Port · The temple and shrine corporations · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Onomichi

The harbour of Bingo on the Inland Sea at the narrow strait facing Mukaishima.

English Wikipedia says the port opened in 1168 and for five centuries served as a rice shipment centre and a hub of foreign trade; the campaign board dates the charter that made it the estate's loading port to 1169. It is the sea door of the great Ōta estate (Ōta-no-shō) of Kōyasan, a few days' ride inland up the Sera and Ōta valleys, from which the rice is carried to Onomichi and shipped to Settsu [board; the estate's records we have not seen]. Senkōji, a hill temple of the 9th century, overlooks the harbour (English Wikipedia).

The jitō's quarrels with Kōyasan over the estate are a thing of the 13th century as we recall [not yet checked against the source] and we give no event for 1200.

Who holds it

Title
Kōyasan's agents for the Ōta estate; the estate's steward under Kamakura is not known
Confidence
low

English Wikipedia (Onomichi) and the campaign board.

Lord in 1200

Kōyasan through its agents; Kamakura's steward (jitō) of Ōta-no-shō, not named.

Overlord

Kōyasan as proprietor of Ōta-no-shō

What the town holds

  • The harbour and its landing
  • The rice-store (the estate's granary) [not yet checked against the source]

How things stand that morning

A temple's port; rice goes out, salt and goods come in.

Charter

The estate's charter: 1168 (English Wikipedia: port opened) or 1169 (board); not pinned.

Trade and crafts

Rice shipment for Kōyasan; salt; coastal shipping.

Where the sources disagree

  • The campaign board entry id onomichi: charter of 1169. English Wikipedia (Onomichi) has the port opened in 1168 and does not mention the Ōta estate.

Evidence: English Wikipedia (Onomichi) gives 1168 and the rice trade; the estate is the campaign board's claim and recollection.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

Primary sources for Temple powers (west)

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
  • 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

  1. OMNIA kja regional brief (KJA_BRIEF.md), the campaign's dated traps and realm table
  2. OMNIA board notes and places for area kjw (starting lead only, checked against the sources)
  3. Onomichi, Hiroshima, English Wikipedia

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.