Takahashi Jōun

Takahashi Jōun (1548-1586) was a military commander of Bungo who served the Ōtomo clan. He was a valiant general who, alongside Tachibana Dōsetsu, was called "the Twin Pillars of the Ōtomo." During the Shimazu army's invasion of Kyushu in 1586, he holed up in Iwaya Castle (present-day Dazaifu, Fukuoka Prefecture) with an overwhelmingly small force of 763 warriors, fought to the bitter end against tens of thousands of Shimazu troops, and met a heroic death at the end of a 13-day siege. Thanks to this valiant stand, the Shimazu army also suffered heavy losses and was delayed in its northward advance, and Tachibanayama Castle, defended by his son Tachibana Muneshige, held out until the Toyotomi army arrived to relieve it. His favored tachi is said to have been made by the swordsmith Niō Saburō Kiyotsuna of Suō, and he later passed it on to his second son, Takahashi Munemasu.