Footsteps of Christians Left in Fushimi, Kyoto

After Toyotomi Hideyoshi built Fushimi Castle in 1592, the Christian faith spread in Fushimi, which had become the political center of the country, but this was followed by persecution and martyrdom, which soon spread to the rest of the country, as Professor Emeritus Mitsumata Shunji of Kyoto Seibo College has noted. At Kyobashi, the heart of the post-station town and always busy with sanjukkokubune boats docking, and Kyo-machi, the main road leading into the capital, Kyoto, captured Christians were dragged around and left exposed to the public (as described in the 1615 and 1616 annual reports from the Society of Jesus). One block north of Fushimi Church (present-day Tango-cho, Fushimi-ku, Kyoto City) is a narrow road, “Ro-no-Zushi,” only wide enough for about one car to pass, that goes east-west from what is now Ryogae-machi to Shin-machi 3-chome in Fushimi-ku, Kyoto City. On the north side of that road was a prison where a large number of Christians were held. Going south down Doami-cho Road from in front of the Fushimi magistrate's court leads to the area where, from west of Kangetsu Bridge (formerly Bungo Bridge) on the north bank of the Uji River to around Yodogawa Bridge, Christians were martyred during the Tokugawa period.

The footprints of Christianity were supposed to have been thoroughly wiped out, but in Fushimi we can use the large number of streets and canals that survive from the days when it was a castle town to determine where these locations were, by comparing period documents and existing place-names.

With the general prohibition on Christianity issued by the Tokugawa Shogunate in 1614, Takayama Ukon was expelled from Japan, and died in 1615 in Manila, in the Philippines, where he ended up living.

In 1624, Fushimi Castle was abandoned, so all the lords' mansions were torn down, and for a while the town dwindled, like a flame going out. However, as time went by, people and goods started flowing through the town again with the start of the “alternate attendance” system which required daimyo to live in Edo every other year. Fushimi began to flourish as a crossroads, and as the entrance to Kyoto, developing as a port and post-station town along the highway. Okura Jiemon moved from Kasagi in the south of what is now Kyoto Prefecture to Fushimi in 1637, 23 years after the prohibition on Christianity, and founded what would become Gekkeikan when he opened a brewery in front of the horse-borne shipping office (bashaku) in the Minamihama area, trading as Kasagiya. This was next door to the residence listed as belonging to “Takayama Ukon,” or Fushimi Jesuit Church, in the old map of the castle town from the days when Toyotomi Hideyoshi ruled. Kasagiya traded with travelers and locals as a small local sake brewery during the Edo period.

The oldest ledger that still exists in Gekkeikan dates back to 1718. In this record of business done by Kasagiya we can see an entry about “Southern Barbarian sake” (Namban-shu). This liquor was considered a famous local product of Kyoto at the time.

So what sort of drink was this Namban-shu? There are a number of theories, such as it being made by adding fruit or mirin to spirits that have been distilled from the sake lees created during the sake brewing process. Under Oda Nobunaga, Christian churches called “Nambanji” or “Southern Barbarian Temple” were built throughout Kyoto in 1576. The connection between Christianity and “Southern Barbarian sake” is unclear, but the name does suggest that there is a relation of some sort.

Minamihama in Fushimi was the entrance to Kyoto and always busy with travelers (this is the area from the current Gekkeikan head office, past the famous Teradaya Inn, out to around Kyobashi over the Hori River). The canal running east-west parallel with the old highway (now called Tateishi Road) had a beaching area opened up on the south side for boats to dock at, so the place was always busy with people coming and going. Here, a Christian lantern was passed down through the generations by the Fukui Genzaburo family, who ran the officially-appointed inn for traveling daimyo. A Christian lantern is a lantern of the shape devised by Furuta Oribe, who had learned the tea ceremony from the famous tea master Sen-no-Rikyu, and can been seen in many gardens, being one of the standard items for a teahouse. There are raised areas that look rather like crosses in the support post under the firebox, with figures that suggest Christ or Mary at the bottom of the post.

The roof and other parts of this lantern were repaired after being damaged in the Great Hanshin Earthquake in 1995, and passed on to Gekkeikan by the Fukui Genzaburo family. In an age when they were heavily suppressed, it is thought that believers would bury these lanterns so that the soil would cover most of the figures, and pray to them in secret. The fact that the mansion which operated as the inn for traveling daimyo also had one of these lanterns serves as a reminder of how the religion had managed to spread widely.