Azai Nagamasa

Drawing on parchment of Azai Nagamasa.

Azai Nagamasa was of the Azai clan of Omi. He was married to the sister of Oda Nobunaga, Oichi or lady Oichi. (Ichi.) (As part of a marriage alliance deal proposed by Nobunaga.)

He was famous as a leader, able to lead a smaller force to victory against a larger one. In his fist battle he overwhelmed the larger forces of the Rokkaku clan that had previous controled the Azai clan. The Azai soldiers asked his father Azai Hisamasa to step down to allow Nagamasa to lead the clan as the Azai Daimyo.

Oichi and Nagamasa were not allowed to live in peace. Her brother the Oda Daimyo Nobunaga declared war on Azai's ancient ally the Asakura clan, and thus with the prompting of his father Hisamasa the Azai clan went out to uphold their time-old alliance.

Nobunaga, who did not well tolerate betrayal made it a concerted effort to destroy Nagamasa. At Anegawa the smaller Azai clan saw great success against the larger Oda clan. With Nagamasa personally leading his clan to battle against the Oda. Similarly, Oda's ally the Tokugawa were greatly outnumbered by Azai's ally the Asakura. Tokugawa Ieyasu devastated the larger forces of Asakura Yoshikage. In the end the battle of Anegawa was a draw.

The Azai and Asakura would continue to fight the Oda with the campaign essentially being a stalemate, that is until the Asakura were isolated and defeated by the Oda. With the Asakura gone, Azai had no allies left to help him fight the Oda. Nobunaga Oda attacked the great Odani castle of Omi province in an all out attack. Nagamasa Azai and his men fought to the death. Whether he died in the fighting or took his own life is up to debate, Lady Oichi did live though, and was re-married to her original husband by Nobunaga, a general of Nobunaga Oda, Katsuie Shibata of the Shibata clan.

It is said that Nobunaga had the skulls of both Nagamasa and his father Hisamasa turned into gold plated cups. Such was the vengeance and disdain of Oda Nobunaga.

Justin Latimer 2011