Keyamura Rokusuke

Written by Tsugano Kafū and Chikamtsu Yasuzō, the Hiko-san Gongen chikai no sukedachi was first performed as a ningyō jōruri play in 1786.

The story was set in the Azuchi-Momoyama period, when Toyotomi Hideyoshi was about to reunify Japan: Yoshioka Ichimisai, a sword instructor to the Kōri (Mōri) clan, is killed with a sneak attack by Kyōgoku Takumi.

Around the same time, Rokusuke, mourning for his late mother, lives a quiet life as a farmer in a mountainous village named Keya (Keya-mura).

Holding an elderly woman on his back to elicit sympathy, Mijin Danjō asks Rokusuke to help him become a swordmaster.

A small village community named Keyamura is located in Tsukinoki, Yamakuni-machi, Nakatsu, Ōita Prefecture.

The Kiyomasa-ki, a not-so-faithful biography of Katō Kiyomasa written in the mid-17th century, claimed that Kida Magobee was killed in a battle with the Jurchens (Orankai) on the Manchurian border (in 1592).

[2] In South Korea, Keyamura Rokusuke is known as the victim of a suicide attack by Nongae, a kisaeng (official prostitute).

Later, various manuscripts of the Imjillok, a semi-fictitious history book, identify him as Katō Kiyomasa or Toyotomi Hideyoshi, which is obviously incorrect.

[4] Choi Gwan claimed that Bak Jonghwa's (朴鍾和) Nongae and Gyewolhyang (1962) was the first to identify the victim as Keyamura Rokusuke.

[2] Kawamura Minato discovered a slightly earlier mention of the new myth: a Japanese novel named Keijō, Chinkai and Fuzan (1951) by Tamagawa Ichirō.