Takeda Nobutake (武田信武)
Nobutake TAKEDA was a busho (Japanese military commander) in the period of the Northern and Southern Courts in Japan. He was born in the Nobutoki-lineage Takeda clan started from Nobutoki, a son of Nobumasa TAKEDA. He was the tenth family head of Takeda clan, Kai Province. According to ''Kai koku shi'' (Records of Kai Province), it is described that his wife was a niece of Takauji ASHIKAGA with reference to '生山系図'. He was also appointed to hikitsukeshu (Coadjustor of the High Court) of the Muromachi bakufu.
Brief Personal History
Nobutake became the family head, taking over his father Nobumune. He was Aki no kuni shugo (the provincial constable of Aki Province). Reponding to the request for the military power by Takauji ASHIKAGA who had defected from Emperor Godaigo's Kenmu government established after the fall of the Kamakura bakufu, Nobutake raised an army in 1335 and offended Yano-jo Castle (Hiroshima City) which was the headquarters of Rengaku KUMAGAI who hoisted the opposition banner. He went up to Kyoto in the next year and joined the power of Ashikaga to fight against the court's side mainly in Kinai region (the five capital provinces surrounding the ancient capitals of Nara and Kyoto). He played an active role in the military action mainly in Saigoku (western part of Japan), and made an effort to calm down Aki Province.
In the later Kamakura period, a branch family of the Isawa-lineage Takeda clan, having a connection with the Tokuso Family of Hojo clan, inherited Kai no Shugo (the provincial constable of Kai Province) instead of the Nobutoki-lineage Takeda clan who had transferred the headquarters as Aki no Shugo. Masayoshi TAKEDA joined the Kenmu government and was certified as Kai no Shugo, but died in a battle field in 1343. Nobutake strengthened the intervention in Kai Province after Masayoshi died. There are some historical materials showing his relation to Kai Province such as the donation to Ichiren-ji Temple in 1346 and the like. A historical material that shows his appointment as Kai no Shugo amid the Kanno Disturbance which broke out due to the conflict between shogun Takauji and his younger brother Tadayoshi ASHIKAGA, implicates Nobutake's entrance into Kai Province to hunt down and kill Tadayoshi.
Takauji strongly trusted Nobutake; in Takauji's plan to construct Tenryu-ji Temple, Nobutake cooperated in the construction together with Ogasawara clan who was Shinano Shugo. He died in 1359 according to the ihai (Buddhist mortuary tablet) in Hosen-ji Temple in Kofu City. According to a family register of deaths of Ichiren-ji Temple or Ketsuo Zeei Goroku (sayings), he died in 1362. Nobutake died in the next year and his son Nobunari TAKEDA took over; Nobutake's second son Ujinobu inherited Aki Shugo.
Nobutake was an educated man and good at Waka (Japanese poetry); his masterpieces are included in "Shin-senzai Wakashu" (New Collection of Japanese Poems of a Thousand Years).