Qualla: Numazu Castle

Numazu Castle: Introduction

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Midori, CC BY 3.0. Where the foothills of Mount Fuji crowd down toward the Pacific, leaving only a narrow corridor between mountain and ocean, travelers on the Tokaido highway had no choice but to pass through Numazu. Whoever held this bottleneck at the northern tip of the Izu Peninsula controlled the main artery between Kyoto and Edo. Takeda Shingen understood this when he built a fortress here in the Sengoku period. The Tokugawa shogunate understood it when it stationed the Mizuno clan here for eight generations. And the Meiji government understood it well enough to tear the whole thing down in 1873, fill in the moats, and sell off the land. Today, a small park with a monument and a fragment of old stone wall are all that remain of a castle that was built, abandoned, rebuilt, and finally erased beneath the streets of modern Numazu.

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Image: Midori | CC BY 3.0

Numazu Castle: The Tiger of Kai's Gambit

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kicho-, CC BY-SA 3.0. The original fortress at this site was not called Numazu Castle. It was Sanmaibashi Castle, built by Takeda Shingen during the Sengoku period as a defensive position against the Odawara Hojo during his invasion of Suruga Province. Shingen designed it with three concentric enclosu...

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Image: Kicho- | CC BY-SA 3.0

Numazu Castle: Changing Hands, Changing Fortunes

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit File:ActCityHamamatsu.jpg by User:Ichitaro File:Akiba jinja 16.jpg by User:takami torao File:Enshu Railway Line 2001.JPG by User:まも File:Hamamatsu castle.jpg by User:Texugo on Wikitravel File:Hamana Ōhasi 001.JPG by User:天然ガス Composition by User:Fjkelfeimvvn, CC BY-SA 3.0. The defeat of the Takeda clan in 1582 by the combined forces of Oda Nobunaga and Tokugawa Ieyasu sent Sanmaibashi Castle into a long decline. Ieyasu held it briefly until Toyotomi Hideyoshi transferred him to the Kanto region in 1590 and gave Numazu to Nakamura Kazuuji, one of Hi...

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Image: File:ActCityHamamatsu.jpg by User:Ichitaro File:Akiba jinja 16.jpg by User:takami torao File:Enshu Railway Line 2001.JPG by User:まも File:Hamamatsu castle.jpg by User:Texugo on Wikitravel File:Hamana Ōhasi 001.JPG by User:天然ガス Composition by User:Fjkelfeimvvn | CC BY-SA 3.0

Numazu Castle: A Castle for Peaceful Times

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit katorisi, CC BY-SA 3.0. In April 1777, the former wakadoshiyori Mizuno Tadatomo received orders to relocate from Ohama Domain in Mikawa Province to Numazu, bringing revenues of 20,000 koku and authorization to build a castle. He chose the ruins of Sanmaibashi Castle as his site, but the fortress he buil...

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Image: katorisi | CC BY-SA 3.0

Numazu Castle: From Samurai Fortress to Military Academy

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Batholith, Public domain. The Meiji Restoration swept the Mizuno clan away in 1868 when the new government abolished Numazu Domain and created Shizuoka Domain for the retired ex-Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu. The castle found an unexpected second life that December as the home of the Numazu Military Academy, ...

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Image: Batholith | Public domain

Numazu Castle: Buried Beneath the City

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Alpsdake, Public domain. The destruction was thorough. Unlike many Japanese castles that left behind dramatic stone foundations or reconstructed towers, Numazu Castle simply disappeared under the growing city. Streets and buildings covered the site where three concentric moats once ringed Shingen's fortr...

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Image: Alpsdake | Public domain