Taku Yasutoshi (多久安順)
Yasutoshi TAKU (1563 - 1636) was a person who lived from the Sengoku period (period of warring states) to the Edo period
He was the originator of the Taku family, one of the four Ryuzoji families which belonged to the Ryuzoji clan of Hizen Province. He was the legitimate son of Naganobu RYUZOJI (the Mizugae Ryuzoji family) who was the youngest brother of Takanobu RYUZOJI. He was first named Iehisa RYUZOJI. He married Chizu, the second daughter of Naoshige NABESHIMA. He became the first yushu (feudal lord) of Taku, and named himself Nagato Yasutoshi TAKU. The Taku yushu was later succeeded by Shigetatsu, his adopted son (a child of Shigetomi GOTO [a son between Iehira RYUZOJI and Yasutoshi's younger sister] whom he adopted and later disowned). He had another adopted daughter, Isegiku (a wife of Tsunetoshi KAMISHIRO).
He participated in the Bunroku-Keicho War, and as when the Japanese army withdrew from the battlefield, the potters such as Sanpei RI were brought from Chosen (Korea) together, he looked after them and made them establish the origin of the Arita ware. In the Battle of Sekigahara, while he followed the master's clan and belonged to the West squad, he delivered a large quantity of rice to Ieyasu TOKUGAWA. In 1607, when Takafusa RYUZOJI died and the head family of the Ryuzoji clan was distinguished, he was appointed to a responsible post by the Nabeshima clan which took the domain over, and he got a treatment equivalent to the family to serve as Ukeyaku (an administrative officer who manages the affairs of the domain) of the Saga Domain.
In 1634, when Hakuan RYUZOJI, a son of Takafusa, named himself Sueaki RYUZOJI, and insisted to Iemitsu TOKUGAWA that the Saga Domain belong to the Ryuzoji clan, Yasutoshi went to Edo and claimed to Bakufu (Japanese feudal government headed by a shogun) that the reign of the Nabeshima clan was a legal one.