ŌTANI

In the summer of 1600, a sick man was carried in a palanquin along the road to join Tokugawa Ieyasu, the most powerful lord in Japan. On the way, he stopped to see an old friend. The friend told him a secret: he was going to raise an army against Ieyasu, and he wanted Ōtani Yoshitsugu at his side.

Ōtani told him the plan would fail. He argued for days. Then he joined it anyway — and two months later, at the Battle of Sekigahara, he died exactly as he had foreseen, in the collapse that followed the betrayal he had warned against.

He had begun as a page boy in the household of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, growing up beside another clever boy, Ishida Mitsunari. He was no great swordsman. He was a man who could count: he organized supplies for Hideyoshi's great campaigns, oversaw the war in Korea, and became lord of the port of Tsuruga. In his later years, a serious illness took his health and his sight. And at Sekigahara, in a battle remembered for the men who switched sides, he became the man remembered for staying.

Told as a narrative history from beginning to end, with a cast of characters, a map, and a travel guide to the places you can still visit today, this book says plainly what the records show, what historians still debate, and which famous stories are only legends — including the famous tea bowl.

Inside, you'll find:

A page boy by Lake Biwa, and a lifelong friendship with Ishida Mitsunari
The unglamorous work of feeding Hideyoshi's armies
The port of Tsuruga, and the war in Korea
A serious illness, and the legend of the tea bowl
Why Ōtani was on his way to join Ieyasu in 1600
The meeting at Sawayama, where he told his friend the truth
The morning at Sekigahara, the betrayal on Mount Matsuo, and the last order
His family after the battle, including his son-in-law Sanada Yukimura
A guide to visiting the places in this story today, from Nagahama and Sawayama to Tsuruga and the battlefield of Sekigahara
If you want a hero who won, this is not your book. If you want the real story of a man who knew he would lose and stood by his friend anyway, turn the page and meet the real Ōtani.