Ohatsu

Ohatsu (お初) or Ohatsu-no-kata (お初の方) (1570 – September 30, 1633) was a prominently placed figure in the late Sengoku period. She was daughter of Oichi and Nagamasa Azai, and the sister of Yodo-dono and Oeyo. Alongside her sisters, she was active in the political intrigues of her day. Ohatsu's close family ties to both the Toyotomi clan and the Tokugawa clan uniquely positioned her to serve as a conduit between the rivals. She acted as a liaison until 1615 in the siege of Osaka, when the Tokugawa eliminated the Toyotomi.¹

Life

Ohatsu was the second daughter of Azai Nagamasa. Her mother, Oichi, was the youngest sister of Oda Nobunaga.

Her father died during the siege of Odani in 1573 after rebelling against Nobunaga, and Ohatsu's brother Manpukumaru was killed. With her sisters and her mother, she joined the Oda clan. In 1582, after the assassination of her uncle in Honnō-ji Incident, her mother married Shibata Katsuie, a general in the service of the Oda, and in 1583, Toyotomi Hideyoshi attacked the Kitanosho castle, the castle that Ohatsu lived with her foster father, Katsuie. Her mother died and Hideyoshi took Ohatsu and her sisters under his care.

When she married her cousin Kyōgoku Takatsugu in 1587, he was a daimyō in Ōmi Province, holding Ōtsu Castle for the Toyotomi. At this point, Takatsugu was a fudai daimyō (hereditary vassal) of the Toyotomi with a stipend of 60,000 koku annually. After 1600, Takatsugu's allegiances had been transferred to the Tokugawa; and he was rewarded with the fief of in and an enhanced income of 92,000 annually.