Nitta Masayoshi (新田政義)
Masayoshi NITTA was a busho (Japanese military commander) in the Kamakura period.
He was the oldest sun of Yoshifusa NITTA
Career
Because his father Yoshifusa died young at age 34 when his grandfather Yoshikane NITTA was still alive, he became the successor of the Nitta clan when he was only 13 years old, and his grandfather served as his conservator. At the same time, his great-grandfather Yoshishige NITTA who was very old but still alive as a priest, Yoshishige also served as a conservator along with Yoshikane. However, Yoshishige died in 1202 and Yoshikane died in 1206, so his grandfather's wife and his grandmother Nittani succeeded as a conservator.
Because Nittani let Tokikane IWAMATSU inherit most of her territory in Nitta no sho (manor) that she inherited from Yoshikane for her life time, it is said that there was relatively little territory when Masayoshi inherited the family. Masayoshi married a daughter of a peer Yoshiuji ASHIKAGA, who had become a senior vassal by having matrimonial relations with the regent Hojo clan for generations.
Incident of fall
In May 1242, a prisoner who was entrusted by bakufu (Japanese feudal government headed by a shogun) broke out, so he paid three thousand hiki as penalty money. In July 1244, Masayoshi, who was living in Kyoto as a Kyoto obanyaku (a job to guard Kyoto), requested access to the Imperial Court and appointment to kebiishi (official with judicial and police powers) without authorization of bakufu.
Because appointment without authorization is a violation to Shogunate law, Imperial Court who was afraid of troubles with bakufu rejected his request. Masayoshi became a priest without permission of bakufu or Imperial Court, canceled obanyaku, went back to Nitta no sho, and rejected attending at bakufu.
Although appointment without authority and becoming a priest without permission were high crimes that deserved confiscation of territories, he received only lenient treatment of confiscation of a part of his territory and soryo-shiki (clan leadership rights), perhaps because of approach by his wife's family home Ashikaga clan. Masayoshi founded Enpuku-ji Temple and retired.
Nitta shi soryo-shiki (the Nitta clan leadership rights) was divided among branch families such as Yoshisue SERADA and Tokikane IWAMATSU, and they both lead the Nitta clan as "hanbun soryo" (half heir) (After a short time, Yoshisue's child Yoriuji SERADA and Tokikane's child Tsunekuni IWAMATSU and others took over as head of the family).
He died at age 71 in 1257, and his oldest son Masauji NITTA succeeded him. His grave is located in Enpuku-ji Temple that he himself founded in Ota City, Gunma Prefecture.
Because of Masayoshi's rash and blind act, fall of the Nitta clan became clear and the head family of the Nitta family fell into straitened circumstances to become a local gokenin (an immediate vassal of the shogunate in the Kamakura and Muromachi through Edo periods) who was not even in "Azuma Kagami" (The Mirror of the East).
Others
It is said that Sadauji YOKOSE (the ancestor of Narishige YURA), the youngest child of Masayoshi, called himself the Yura clan (Yokose clan) and wielded his influence as a Nitta family (there is another theory that Sadauji was a child of Yoshimune NITTA who was a descendant of Yoshimasa).