Uwajima Castle

Uwajima Castle (宇和島城, Uwajima-jō) is a hirayama-jiro Japanese castle located in the city of Uwajima, Ehime, Japan. An alternate name for this castle is Tsurushima-jō. The castle is one of twelve Japanese castles to still have its historical tenshu. It has been protected as a National Historic Site since 1937.

Uwajima Castle is located on a hill at the center of the city of Uwajima in southern part of former Iyo Province. It was originally built on the seashore, with the ocean forming a natural moat on three sides; however, due to land reclamation it is now in the center of the city. During the Heian period, Uwajima (notably the island of Hiburijima in Uwajima Bay) was center of piracy in the Seto Inland Sea and became the stronghold of Fujiwara no Sumitomo in his rebellion. In 941 Tachibana Tachibana, a guard envoy, set up a fort in this area when suppressing the rebellion, and named the fortification "Itashima Marugushi Castle".

During the Muromachi period, a branch of the Saionji family was appointed as governor of the area by the Ashikaga shogunate, but was constantly being invaded his more powerful and aggressive neighbors. The Saionji survived by the fluid loyalties and fierce resistance, but were eventually overcome by Chōsokabe Motochika, who was in turn overthrown by the forces of Toyotomi Hideyoshi.

Iyo Province was given to Kobayakawa Takakage, who assigned the area around Uwajima to his adopted son and half-brother, Hidekane. Takakage was later transferred to Kyushu and was replaced by Hideyoshi's general Toda Katsutaka, who expanded on the minor fortification, transforming it into a Sengoku period castle. Toda, who ruled with extreme harshness, went insane and died during the invasion of Korea without heir. Hideyoshi then assigned Tōdō Takatora to the domain. A noted castle designer, Takatora spent six years re-building the castle, starting in 1601. In 1604 he moved the tenshu of Kagomori Castle to Uwajima Castle and made it the castle's Tsukimi Yagura.

Tōdō Takatora retained the original layout of the castle, which had an oblong inner bailey measuring 30 by 100 meters, with the tenshu in the center of the southern portion. He added stone walls and expanded on the surrounding secondary enclosures, adding fortified gate and water moats.

Text adapted from “Uwajima Castle” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Uwajima Castle ranks #1,120 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #55 of the 297 mapped in Japan. Founded 1601, it is older than 32% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 580 atlas entries founded in the 17th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 5,436 times in the last 60 days, more than 85% of the atlas. It is one of the 15 landmarks on the atlas's regional map of Shikoku. See how Japan compares in the castle statistics.

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