Report: November 2024 Research Trip to Saga Prefecture

In December 2024 a research team of the THRG (F.T. and G.K.) went on a mission to Saga Prefecture to photograph a set of 19 transmission documents kept at the Saga Prefectural Nagoya Castle Museum (肥前名古屋城特別史跡). The documents, probably dating to the end of the 18th or the beginning of the 19th century, proved to be a set of beautifully illustrated hand-made copies of older scrolls from the mid-1600s.

Afterwards, the team passed through Momonokawa (桃川) – burial place of Nakano Jinuemon Kiyoakira (中野神右衛門清明; 1556-1621), the great-grandfather of Nakano Shūmei (中野就明; 1659-1730) and grandfather of Yamamoto Jōchō (山本常朝; 1659-1719), as well as through the Okawachiyama (大河内山) – the “village of secret kilns” whose governor he was during the time of Lord Nabeshima Naoshige (鍋島直茂; 1537–1619). All these people and places are connected to the Takeo-Saga-Taku line of Taisha-ryū which produced the Taisha-ryū Unravelling the Cords (Taisha-ryū Kaichū; タイ捨流解紐).

Passing through the town of Taku (多久市), the team also paid a visit to Ennō-ji temple (円応寺) in Takeo City (武雄市). At the temple there is a stone monument dedicated to casualties of the Shimabara Rebellion (島原の乱; 1637-8) on which the name of one Kijima Gyōuemon II. (木島形右衛門) – a master of the Kijima line of Hizen Taisha-ryū, can be found. Aside from that, the Kijima family tombs were also located within the grounds of Ennō-ji and a more thorough survey of them is planned for the future.Furthermore, a local publication by the Takeo City History Research Association stored at the City Library provided invaluable information on the genealogy and history of the four Kijima shihanke who were masters after the time of Marume Kurando, the founder of Taisha-ryū.

Paralelly, another team (Y.T. and U.E.) went to the Nagasaki Prefectural Library (長崎県立図書館), where they took photographs of an important Shinkage-ryū transmission document connected with the early years of Taisha-ryū in that area. Later on, a lengthy stay by G.K. at the National Diet Library in Tokyo was done in order to copy more than 400 pages of otherwise inaccessible relevant secondary sources.

G.K. & A.A.