Toyama Castle
Encyclopedia
Japanese castle
' were fortresses composed primarily of wood and stone. They evolved from the wooden stockades of earlier centuries, and came into their best-known form in the 16th century...
in Toyama city
Toyama, Toyama
is the capital city of Toyama Prefecture, Japan, located on the coast of the Sea of Japan in the Chūbu region on central Honshū, about 200 km north of the city of Nagoya and 300 km northwest of Tokyo....
, Toyama Prefecture
Toyama Prefecture
is a prefecture of Japan located in the Hokuriku region on Honshū island. The capital is the city of Toyama.Toyama is the leading industrial prefecture on the Japan Sea coast, and has the industrial advantage of cheap electricity due to abundant water resources....
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
. Built in 1543, the castle and its surrounding land is maintained by the government of Japan as a public park.
In 1581, Sassa Narimasa
Sassa Narimasa
, also known as Kura-no-suke , was a Japanese samurai of the Sengoku through Azuchi-Momoyama period. He became a retainer of Oda Nobunaga in 1550 and was granted Etchū Province as a reward for helping Shibata Katsuie fight the Uesugi clan. After Nobunaga's death, in 1584 he joined Tokugawa Ieyasu...
, a retainer of Oda Nobunaga
Oda Nobunaga
was the initiator of the unification of Japan under the shogunate in the late 16th century, which ruled Japan until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. He was also a major daimyo during the Sengoku period of Japanese history. His opus was continued, completed and finalized by his successors Toyotomi...
became lord of the castle. After the Honnoji Incident of 1585, there was a falling out between Sassa Narimasa and Hideyoshi, and Hideyoshi attacked the castle with 100,000 soldiers, destroying it. Maeda Toshinaga
Maeda Toshinaga
' was a Japanese daimyo who was the second head of the Kaga Domain. He was the eldest son of Maeda Toshiie and married one of Oda Nobunaga's daughters, Ei-hime....
later rebuilt the castle and temporarily used it as his retirement home until much of it burned down in 1609. In 1661 Maeda Toshitsugu
Maeda Toshitsugu
was a Japanese daimyo of the early Edo period, who ruled the Toyama Domain. He was the 2nd son of Maeda Toshitsune, the third lord of the Kaga Domain.-References:...
rebuilt the castle again and made it his home. His descendents ruled over Toyama from here until the Meiji Restoration
Meiji Restoration
The , also known as the Meiji Ishin, Revolution, Reform or Renewal, was a chain of events that restored imperial rule to Japan in 1868...
, when it was dismantled in 1870. Post-WWII, it was rebuilt as a modern concrete structure in 1954. Nowadays, the castle remains were renovated as the Toyama Castle Park, a place to relax and it is utilized as 富山市郷土博物館ーToyama Local History Museum, and 富山市佐藤記念美術館ーSato Memorial Museum, noted for its collection of utensils for Tea ceremony
Tea ceremony
A tea ceremony is a ritualised form of making tea. The term generally refers to either chayi Chinese tea ceremony, chado Japanese tea ceremony, tarye Korean tea ceremony. The Japanese tea ceremony is more well known, and was influenced by the Chinese tea ceremony during ancient and medieval times....
and antiques.