日本の城とは？
日本の巨大な城は、戦国時代（1467-1568）の産物である。1336年から続いた足利幕府の崩壊に始まり、その後数十年にわたり、さまざまな勢力が日本の支配権をめぐって争った。
戦国時代の城の特徴として、天守閣があり、そこを拠点に武将たちが領地を支配した。この時期までにすでに数百年にわたって城郭は存在していたが、初期の「城」は山の上に築かれ、土塁や木柵で囲まれているのが一般的であった。山上の城は防御しやすいが、農地や街道から遠く、行政の中心地としては不向きであった。1500年代初頭から、城は山ではなく丘の上に築かれるようになり、やがて平地にも築かれるようになった。この城郭建築の黄金時代には、日本の城の象徴である天守閣が誕生した。
松本城は16世紀後半に築城され、新旧の技術が混在した城であった。大天守の階層は、後世の城郭によく似ている。しかし、天守閣の全体的なデザインは、天守の上に天守を積み重ねたようなもので、より初期の城の特徴を示している。このように、松本城は城郭設計の過渡期を代表する城である。
What Are Japanese Castles?
Japan’s towering castle keeps are products of the Warring States period (1467–1600), an era of bloody clashes between regional warlords. Beginning in the 1400s, the ruling Ashikaga clan began to lose control of the increasingly fractured country. Different factions spent the following decades battling to expand their territory, and Japanese castles developed greatly during this long period of near-constant warfare.
The presence of a great keep (tenshukaku) is a distinctive trait of castles from the late Warring States period. Castles of that time functioned as the administrative centers from which warlords controlled their territory. Fortified towns and strongholds had already existed for hundreds of years by that time, but these early “castles” were generally built atop mountains and encircled by earthen embankments or wooden barricades.
Mountaintop castles were easy to defend, but they were necessarily far from farmland and main roads. This made them unsuitable as centers of administration. Beginning in the early 1500s, castles were built on hills rather than mountains, and eventually, they were built on flatland as well. This gradual evolution produced the iconic great keeps for which Japanese castles are now known.
Built in the late sixteenth century, Matsumoto Castle was constructed using a mix of both new and old technology. The successively smaller levels of the Great Keep are similar to those of later castles. However, the architectural structure of the Great Keep, which can be described as one tower stacked onto another, is more indicative of earlier castles. Consequently, Matsumoto Castle represents a transitional phase of castle design.
