Virtual Settsu 33 Kannon Pilgrimage #32 Nyogan-ji Temple

 

     Kire-ji Temple was founded by Prince Shotoku (574-622) in Kurehito Village, Sumiyoshi County, Settsu Province.  The village was first documented in the Man'yoshu, or Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves, which was compiled sometime after 759, as the site of a party in which Emperor Shomu (701-756) took part on March 7th, 756.  As Hito means people, the village seems to have been called just Kure in the 5th century, and the temple name could have been pronounced Kure-ji from its foundation date. 

     The temple declined and was revived by Kukai (774-835) in 817, and was renamed from Kire-ji to Nyogan-ji.  So, the village could have come to be pronounced Kire before the 9th century.

     The village was first documented as Kire in 1373.

     In the Middle Ages, Kire Village was a moated settlement centered around Nyogan-ji Temple, and the entire area was called Kire Castle, which functioned as a subordinate castle of Takaya Castle.  In the middle of the 16th century, when Hosokawa Ujitsuna (1513-1564) struggled against Hosokawa Harumoto (1514-1563) for supremacy in the Muromachi Shogunate, Kire Castle might have been under Ujitsuna's power.  In 1549, Harumoto escaped to Omi Province, and, in 1552, Ujitsuna moved to Yodo Castle in the south of Kyoto.  Ujitsuna defeated Harumoto, but it was Miyoshi Nagayoshi (1522-1564) who really won the struggle.  Nagayoshi formed the Miyoshi Regime, putting Ashikaga Yoshitsuna  (1509-1573), who was the second son of Yoshizumi (1481-1511), the 11th shogun, as shogun. 

Address: 6 Chome-1-38 Kire, Hirano Ward, Osaka, 547-0027

Phone: 06-6709-2510

Takaya Castle Ruins

Address: 5 Chome-6-7 Furuichi, Habikino, Osaka 583-0852