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Battles, incidents, and historical events related to Japanese swords
24 events
March 2, 1657 (Meireki 3, 1st month, 18th–20th day of the lunisolar calendar; the fire lasted until about March 4)
A catastrophic fire on the 18th–20th days of the 1st month of Meireki 3 (March 2–4, 1657) that consumed much of Edo. The keep and main compounds of Edo Castle burned and the keep was never rebuilt. Damage to famous swords held by the shogunal house and daimyo families is also recounted, linking the fire to sword-history concepts such as fire-damaged blades, re-tempering, and "lost meibutsu."
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c. 1656 (Meireki 2)
In Meireki 2 (1656), Nagasone Kotetsu, a 50-year-old armorer, moved to Edo and shifted from armor-making to sword-smithing. It was a historic turning point that would later earn him recognition as the foremost swordsmith of the shintō period.
April 1, 1772 (Meiwa 9, 2nd month, 29th day)
On April 1, 1772 (Meiwa 9/2/29), a fire broke out at Daien-ji temple on the Gyōninzaka slope in Meguro, Edo. Dying down and flaring up again, it spread until the 1st day of the 3rd month and burned a wide area of Edo. The Great Meiwa Fire (also called the Meguro Gyōninzaka Fire), one of the largest fires in Edo's history with 14,700 dead, is thought to have dealt a blow to the swordsmiths working in Edo as well, and it occurred as the shintō period was giving way to the shinshintō period.
August 15–16, 1863 (Bunkyū 3, 7th month, 2nd–3rd day)
A war fought between the Satsuma domain and the British fleet in Kinko Bay on August 15–16, 1863 (Bunkyū 3/7/2–3). In response to seven British warships that arrived demanding reparations for the Namamugi Incident, the Satsuma artillery batteries opened fire. The British vessels burned Satsuma's steamships and bombarded the city, but Satsuma fiercely resisted and severely damaged the British warships. Through this conflict, Satsuma came to understand the futility of the expel-the-barbarians movement, improved relations with Britain, and shifted toward overthrowing the shogunate and pursuing modernization.
c. 1604 (Keichō 9), per tradition (based on the "Kokura Hibun," "Niten-ki," and other sources compiled after Musashi's death)
A legend holding that in 1604, Miyamoto Musashi fought a duel against the prestigious Yoshioka school of swordsmanship at Ichijōji Sagarimatsu in Kyoto. Tradition holds that Musashi single-handedly prevailed against several hundred disciples, but the account rests on commemorative sources compiled after Musashi's death, and its historicity is subject to scholarly doubt.
12th day of the 2nd month, Keichō 8 (1603)
On the 12th day of the 2nd month of Keichō 8 (March 24, 1603), Tokugawa Ieyasu was appointed Sei-i Taishōgun and established the shogunate in Edo. The consolidation of power, achieved about two years after the Battle of Sekigahara, laid the foundation for the Edo period, which lasted more than 260 years. Through the organization of the bakuhan system, the enactment of the Buke Shohatto, and the legalization of the sankin-kōtai system, the warrior status and sword-fitting culture became highly institutionalized, and the Japanese sword evolved from a weapon into a symbol of samurai authority and beauty.
13th day of the intercalary 6th month, Keicho 20 (7 August 1615)
Issued by the Edo shogunate in the intercalary sixth month of 1615, just after the Summer Siege of Osaka, it ordered daimyo to dismantle all castles but their seat. Some 400 castles are said to have been razed, sharply reducing the number of castles.
Keicho 20 / Genna 1 (1615)
In 1615 the Toyotomi fell in the Summer Siege of Osaka, and the era name was changed from Keicho to Genna the same year. Called Genna Engu, 'the laying down of arms', it is regarded as the starting point of some 250 years of peace.
6th day of the 5th month, Keichō 20 (1615)
A battle on the 6th day of the 5th month of Keichō 20 (1615) in the Summer Campaign of Ōsaka, fought near Dōmyōji and Konda in Kawachi Province between the Toyotomi army and the Tokugawa Yamato column. Gotō Mototsugu and Susukida Kanesuke, who had gone ahead, were killed, and Sanada Nobushige covered the retreat.
13th day of the 4th month, Keichō 17 (1612), according to the Niten Ki (disputed)
On the 13th day of the 4th month of Keichō 17 (May 13, 1612), Miyamoto Musashi and Sasaki Kojirō fought a one-on-one duel on Ganryūjima Island in Buzen Province. Musashi emerged victorious in the most celebrated single combat in Japanese history.
4th day of the 3rd month – 4th day of the 4th month, Keichō 14 (1609) — from the fleet's departure at Yamakawa to the surrender of Shuri Castle
In 1609, a force of roughly 3,000 troops led by Kabayama Hisataka, acting on the orders of Satsuma domain lord Shimazu Iehisa, invaded the Ryukyu Kingdom. Departing from Yamakawa Harbor, they sailed via Amami Ōshima, Tokunoshima, and Okinoerabujima to land at Unten Harbor, forcing the surrender of Shuri Castle and King Shō Nei. Ryukyu subsequently entered a dual subordination to both Japan and China that lasted until the end of the shogunate.
c. 1606 (Keichō 11)
First-generation Yasutsugu receives the name "Yasutsugu" and permission to use the triple hollyhock crest from Tokugawa Ieyasu, establishing the symbolic status of Edo sword craftsmanship.
7th month, Keian 4 (1651)
In 1651 (Keian 4), a group of rōnin led by the military strategist Yui Shōsetsu and the spearmanship master Marubashi Chūya attempted an abortive coup to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate. Seeing opportunity in the death of the third shogun Iemitsu and the succession of the young Ietsuna, they plotted an uprising, but it was exposed in advance through an informant. Shōsetsu took his own life at Sunpu, and Chūya was executed by crucifixion. The affair exposed the destitution of the masterless samurai produced in the age of peace and prompted a reform of shogunal policy toward the rōnin.
December 26, 1634 (Kan'ei 11, 11th month, 7th day)
On the 7th day of the 11th month of Kan'ei 11 (1634), at Kagiya no Tsuji in Ueno in Iga Province (present-day Iga City, Mie Prefecture), the swordsman Araki Mataemon assisted his brother-in-law Watanabe Kazuma against the party of Kawai Matagorō, the enemy of Kazuma, and Kazuma cut down Matagorō. Counted among the Three Great Vendettas of Japan, it was the largest duel of the Edo period, and Araki Mataemon's outstanding swordsmanship and courage became legend.
An'ei 3 (1774) – Bunsei 8 (1825)
Suishinshi Masahide (1750–1825), who was taken into service by the Akimoto family, lords of Yamagata domain, in An'ei 3 (1774) and forged swords in Edo, criticized the ostentation and formalism of the sword world of his time. He proposed the fukkotō-ron (the doctrine of reviving the swords of old), which held that Japanese swords should return to the ways of the kotō era. Through works such as Tōken Jitsuyōron and Kenkō Hidenshi, he called for a return to the Kamakura and Nanboku-chō styles of kotō, and more than 100 disciples from across the country gathered at his workshop. His theories were carried on by his disciple Taikei Naotane and others, and Masahide, Naotane and Minamoto Kiyomaro are together called the 'Edo Sansaku' (Three Masters of Edo). The movement dramatically revived the declining culture of Japanese swords. Positioned as the watershed between shintō (new swords) and shinshintō (new-new swords) in sword history, it combined with the sharp rise in sword demand of the bakumatsu period to produce a golden age of swords that lasted until the eve of the Haitōrei (Sword Abolishment Edict).
19th day of the 2nd month, Tenpō 8 (1837)
On March 25, 1837 (19th day of the 2nd month, Tenpō 8), Ōshio Heihachirō, a former aide of the Osaka East Magistrate's office, led an uprising in Osaka under the banner of saving the people. As the largest city revolt of the Edo period, it profoundly influenced the late-shogunate loyalists.
1833-1838 (Tenpō 4 to Tenpō 9)
The Tenpō Famine, a large-scale famine that struck all of Japan from Tenpō 4 (1833) to Tenpō 9 (1838). Continued crop failures caused by cooling weather led to serious damage, especially in the Ōu region. Across Japan the population fell by about 1.25 million, and in Ōsaka it is said that from 150 to more than 200 people starved to death each day. Amid the social unrest caused by hunger, large-scale uprisings and rebellions such as the Ōshio Heihachirō Rebellion and the Tenpō Disturbance followed one after another, accelerating social turmoil toward the late Edo period. It was a grave incident that exposed the declining governing capacity of the Tokugawa shogunate and a fundamental crisis of the Edo-period system.
5th month, Tenpō 10 (1839) — the exact day of the arrests is not firmly established
In the 5th month of Tenpo 10 (1839) the shogunate arrested and punished the Western-learning scholars Watanabe Kazan, Takano Choei and others in an act of suppression of speech. Behind it lay criticism of the shogunate's policy of repelling foreign ships after the Morrison Incident of 1837, in Kazan's Shinkiron and Choei's Boshin Yume Monogatari, and the inspector Torii Yozo is said to have led the crackdown on the circle of Western-learning scholars, the Shoshikai. Kazan was placed under house confinement and Choei was sentenced to life imprisonment. The affair reveals a clash among warrior society, Western learning and shogunal politics.
September 5–8, 1864 (Genji 1/8/5–8)
A war fought from Bunkyū 3 to Genji 1 (1863–1864), in which the four-nation allied fleet of Britain, the United States, France, and the Netherlands launched a retaliatory attack on Shimonoseki after the Chōshū Domain fired on foreign ships. On September 5, 1864 (Genji 1/8/5), a 17-ship allied fleet subdued the Chōshū batteries in the Kanmon Strait with a concentrated bombardment, and the Chōshū forces suffered a crushing defeat. The war made the Chōshū Domain realize the impossibility of jōi (expelling foreigners), and it became a turning point toward the overthrow of the shogunate and the Meiji Restoration.
27th day of the 3rd month, Genji 1 (May 2, 1864) — rising at Mount Tsukuba; surrender in Echizen, 17th day of the 12th month, Genji 1 (January 14, 1865)
On the 27th day of the 3rd month of Genji 1 (May 2, 1864), the radical loyalist faction of Mito domain known as the Tengu-tō, led by Fujita Koshirō, raised an insurrection at Mount Tsukuba, clashing with shogunate forces and pro-shogunate domains. After a desperate march toward Kyoto under Takeda Kōunsai, the group surrendered at Tsuruga in Echizen Province; more than 350 members including Takeda Kōunsai were executed. The rebellion was the tragic denouement of the Mito school's expulsionist ideology played out in civil war within the domain that had originated it.
11th month, Kyōhō 4 (1719)
In the 11th month of Kyōhō 4 (1719), Honami Kōchū (?–1725), acting on the orders of Tokugawa Yoshimune (1684–1751), the eighth shogun of the Edo shogunate, compiled and presented the Kyōhō Meibutsuchō. This catalogue of famous blades systematically recorded 274 blades from the Heian period onward (168 extant blades, 80 lost blades, and 26 supplementary entries), together with their inscriptions, provenance, dimensions, and valuations. It was compiled during the Kyōhō Reforms of the Edo shogunate. It is still consulted today as an essential reference for sword research and remains a landmark project in the systematization of Japanese sword culture.
April 21, 1701 (Genroku 14) / Raid: January 30, 1703 (Genroku 15, 12th month, 14th day)
In 1701–1703, Lord Asano of Akō domain attacked Kira Yoshinaka in Edo Castle and was sentenced to seppuku. The following year, forty-seven loyal retainers led by Ōishi Kuranosuke avenged their lord by raiding Kira's mansion — Japan's most celebrated act of samurai loyalty.
December 11, 1637 – April 12, 1638 (Kan'ei 14, 10th month, 25th day – Kan'ei 15, 2nd month, 28th day)
In Kan'ei 14–15 (1637–1638), Christian peasants of Shimabara in Hizen Province and Amakusa in Higo Province rose against the shogunate with Amakusa Shirō Tokisada as their leader. About 37,000 people shut themselves up in Hara Castle and were crushed after fierce fighting against a shogunate army of 120,000. It was the largest uprising of the Edo period and the event that sealed the policy of national seclusion.
1601 (Keicho 6): instructor to Hidetada; 21st day of the 3rd month, 1621 (Genna 7): instructor to Iemitsu
Yagyu Munenori became sword instructor to the second shogun Tokugawa Hidetada in 1601 and to the third shogun Iemitsu in 1621, establishing Yagyu Shinkage-ryu as the shogunal house style; he later rose to daimyo rank.