Battle of Shijōnawate

The Shogunate's Great Army Advancing on Kawachi

In Shōhei 3/Jōwa 4 (1348), Kusunoki Masatsura, who served Emperor Go-Murakami of the Southern Court, continued to resist the Muromachi shogunate from his base in Kawachi Province, carrying on the will of his late father, Masashige. More than ten years had passed since Masashige was killed in the Battle of Minatogawa in Engen 1 (1336). By then Masatsura had grown up to become head of the Kusunoki family, and from Shōhei 2 (1347) onward he raised troops one after another in Kii and Kawachi, defeating shogunate forces at Fujiidera and Sumiyoshi and gaining momentum. His victories, especially the defeat of Hosokawa Akiuji near Fujiidera in the 9th month of Shōhei 2 (1347) and of Yamana Tokiuji near Sumiyoshi in the 11th month of the same year, reached even Kyoto and caused deep alarm among Ashikaga Takauji and his brother Tadayoshi, who led the shogunate's government, and among Takauji's chief retainer, Kō no Moronao. At this time the shogunate was already divided by internal policy conflicts that would lead to the Kannō Disturbance, and the political situation was such that neither Takauji nor Tadayoshi could afford to leave the expansion of Southern Court forces unchecked.

Responding to this situation, the shogunate settled on a policy of directly attacking the Southern Court's base at Yoshino, and decided to dispatch a great army to Kawachi under its chief retainer, Kō no Moronao, as commander-in-chief. The first army, led by Moronao, is recorded with varying troop numbers across sources, but according to the Daigo Jizōin Diary it is put at roughly 10,000. It set up its main camp at Nozaki in Sarara District of Kawachi Province and also stationed a separate detachment on Mount Iimori to the east, forming a double line of defense. The second army, led by Moronao's brother Kō no Moroyasu, is said to have advanced toward Sakai in Izumi Province, establishing a posture to pincer the Southern forces from north and south. Masatsura's strength, by contrast, is recorded in the Taiheiki as more than 3,000 mounted warriors, but the prevailing view holds this to be an exaggeration typical of a narrative, and the actual number is thought to have been even smaller. Masatsura chose to fight in the open field despite the overwhelming disparity in numbers. It is thought that behind this decision lay the circumstance that, to defend Yoshino directly, there was no effective strategy other than halting the shogunate's great army at this stage.

Fierce Fighting from Nozaki to Kitashijō

On February 4, 1348 (Shōhei 3/1/5), the brothers Masatsura and Masatoki deliberately offered decisive battle despite their inferior strength. The area around Nozaki, where the two armies faced each other, was a narrow marshland largely enclosed on its west side by Fukono Pond, and Masatsura's forces are said to have taken advantage of this terrain to attempt a surprise attack on Moronao's main camp. In the opening phase the Southern forces gained the upper hand, and it is also said that at one point they cut their way almost to Moronao's main camp. However, a shogunate detachment stationed on Mount Iimori to the east responded and sortied against their flank, and the course of the battle was transformed. Though caught in a pincer, Masatsura's forces pushed Moronao's army back from Nozaki as far as Kitashijō, but without delivering a decisive blow, their front stretched thin and they gradually lost men.

Masatsura nonetheless continued to fight valiantly, but after sustaining a grievous wound, and resolving that the end had come, he and his younger brother Masatoki are said to have taken their own lives by stabbing each other. Masatsura's head, taken at Kitashijō, was exposed at the Rokujō riverbed in Kyoto on the following day, the 6th day of the 1st month. In this battle the Southern forces are said to have lost, beginning with Masatsura and Masatoki, 27 members of the clan and senior retainers, and to have suffered several hundred dead, including ordinary foot soldiers. On the other hand, the records state that shogunate losses were limited to a few men, including Ueyama Takamoto, Hosokawa Yoriyuki, and Hosokawa Yoshiharu, and the battle ended in an overwhelming victory for the shogunate's army in both troop strength and casualties. The Taiheiki, which records the course of the battle, describes in detail Masatsura's valiant fighting and the grim intensity of his last moments. This scene laid the groundwork for it to be passed down in later ages in various forms, including kabuki, kōdan storytelling, and school songs (shōka).

The Fall of Yoshino and the Southern Court's Plight

As a result of the crushing defeat at Shijōnawate, the Southern Court's defensive line in Kawachi effectively collapsed. With the loss of Masatsura, the foremost young commander of the Southern Court, the core of organized resistance was gone, and the shogunate's army continued its advance into Yamato with almost no opposition. Late in the 1st month of Shōhei 3 (1348), the temporary palace at Yoshino, the Southern Court's base, finally fell to the shogunate's attack, and Emperor Go-Murakami was forced to flee to the temporary palace at Anō (present-day Gojō, Nara Prefecture). Having been driven out of Yoshino, the Southern Court was thereafter placed in an unstable state, moving from place to place for a long time, and the defeat at Shijōnawate marked the starting point of this.

The Kusunoki family, which had served since the time of Masashige, had formed the core of the Southern Court's military strength with Kawachi and Izumi as its bases. However, through the double blow of the deaths of Masatsura and Masatoki and the loss of Yoshino, the Southern Court's power and prestige receded sharply from this battle onward. The defeat at Shijōnawate was not merely a regional battle. It is also regarded as one of the turning points that decided the Northern Court's advantage, leading to the power struggle within the shogunate (the Kannō Disturbance) that came to the surface from Shōhei 3 into the following year. Ironically, Kō no Moronao, whose prestige was greatly enhanced by this victory, soon sharpened his conflict with Tadayoshi's faction, and in the midst of the Kannō Disturbance met a tragic end.

What Kusunoki Masatsura Left Behind

Before setting out for Shijōnawate, Masatsura is said to have carved a death poem with an arrowhead on the wall boards of the Nyoirin-dō at Yoshino. The poem reads: kaerajito kanete omoeba azusayumi naki kazu ni iru na o zo todomuru. Together with the parting at Sakurai (the scene in which Masashige gave Masatsura instruction before setting out for Minatogawa), this anecdote was widely passed down in later ages as a story symbolizing the loyalty of the Kusunoki father and son. In the Edo period and afterward, with the veneration of the Kusunoki, and amid the rising Meiji-era advocacy of the Southern Court's legitimacy, Masatsura's reputation grew even higher. At the foot of Mount Iimori, near the Kusunoki-zuka, said to be Masatsura's grave, Shijōnawate Shrine, enshrining Masatsura as its principal deity, was founded in 1890 (Meiji 23). Today, in the area of Daitō and Shijōnawate in Osaka Prefecture, Masatsura's grave and monuments to the old battlefield still dot the landscape, and the city name "Shijōnawate" also derives from Shijōnawate Shrine, which is named after this battle.

In modern times, this battle has been repeatedly taken up in history education and literary works, not only as a story of loyalty but also as an event symbolizing the Nanboku-chō turmoil, a great turning point in Japanese history.

Sources on the Battle and Its Legacy

The most detailed source transmitting the course of the Battle of Shijōnawate to the present day is the Taiheiki, and its scenes from Masatsura's departure to his final moments are known as among the most celebrated passages in that work. However, because the Taiheiki contains a great deal of embellishment as a war chronicle, the position of recent scholarship is that the details of troop numbers and fighting must be checked against contemporary records such as the Entairyaku, the Daigo Jizōin Diary, and the Aso Documents in order to uncover the real picture. Even so, regarding the broad outline, that Masatsura with a small force challenged the shogunate's great army and met a grim end, multiple sources agree, and the historical framework remains unshaken.

In the modern era, the Battle of Shijōnawate came to be given a special place within the imperial-nationalist view of history, which treated the Southern Court as legitimate, rather than being regarded merely as one medieval battle. Masashige and Masatsura, father and son, were both called Dai-Nankō and Shō-Nankō. Together with the Meiji government's establishment of the theory of Southern Court legitimacy, they were repeatedly featured as symbols of loyalty to the sovereign and love of country in school education and state-authorized textbooks. The founding of Shijōnawate Shrine was also realized against this historical background, and among local people, festivals commemorating Masatsura continue to this day. After the war, the historical view itself was reexamined, but the historical assessment that the Battle of Shijōnawate was an important battle that influenced the outcome of the Nanboku-chō turmoil remains unshaken even in current academic research.

Today, historic sites connected with the Battle of Shijōnawate are widely distributed across Daitō and Shijōnawate in Osaka Prefecture. Through the Kusunoki-zuka, said to be Masatsura's grave, stone monuments erected at the site of the decisive battle, and Shijōnawate Shrine, the memory of the Nanboku-chō period is carefully passed down within the local community. Many worshippers visit the annual festival, and ceremonies commemorating the loyalty of the brothers Masatsura and Masatoki continue to be held.