Retirement to Sunpu
At the end of his life the first Tokugawa Shogun, Ieyasu, controlled nearly all of Japan. As Shogun he could spend his final days virtually anywhere he wanted. Interestingly he didn’t choose his homeland of Mikawa, nor the vast and fortified Edo Castle, nor the flatland castle in Kyoto. In his final years he retired to Sunpu Castle. Sunpu was the castle Ieyasu had been held at as a child by the famous daimyo Imagawa Yoshimoto. Though no one is completely sure why. Was it because an old man was nostalgic? Was it because Sunpu was located between Edo and Kyoto and close enough to Edo that he could still be contacted but was letting the new Shogun bloom? Was it simply that Sunpu was a castle who’s architecture he enjoyed? We may never know.
