Who Is Lady Shizuka (Shizuka Gozen)?
The shirabyōshi dancer Yoshitsune loved
Shizuka
Lady Shizuka is the woman Minamoto no Yoshitsune deeply loved. She was famed as the finest shirabyōshi in Kyoto, a female performer of song and dance. Her mother, Iso no Zenji, was also a shirabyōshi.
When the Horikawa residence is attacked at night, she is the first to sense danger, wakes the sleeping Yoshitsune, and helps him into his armor. She follows him when he flees the capital, but they part in the snow on Mount Yoshino, and she is abandoned by her escorts and captured. Sent to Kamakura and ordered to dance before Yoritomo, she sings of her longing for Yoshitsune in front of his enemies: "Shizu ya shizu, shizu no odamaki kurikaeshi, mukashi o ima ni nasu yoshi mo gana" ("As thread winds round the spool again and again, if only I could turn the past back into the present"). The baby boy she bears Yoshitsune in Kamakura is put to death on Yoritomo's orders.
The place where she danced is said to be Tsurugaoka Hachimangū shrine in Kamakura, where events connected with Shizuka's dance are still held today.
Episodes featuring this character4
NEWEpisode 7
Assassins Came. The Hero Slept.The Night Raid at Horikawa (Shizuka Gozen)
Yoritomo sends the assassin Tosabō to kill his brother, and Yoshitsune accepts Tosabō's false oath because he wants so badly to trust his brother. That night, it is Lady Shizuka, the famous dancer, who senses danger first. She wakes him, straps him into his armor, holds up the lights in the dark, and finally sets the mansion ablaze to call Benkei and the others to the rescue.
19 pages
NEWEpisode 8
He Abandoned the Capital to Save ItThe Storm at Daimotsu Bay (Yoshitsune's Flight)
Hunted by his own brother, Yoshitsune refuses to turn the capital into a battlefield and flees west, setting sail from Daimotsu Bay. But a violent storm scatters his fleet, and only a handful are washed back to shore. Having lost everything, the survivors set out for Mount Yoshino.
19 pages
NEWEpisode 9
The Yoshitsune They Faced Wasn't HimMount Yoshino (Shizuka's Parting and Sato Tadanobu)
On snowbound Mount Yoshino, Yoshitsune decides to send Shizuka back to the capital to save her from the warrior monks hunting him. But the escorts she trusted abandon her in the snow, while on the same mountain Satō Tadanobu dons his lord's armor and name, and makes a lone stand among the cedars.
19 pages
NEWEpisode 11
She Sang of Him to the Men Hunting HimLady Shizuka's Dance at Tsurugaoka
Shizuka parted from Yoshitsune on a snowy mountain as he fled his brother Yoritomo. Now she is captured and sent to Kamakura. She refuses to say where Yoshitsune is, and the baby she gives birth to is taken from her. With only her dance and her pride left, she is ordered to dance at the shrine for Yoritomo and Masako. There, in the heart of enemy territory, she boldly sings of her longing for the man she loves.
19 pages