Yamagata Castle
castle in Yamagata city, Japan
Yamagata Castle (山形城, Yamagata-jō) is a flatland-style Japanese castle located in the center of the city of Yamagata, eastern Yamagata Prefecture, Japan. Throughout the Edo period, Yamagata Castle was the headquarters for the daimyō of Yamagata Domain. The castle was also known as "Ka-jō" (霞城). The castle grounds are protected as a National Historic Site by the Japanese government.
Overview
The Yamagata Basin is a long and narrow inland valley of the Mogami River bounded by the Ōu Mountains to the east. It is an important communications center for the southeastern portion of the Tōhoku region of Japan, connecting the Shōnai Plains and the Sea of Japan to the west with the Yonezawa Basin to the south, and the Sendai Plains and the Pacific Ocean across the Ōu Mountains. In addition to riverine traffic, the route of the Ushū Kaidō highway also passes through the area. Yamagata Castle is located at the southern end of the Yamagata Basin.
History
Early history
The first castle on this site dates to the middle of the Muromachi period, when Shiba Kaneyori established himself as lord of the surrounding area of Dewa Province and built a fortified residence on the site of what is now the inner bailey of Yamagata Castle. The Shiba clan was a strong supporter of the Ashikaga shogunate and the Northern Court.
“Yamagata Castle” enters the record as castle in Yamagata city, Japan. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Yamagata, Castle and castle can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Yamagata Castle” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Yamagata, Castle and castle provides the most credible route into that argument.
Place names and jurisdictional language are key evidence: both can reveal earlier catalogue descriptions and overlooked record series. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q15604669. VIAF identifies the subject as 259428233. Authority coordinates are 38.256, 140.328. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Yamagata Castle” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.