Sōma-Nakamura Castle

Overview

Sōma-Nakamura Castle (相馬中村城, Sōma Nakamura-jō) was a Japanese castle in northern Fukushima Prefecture, in what is now the city of Sōma. It served as the administrative centre of Sōma Domain, a feudal territory held by the Sōma clan under the Tokugawa shogunate. Construction began in 1611, the sixteenth year of the Keichō era (慶長, けいちょう), placing it early in the Edo period (1603–1868). The castle stood at the coordinates 37.7980361, 140.9143139, on ground that is now Baryō Park.

History

The Sōma clan were already established in this part of Mutsu Province when the Edo period opened. The castle they built at Nakamura became the seat of the Sōma-Nakamura Domain, and the domain's headquarters were located there. Work on the castle began in 1611, during the Keichō era, a time when the Tokugawa shogunate was consolidating its control over the domains and reorganising the old medieval fortifications of the north.

The site was known by several names. Besides Sōma-Nakamura Castle, it was called Nakamura Castle, and also Mutsu-Nakamura Castle, a name that distinguished it from other castles sharing the Nakamura name elsewhere in Japan. Its contemporary nickname was Baryū Castle (馬陵城, ばりょうじょう), taken from a place name mentioned in the Chinese Spring and Autumn Annals. That literary borrowing was a mark of the prestige the Sōma clan attached to their seat.

As the domain's administrative centre, the castle housed the machinery of local government through the whole of the Edo period. The Sōma clan governed from this site for the duration of the shogunate, and the castle remained the focal point of the domain until the feudal system was abolished in the years after 1868.

What Stands There Today

Nothing of the original castle survives as a working fortification. The site is now Baryō Park, a public park in the city of Sōma, taking its name from the castle's old nickname Baryū. The park preserves the footprint and setting of the castle grounds, and it is the point of reference for anyone looking for the castle today. The location is in Sōma-shi, in Fukushima Prefecture.

The Name in Japanese

The full name is written 相馬中村城. In kana it is read そうまなかむらじょう, and in romaji it is Sōma Nakamura-jō. The name breaks into four kanji, each carrying its own meaning and reading.

相 (そう, sō) — This character means "mutual" or "together" in ordinary use, but here it is the first element of the clan name Sōma. As a surname component it is read sō, not its more common readings.

馬 (ま, ma) — "Horse." This is the second half of the clan name. Read alone it is usually uma or ba, but inside the name Sōma it takes the reading ma. Together, 相馬 (そうま, Sōma) is the name of the clan that ruled the domain.

中 (なか, naka) — "Middle," "inside," or "centre." It appears in the place name Nakamura and is read naka here.

村 (むら, mura) — "Village." Combined with the previous character, 中村 (なかむら, Nakamura) means "middle village" — a very common Japanese place name. The castle name uses this to identify the settlement it guarded.

城 (じょう, jō) — "Castle." This is the standard suffix attached to the name of a Japanese castle. It is read jō in this compound, though the same character is read shiro when it stands alone.

Put together, 相馬中村城 means "the castle of Nakamura in Sōma" — the Sōma clan's castle at the village of Nakamura. The alternative name Mutsu-Nakamura Castle adds 陸奥 (むつ, Mutsu), the old province name for the region, to distinguish this Nakamura from others. The nickname Baryū Castle uses 馬陵 (ばりょう, baryō), a two-character place name drawn from Chinese classical literature, with 城 again read jō.

Visiting and Context

The castle site lies within Baryō Park in Sōma, in the far north of Fukushima Prefecture. The city sits in the coastal region of the old Mutsu Province, and the park occupies the former castle grounds. For a reader studying Japanese, the name repays attention: 城 (じょう, jō) is the single most useful character for reading about Japanese castles, and it appears in the names of fortifications across the country. The pairing of a clan name (相馬, Sōma) with a place name (中村, Nakamura) and the suffix 城 is the standard pattern for castle names, so Sōma-Nakamura Castle is a good model for parsing others. The site's identity as the headquarters of the Sōma-Nakamura Domain ties the castle directly to the feudal geography of the Edo period, when domain and castle were effectively the same administrative unit.