This design is taken from the period of civil war which preceded the unification of Japan.
In 1564,the military leader Oda Nobunaga(1534-1582) was besieging the Saito clan in their
castle on Inaba Mountain,near Gifu in central Japan. The momentum of Nobunaga's campaign
had been checked by the well-guarded castle, which seemed imprignable. Nobunaga's young
lieutenant, Toyotomi Hideyohsi, learned of an unguarded route into the cstle complex and
planned a daring assault, for which he chose six of his best men. Tying food around their
waists and water-gourds on their backs, they arranged that as soon as they were inside the
castle they would raise the gourds high above the walls on bamboo poles as a signal for
the troops outside to attack.
Hideyoshi and his men set off late in the afternoon of the thirteenth day of the eighth
month, a date indicating an almost full moon. The approach was long and difficult, culminating
in a perpendicular cliff. This they scaled by the light of a moon so bright that "every bamboo
leaf was clearly visible."Tha plan went smoothly and the castle was taken. The story of
Hideyoshi's gourds was a famous one, which Yoshitoshi had illustrated before in a triptych of 1877.
Large size= 10,500 yen
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