Okinawa...Three Rival Chieftains

 A CENTURY OF CONFLICT

1314-1398

THREE RIVAL CHIEFTAINS BID FOR CHINESE RECOGNITION

Tamagusuku was only nineteen years of age in 1314 when he succeeded his father as paramount chief or king among the territorial lords on Okinawa. The administration fell into confusion; he could not command the loyalty and respect of his principal officers. Disputes at Urasoe soon led to open rebellion.

The Lord of Ozato left Urasoe and retired to his own castle on a high bluff about ten miles south of Urasoe and a little to the southeast of the present-day fishing port of Itoman. His retainers and associates controlled all of southern Okinawa. Each had his own stronghold on a rocky hilltop, from which the surrounding farms and woodland could be controlled. Today the broken walls of these enclosures may be traced at many sites, a number of them scattered over the rolling countryside which became the last battleground of World War II. Ozato Castle was the largest of these. Little is left of it; a modern primary school stands within the stone walls of the inner court. Nothing remains of the ancient residential buildings, and the wellsprings which supplied it are choked and overgrown. Tradition says that a deep inlet from the sea at one time reached to the base of the bluff and the walls, bringing to the very gates of the castle trading ships and fishing craft. The food-producing farm villages lay to the south and east.

Here the Lord of Ozato now declared himself to be King of Nanzan. Despite its territorial limitations and the poverty of its resources, his principality was destined to endure for a century, sustained by the ambitions of seafaring merchants, the boldness and persistence of its chieftains, and the fortunate location of the castle.

Meanwhile, far to the north of Urasoe, in the mountainous isolation of Motobu Peninsula, the Lord of Nakijin Castle likewise declared himself independent of Tamagusuku. His territories and the territories of the less important anji who were associated with him comprised a district far greater in extent than either the lands left to Tamagusuku or the territory controlled by the self-styled King of Nanzan. This northern principality was now called Hokuzan (Northern Mountain), a poor country, embracing many square miles of wild mountainous terrain, with few isolated valley areas and marginal fields between the steep hills and the sea. The farming and fishing settlements of Hokuzan were the most primitive on Okinawa. Land poverty and sparse settlement offset the advantages of extended territory. Even today the people of central Okinawa, who consider themselves more sophisticated, apply the term jambara to the people of northern Okinawa, a name which has some of the belittling connotation of the term "hillbilly" in American slang. They continue to be marked off by strong local dialect variations and by a significant number of curious everyday customs, habits, and traditions, enough to suggest the possibility of a strong differentiation in prehistoric times—perhaps even a different geographic and racial origin for the settlers who spread among these northern valleys and seaside coves.

At Nakijin itself a strong castle was erected on an isolated mountain outcropping. Back of it the land falls away steeply for a short distance, then rises toward the central mountain mass of Motobu. On the cast there is a precipitous drop into a stream-filled gorge. On the north and northwest the land slopes only a little less steeply toward the shore and a harbor inlet which at one time reached to the mountain foot. Unten Harbor lies approximately five and one-half miles to the east. Enough remains of the old castle- keep and its encircling defensive walls to give evidence of a relatively high degree of engineering in that age. The lord's residence occupied the innermost and highest enclosure. Here was a small, clear spring and a park or garden area. Service buildings and residences for important vassals were at a lower level, but within the principal walls. The remains of three shrines (uganju) stand at the crest of this eminence, overlooking the port-inlet below and the channel between Motobu and the Iheya-Izena islands. Much of the stonework is solid and massive, but it everywhere shows roughness and lack of fine cutting and precision fitting characteristic of castle walls and residential building in central and southern Okinawa of the same period.

Thus three small rival principalities came into being on Okinawa. The territory left to Tamagusuku became known as Chuzan (Central Mountain), which enjoyed the advantages of the most developed castle towns and harbor facilities and a measure of prestige derived from its history as the established source of authority. The lords of Chuzan, Hokuzan, and Nanzan were in fact not "kings" at all, but petty barons, each with his own retainers owing him direct service, and his own estates. Each had the allegiance of anji or lesser chieftains whose lands lay nearby. The anji in turn were masters of farming and fishing villages and of a body of retainers who bore arms and owed indirect service to the lords who lived in the castles at Urasoe. Nakijin, and Ozato. The lesser anji had castles of their own, but these for the most part were stockaded, thatch-roofed dwellings built on defensive hilltop positions from which the nearby agricultural villages could be controlled. We do not now know what feuds and alliances over the centuries had brought into being this division of Okinawa into three units.

The defection of the lords of Hokuzan and Nanzan meant a serious loss of revenue for Tamagusuku's government. Local lords in the outer islands were quick to take advantage of Chuzan's weakened authority and ceased sending tribute to Urasoe.

Tamagusuku died in the third month of 1336, leaving a child often years to succeed him. Then followed difficulties which have been experienced in many courts in many parts of the world; the young king's mother meddled in government affairs, abused her privileges and position of authority, and further alienated popular support for her son.....’ extract from " OKINAWA, The History of an Island People...Revised Edition, George H. Kerr (1958)