Siege of Tottori
| Siege of Tottori | |||||||||
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| Part of the Sengoku period | |||||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
| forces of Oda Nobunaga | Mōri clan | ||||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
| Hashiba Hideyoshi |
Kikkawa Tsuneie  †
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The Siege of Tottori Castle occurred in 1581 and was part of Oda Nobunaga's campaign to consolidate his power in western Honshu in an effort to unite Japan during the late 16th century. The siege was fought between Hashiba Hideyoshi, a Oda clan general, against a garrison under an ally of the Mōri clan. It is one of the few cases in which starvation tactics were used towards the successful completion of a siege during the Sengoku Period in Japanese history. The siege lasted up to 200 days.
Tottori Castle (鳥取城 Tottori-jō?) was key to the Mōri clan's defense of their inner provinces against the encroachment of Oda Nobunaga.
In late 1580, as part of his campaign to extend Nobunaga's domain to the west Hashiba Hideyoshi moved north from his new base in Harima and by 1581 entered Inaba province on the Sea of Japan wherein his forces encountered Tottori. The yamashiro (mountain) castle, built into the mountain itself, was owned by the Yamana clan under Yamana Toyokuni, but had passed to the Mori and was guarded by their retainer, Kikkawa Tsuneie. Hideyoshi made efforts to negotiate with Tsuneie, but the Mori retainer was resolved to hold onto the castle and keep it from falling into Oda hands.
The siege began when Hideyoshi opted to cut off the castle's supplies and starve the garrison out. To this end, Hideyoshi drove the local villagers within the walls of the castle and all the approaches to Tottori were covered by erecting towers every 500 meters around the perimeter. Hideyoshi even went as far as purchasing all the available rice in Inaba province at several times the market price to aid in the process of breaking the resolve of the garrison.
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