIBibDetail.php?tpl_wid=WBPL110&tpl_wish_page_no=1&tpl_select_row_no=1&tpl_hit_num=1&tpl_bef_keyword=&tpl_action=&tpl_search_kind=1&tpl_keyword=&tpl_s_title=&tpl_s_title_mode=BI&tpl_s_title_oper=AND&tpl_s_author=&tpl_s_author_mode=BI&tpl_s_author_oper=AND&tpl_s_published_place=&tpl_s_published_place_mode=ZI&tpl_s_published_place_oper=AND&tpl_s_publisher=&tpl_s_publisher_mode=ZI&tpl_s_publisher_oper=AND&tpl_s_nengou=AD&tpl_s_published_year_from=&tpl_s_published_year_to=&tpl_s_ndc=&tpl_s_ndc_mode=ZI&tpl_s_heading=&tpl_s_heading_mode=ZI&tpl_s_heading_oper=AND&tpl_s_toc=&tpl_s_toc_oper=AND&tpl_item_oper=AND&tpl_sort_key=TITLE&tpl_sort_order=ASC&tpl_list_num=20&tpl_s_jp_num=41003698]