Heading a little south along the shopping street from Kintetsu Wakae-Iwata Station, the road splits in two, and just before the fork, on the left, you'll notice a small grave surrounded by a low stone wall. It's the grave of Iijima Saburōemon, a retainer of Kimura Shigenari who was killed in the Summer Campaign. You might wonder why it's in a place like this, but this spot was the northern end of the former Wakae embankment. The east side of that fork is now a road, but that road itself is where the Wakae embankment was. The west side of the fork is the Kawachi Kaidō. Not a single trace of it remains today, but with this embankment between them, Kimura's troops fought fierce battles against the troops of Tōdō Takatora and Ii Naotaka. Iijima, gravely wounded by a spear on the south side of the Wakae embankment, died in battle at the northern end of this embankment. No matter when I pass by, I've never seen it without flowers. I imagine his descendants and kind passersby leave flowers. I think it's proof that, even to this day, no one has forgotten the desperate fight of Kimura Shigenari and Iijima Saburōemon.

Here lies the grave of Iijima Saburōemon, who was renowned for his archery in the Sengoku era. It is truly a historic site of a man who embodied the saying 'a single skill can save your life', as well as an outstanding art in service of the world. Incidentally, the photo shows how it looked when taken in 2005. There are no plantings now. Perhaps they were planted out of affection, to shut out the noise and because the western sun must be hot. Below I've transcribed and am sharing the text of the sign explaining its history, erected in March of Heisei 9 by the Iwata-chō Cultural Properties Preservation Society of Higashiosaka City. 【Grave of Iijima Saburōemon】Iijima Saburōemon was born in Takaida Village in this city. He excelled at archery from a young age, and as an adult served the Sengoku warlord Oda Nobunaga. After Nobunaga's death he served Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and after Hideyoshi's death, his son Hideyori. In the 5th month of Genna 1 (1615), in the fighting around Wakae and Yao during the 'Summer Campaign of the Siege of Osaka', he fought the Tokugawa army under Kimura Nagato-no-kami Shigenari, was speared by the enemy commander Yamaguchi Izumi-no-kami Shigenobu, and died in battle at this spot. It is said to have been a ferocious battle in which both Shigenari and Shigenobu were killed. Saburōemon's eldest son Sankichi followed him in death, and his wife and mother also took their own lives, but it is said that his second son, saved by his wet nurse, built his father's graves here and in Takaida after he grew up. This spot where Saburōemon died was also a marshland where large and small irrigation channels converged, and there was a narrow bridge called the 'Karintohibashi' linking Wakae Village and Iwata Village; even now, beneath the road, water still flows into the Kusune River just as it did long ago.

Seeing this grave appear out of nowhere, I thought of the local people who revered great figures in the past.

お墓