From the North
Hirosaki, Matsumae, Ezo and the road to Hokkaido
Daito ryu practitioners are often told tales of Aizu. Oral tradition tells us Daito ryu migrated to the region from Kai province with a surviving member of the Takeda clan. There, it remained dormant or hidden from prying eyes. Only centuries later, well into the Meiji era, would Sokaku Takeda sensei open the tradition and its teachings.
But.
Sokaku sensei had already spent some time in the northern part of the country by the time we see the first historical traces of public teaching emerge. He’s said to have first traveled to Hokkaido in 1887, and by 1891 he was back on the road, presumably the majority of the time in the northern regions; the first entries in the eimeiroku, his personal ledgers, start around 1898, and from there, we can trace his travels with great accuracy. He would spend the next twelve years bouncing around the northern prefectures of the main island, and while he didn’t officially move to Hokkaido until 1910 he seldom left the north from then onward.
Taken altogether, the good majority of the second half of his life was spent in Hokkaido, and nearly all of it was spent north of Fukushima prefecture — where Aizu once was.
In that sense, it’s rather surprising how rarely the topic of the northern regions — and of Hokkaido in particular — is brought up. After all, not only must there have been some bidirectional influences, but the sheer popularity Daito ryu would gain in those regions (again, in Hokkaido especially), which in turn would create the legacy we know today, seems to call for an examination of their history and how it might have contributed to the tradition’s eventual explosion in popularity.
So today, let’s have a look at the history of the north in general, and of Hokkaido more specifically. We’ll try to identify how these regions might have influenced or otherwise impacted the tradition over time. While speculative in nature, this effort should still help us get a better understanding of the microcultural context in which Daito ryu came to relative proeminence during the early 20th century. If anything, it might help us enrich our understanding of other recorded facts and events about the tradition.
Quick history
Fun fact: Found in *a lot* of Hokkaido place names, the suffix “-betsu” (often rendered as 別 in kanji) comes from the Ainu word (suffix?) for river. So this river in Asahikawa, Chuubetsugawa (“kawa” being Japanese for river), is the Chiu (Choppy) River River.
Source: https://twitter.com/am_kaz/status/1574191118463356929
Numerous locations, mountains, and rivers surrounding Abashiri, Kitami, Engaru, and Shirataki are suffixed with the term “betsu”. Many major students of Takeda Sokaku sensei with lineages still in existence today come from this very region alone (the remaining mostly connected either through Sapporo or Asahikawa — two cities also in Hokkaido). It’s also in this area that Ueshiba Morihei sensei, would first encounter Sokaku sensei and establish a settlement for a time.
It’s rather impressive. Not only does Aikido find its inception point (so to speak) in that limited region, but at least three of the major Daito ryu lineages still active today do as well!
Yet, Hokkaido was only colonized by Japanese people relatively recently, with settlement efforts going into full swing from the Meiji era onward. Until then, most of the northern island — then known as Ezo— was mostly populated by the Ainu (also known as the people of Ezo), the other people indigenous to Japan.
The Japanese government during the 19th and 20th centuries denied the rights of the Ainu to their traditional cultural practices, most notably the right to speak their language, as well as their right to hunt and gather. These policies were designed to fully integrate the Ainu into Japanese society with the cost of erasing Ainu culture and identity. […] Intermarriage between Japanese and Ainu was actively promoted by the Ainu to lessen the chances of discrimination against their offspring.
Source: Wikipedia
Many of such areas with less-than-common Japanese names or readings were Ainu towns and settlements going as far back as the 1600s. Historical notes of surveys of the time list these regions with slightly different pronunciations likely more closely based on the original spoken Ainu language. For instance, Yubetsu would be referred to as Yubechi, Tsubetsu would be referred to as Tsuhechi, and so on.
This doesn’t mean the island was entirely void of Japanese people (i.e. Yamato people) though. On both ends of the Tsugaru straight were domains of interest; on the main island was the Hirosaki domain (also known as the Tsugaru domain) and on the Hokkaido side the Matsumae domain.
Hokkaido, or at least the southernmost part, was granted to the Matsumae clan by Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1604. They were also given exclusive rights to engage in commerce with the Ainu in exchange for acting as the northern border peacekeepers. In reality, the Ainu were mostly seen as barbarians, and there must have been at least as much fighting as there was any sort of commerce. This doesn’t mean some positive relationships didn’t exist though; fishery, for instance, was done in collaboration with the Ainu until the industry was disrupted by commercial interests from the south. Such joint ventures probably helped in peacekeeping efforts by creating joint interests.
Alas, this all changed slowly with the Meiji era. Ezo was renamed to Hokkaido officially in 1869. With fish, wood, and minerals being abundant in the region, and with industrialization coming in full swing, commercial interests started to roll in. And with a growing sense of national pride showing up on the horizon, few cared for what might have been the Ainu’s birthright — not unlike what countless native people have suffered from all over the world through history. Along with that, state sponsored colonization of the island started, and gradually people from the south started to head north in hope of land and personal fortune.
It’s easy to imagine people already in relative proximity — namely, in Matsumae, Hirosaki, or other northern domains — seeing the times changing, and the potential opportunities for wealth in going further north. If anything, they would have been more accustomed than most to harsh weather conditions.
Regardless though, pretty much anyone who wished to explore the north would have to go through these two domains — or at least the past territories they occupied, given the domain system was abolished in 1873. This is relevant since many historical characters of Daito ryu — Sokaku sensei, Horikawa Taiso, Sagawa Nenokichi, and so on — would go through those regions on their trip towards the northern wilderness.
Which could be more significant than we might expect at first glance.
Takeda connections
The Matsumae clan, interestingly, descends from the Takeda of Wakasa in the southwest of the country — one of the cadet subbranches of the Takeda clan of Kai (through the Takeda clan of Aki; both Kai and Aki were lead by the same family head for some time before eventually being ) with Takeda Nobutake as a common ancestor.
And the Hirosaki domain isn’t without his loose historical ties to the Takeda either. Tsugaru Tamenobu, the first head of the Tsugaru domain, originally came from the Nanbu clan of Kai province. In fact, they descended from Takeda Yoshikiyo, a common ancestor to the Takeda of Kai. Interestingly enough, the Nambu clan itself was then in charge of the Morioka domain, where Horikawa Taiso (father to Horikawa Kodo) originally came from.
Obviously, the familial ties were very distant, but bloodline connections were still often greatly valued. And most bushi would have trained in martial arts to some degree, some eventually relying on said training to continue making a living post-Edo period. This probably created a rather welcoming environment for an unknown art from Aizu carried on by a descendant of the Takeda of Kai. At the very least, one can imagine how it might have piqued the curiosity of some.
It might also explain why Daito ryu densho include a full familial lineage the way they do — something quite particular when contrasting with how other traditions would generally do things. Takeda Yoshikiyo, for instance, is listed in this lineage, something that probably would have been at least noticed by anyone who served the Tsugaru clan given he was a common ancestor to that family. And while Takeda Nobutake is one of the names omitted from the lineage, he still can be found in extended lineages between Takeda Nobumitsu (written 信光) and Takeda Nobumitsu (written 信満). If anything, the former Nobumitsu (written 信光) would still have been well-known to the people associated with the Nanbu and Tsugaru clans.
If we believe the theory that the tradition was only formalized by Takeda Sokaku sensei during the 1890s (and the densho crafted in that era), and given his area of operation focused primarily on regions with past feudal lords historically connected to the Takeda of Kai, the inclusion of a full lineage might have helped garner some additional regional sympathy, and still would certainly have looked impressive to people less familiar with lineage matters.
The Boshin War and the Battle of Hakodate
Compounding this would have been the earlier connections with, and later arrival of, numerous people from Aizu. Many past retainers ended up north — either on Hokkaido or in the mainland’s northernmost area — once the war was done and lost.
During the Meiji Restoration, when Japan transitioned from shogunate to practical imperial rule, Aizuwakamatsu City, center of the then Aizu Domain, was one of the country’s last samurai strongholds where Aizu clan samurai remained loyal to the shogun until their defeat at the hands of imperial forces during the Boshin War in November 1868.
In defeat, senior clan members were exiled to the Shimokita Peninsula in Aomori Prefecture [Ed.: the other geographical proximity point of mainland to Hokkaido] and the new Meiji government ordered Aizuwakamatsu’s Tsuruga Castle to be razed to the ground.
Source: Samurai legacy source of pride, identity for residents of Aizuwakamatsu, Kyodo News
Not only that, but we know some people from Aizu went north to participate in some of the last battles of the war. For instance, the last battle Saigo Tanomo was involved in was the battle of Hakodate — then part of the Matsumae domain but taken over by runaway military units who tried to establish the Republic of Ezo (an independent country technically subservient to the Emperor but fighting against the rising political forces of the time).
Records suggest a total of 70 people from Aizu went on to fight in the battle of Hakodate as the Aizu Yugekitai (会津遊撃隊, or Aizu Commandos), lead by Suwa Tsunekichi (諏訪常吉).
Saigo Tanomo was not part of this group; he was appointed as a reserve officer of sort, a position known as Yakuingai Esadzume (役員外江差詰); this was probably done in an effort to keep experienced counselors and strategists focused on what they knew best. Conversely, his biological brother, Yamada Yojiro, served as an infantry officer within the Aizu Yugekitai. A book published by the Saigo Tanomo research group only refer to his rank as Sazuyaku (差図役), a rather vague and unspecific rank. This lack of clarity is probably due to the fact that the ranks were newly created in an effort to map with Western military structure (and often making up the terminology more or less on the fly).
旧幕府軍は陸軍と海軍に分かれ、以下のような組織となっていた。なお「列士満（レジマン）」と言うのは、フランス語で連隊を意味する Régiment をそのまま当て字にしたものである。
The former shogunate forces were divided into Army and Navy, and were organized into the following units. Note that the term rejiman [列士満] is imported from the French “Régiment”, meaning military regiment.
Source: Wikipedia
The Aizu Yugekitai met with some success early on at the battle of Matsumae castle, but would ultimately be driven to retreat to Hakodate castle, where they would meet their demise along the rest of the Ezo Republic’s forces — including hundreds of soldiers of the Matsumae domain, amongst others. The Republic failed, the battle was lost, and Saigo Tanomo ended up serving prison time. But not before the people of Aizu made display of their military might one last time.
All of the above— the distant familial ties, the exile up north of numerous Aizu retainers, the battle of Hakodate, the colonization efforts—all of this might just have ended up in the creation of a perfect background for Sokaku sensei’s travels.
As we’ve mentioned, Sokaku sensei would first make his way to Hokkaido around 1887. However, by 1888, he was back in Fukushima (Aizu-bangecho), got married, and had two children, a daughter in 1889 and a son in 1891. He however left soon after, and never seem to have ever truly returned afterward. His specific whereabouts until 1898 are somewhat unclear, but given nearly all records in the eimeiroku from 1898 onward detail travels in the northern region of the main island, it’s probably safe to assume his travels during this relatively undocumented period were also in that region as well. These travels appear to have continued until 1910, when he once more reached Hokkaido, and moved there semi-permanently. Travels outside of the northern island would be few and far between until the 1930s, and even there much of his travels were kept to the northern parts of the country. He would pass away in 1943, in Aomori prefecture.
Overall, he would spend nearly 50 years traveling and teaching in the north, and conservatively at least 20 exclusively on Hokkaido.
It’s rather amazing to ponder how purely circumstantial historical events might have contributed to or outright primed such an explosion of the art regionally, to the point the name of the tradition eventually reached the ears of avid martial arts practitioners much further south. Certainly, Sokaku sensei’s own travels must have greatly contributed, but it also seems hard to dismiss the apparent favorability of the local environment as well.
Classical martial arts
The regional martial arts of Matsumae and Hirosaki might also help explain some of the oft-reported ties of Sokaku sensei to certain specific arts — or at least the emphasis on those in historical writings.
A number of them have been frequently mentioned over the years.
- Ono-ha Itto ryu kenjutsu
- Jikishinkage ryu kenjutsu
- Shibukawa ryu jujutsu
- Hozoin ryu sojutsu (and the Takada-ha lineage in particular)
Putting aside whether Sokaku sensei truly practiced any or all of those arts to any serious level (some, for instance, suggest he held an Inka in Hozoin ryu and a Menkyo in Ono-ha Itto ryu — both licenses serving as the highest degree achievable in each respective art), the traditions themselves are of particular interest when considering the local traditions being practiced in the north prior to his arrival.
Ono-ha Itto ryu kenjutsu
One of the primary kenjutsu traditions of the Hirosaki domain.
Jikishinkage ryu kenjutsu
One of the primary kenjutsu traditions of the Matsumae domain.
Shibukawa ryu jujutsu
Not practiced in either domain. However, a jutte jutsu curriculum with historical roots to the tradition was taught in the Hirosaki domain as Shibukawa ryu jutte jutsu.
Hozoin ryu sojutsu
Various lineages were practiced in both domains. Hozoin ryu Takada-ha, for instance, was practiced in the Matsumae domain; the main lineage, in turn, was practiced in the Hirosaki domain.
This may further explain how Sokaku sensei might have been seen favorably within the regional classical martial arts community — or at least how he might have connected with some of the local practitioners early on. Additionally, it might explain why those particular traditions tend to be highlighted. Since the local audience had prior familiarity with them (and probably valued them), it would be natural they preferred to highlight those whenever providing recollections about Sokaku sensei’s stories of training.
Conclusion
While the history is interesting, I’ll be the first to admit that much the potential connections drawn in this article remain speculative and circumstantial.
Nevertheless, such background information is of crucial importance in developing an understanding of how Daito ryu became the tradition we know today, and how it ultimately reached us. As interesting as the oral legends of the times in Aizu might be, there is little left in lieu of historical material and hard facts to corroborate said stories. Chances are slim we’ll ever be able to extract more from them. However, much of the history of Iwate, Aomori, and Hokkaido (where Morioka, Hirosaki, and Matsumae were located respectively) can potentially help contextualize, if not corroborate, many of the recent stories about key figures in Daito ryu’s popularization.
This in turn might help us gain new perspectives on the culture of the tradition, which in turn might prove informative when thinking about our own training.
