Hiraizumi on the Kitakami river was the capital of the Northern Fujiwara for four generations, the greatest town of the north, with Chūsonji on its hill, the twin temples of Mōtsūji, the Fujiwara palace and the Kanjizaiō-in.
The Fujiwara's wealth was Mutsu gold, horses, hawks, feathers and the pelts that came from Ezo, and its trade ran down the Kitakami to the sea. On 2 October 1189 Yasuhira fled and set the town on fire; Yoritomo entered it on 3 October (English Wikipedia: Northern Fujiwara). What stands in 1200 is a burned city with temples: Chūsonji survived and fell into decline, Mōtsūji went to ruin by 1226, and the Konjikidō stands.
The town is held by stewards and the Ōshū commissioner; the gold is not mentioned in any source for the 1190s.
Who holds it
- Title
- Local governor or lord
- Confidence
- low
No holder is dated for 1 January 1200.
Lord in 1200
Kasai Kiyoshige, the Ōshū commissioner, and the stewards
Council
Not known: the temples' clergy and Kamakura's stewards.
Communities
Tendai clergy, stewards and the remnant of the Fujiwara's craftsmen and retainers.
Militia
Stewards' men; no numbers.
Walls and castle
The Takadachi and the palace burned in 1189; no walls are known.
Trade and crafts
Gold, horses and goods of the north are the old trade; no figure for 1200.
Places of note
- Chūsonji: The hill temple
- Mōtsūji site: The garden and ruins
Where the sources disagree
- The campaign board's Hiraizumi point (38.987 141.113) is accepted.
Evidence: The destruction and the temples are on English pages; the 1190s are not.
"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.
On the map: The near land is drawn as seeds round the town; rights over men are scattered.
Primary sources for Kamakura regime
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- Hundred Times Refined Extracts: court annals (late thirteenth century, from court diaries). Short dated annals of the imperial court excerpted from courtiers' diaries, among them the Gyokuyo and the Meigetsuki. Read online
- Mirror of the East, Anonymous; compiled by officials of the Kamakura shogunate (compiled about 1300 from the shogunate's records, diaries and family documents). The Kamakura house's own chronicle, in daily entries. Read online
- Jottings of a Fool: an interpretative history of Japan, Jien (慈円) (about 1219 to 1220, revised to about 1223). A history by Kujo Kanezane's brother, head of the Tendai school and the leading churchman of the court, written to explain the fall of the Kujo and the rise of the warriors as the working of principle (dori). Read online
- Diary of the Inokuma Regent: the diary of Konoe Iezane, Konoe Iezane (近衛家実) (1197 to 1218, as a daily diary). The diary of the regent's heir, aged twenty-one in 1200 and already a senior courtier under his father Konoe Motomichi, who was regent (sessho) for the child emperor Tsuchimikado. Read online
- Leaves of Jade: the diary of Kujo Kanezane, Kujo (Fujiwara) Kanezane (九條兼實) (1164 to 1200, as a daily diary). The diary of the former regent, Yoritomo's ally at court, who had been driven from power in the Kenkyu purge of 1196 and lived in retirement in 1200. Read online
- Record of the Bright Moon: the diary of Fujiwara no Teika, Fujiwara no Teika (藤原定家) (1180 to 1235, as a daily diary, with gaps). The diary of the poet and courtier, then thirty-eight and a middle-ranking official of the Kujo house. Read online
- Surviving Documents of the Kamakura Period, Various; collected by Takeuchi Rizo (竹内理三) (documents of 1185 to 1333, collected and printed 1971 to 1997). The collected charters, deeds, court orders, shogunal directives, temple records and land registers of the Kamakura age, printed in date order. Read online
- The Tale of the Heike, Anonymous; traditionally attributed to Shinano no Zenji Yukinaga, performed and reshaped by blind reciters (early thirteenth century in its first form; the standard Kakuichi text was fixed in 1371). The epic of the Genpei war, in the form the reciters gave it over the century after 1200. Read online
Sources and studies
- KJA_BRIEF.md and the OMNIA board for sheet kja (the lead's notes: [own] computation, [not yet checked against the source] recollection, [en] English Wikipedia)
- Azuma Kagami (the Kamakura chronicle), Kenkyu 10 to Shoji 2 entries, recalled and through the brief; ja.wikipedia and ja.wikisource were refused in this session, so no entry was re-read
- Jeffrey P. Mass, Warrior Government in Early Medieval Japan (1974), from memory; the archive.org full text could not be opened
- English Wikipedia: Northern Fujiwara (read this session; thin)
- English Wikipedia: Chūson-ji (read this session; thin)
- English Wikipedia: Mōtsū-ji (read this session; thin)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.