Who Is Asakura Yoshikage (Asakura Saemon-no-kami)?
The Echizen lord who lost Ichijodani
Asakura Saemon-no-kami Yoshikage
Asakura Yoshikage was a Warring States lord who ruled Echizen (today's northern Fukui Prefecture) and the last head of the Asakura clan, which flourished at its base in Ichijodani. He fought Nobunaga for years and, together with Azai Nagamasa, gave him serious trouble, but he was destroyed in 1573.
Those who fought Nobunaga at Kanegasaki in Episode 7 and Anegawa in Episode 8 were mainly his kinsmen and retainers; at Anegawa, Asakura Magosaburo (Kagetake) led the army. In Episode 10, chased by Nobunaga, he abandons Ichijodani and flees, then takes his own life when his kinsman Kageakira betrays him. On New Year's Day of the following year, his head, decorated with gold, is brought out at a banquet.
During his wandering years, Ashikaga Yoshiaki turned to Yoshikage before Nobunaga, but Yoshikage didn't move his army toward Kyoto. The remains of his town survive in Fukui City today as the Ichijodani Asakura Family Historic Ruins, showing what a castle town of the time was like.
