28 August 2025 The Future is the Product of the Past

400-year historical document confirms the martyrdom of Japanese Christians

In Japan, the suppression of Christianity increased from the end of the 16th century to the beginning of the 17th century, and many missionaries and Japanese believers were martyred during this period.

New research found a letter stating that between 1600 and 1620, Lord Ogura, Hosokawa Tadao ordered the execution of the main vassal of the Hosokawa family, Diego Gayato Gagayama, and ordered the exile of the two Christian.

The punishment and martyrdom of both men were previously known only from the Jesuit missionaries’ accounts to Rome. The discovery of the original historical documents created in the Hosokawa family explained both the authenticity and the limitations of the missionary writings of the time.

In the mid-16th century, with the arrival of the Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier, the number of Christian followers in Japan surged. In the end, some feudal lords, Daimos, and their vassals believed in Christianity.

In the Kyushu region, in particular, there were many Christians who served as gateways to missionary work and “southern barbarian culture.” The Hosokawa family, who eventually became the lords of the Kyushu region, had many Christian servants.

It is well known that Tama (Gracia / Garasha) Hosokawa, wife of Tadaoka Hosokawa, the second head of the family, was a Christian. She kept the faith and met her end in the Great Civil War, the Battle of Sekigahara, in 1600.

When the Edo shogunate issued a nationwide ban on Christianity in December 1614, members of the Hosokawa family abandoned their faith one by one. However, some vassals in the family chose not to back down, notably Hayato Kagayama and Genya Ogasawara.

Hayato Kagayama was a military commander who served three feudal lords who were closely related to Christianity.

The first two were Christians, and after losing them to deportation and death from illness, he proved to be a very valuable servant to the Hosokawa family. Although Tadaoki Hosokawa himself was not a Christian, his wife Grace was a devout Catholic.

Genya Ogasawara was Hayato’s son-in-law and the son of a man known to be with Gracia in the last moments of her life. When the Hosokawa family mansion was besieged by the enemy during the Battle of Sekigahara, Genya’s father took Gracia’s life and then committed seppuku, a form of ritual suicide under the samurai code of honor. Both were on the orders of Lord Ogasawara, who was then deeply grateful to Genya’s father for protecting his wife’s honor and not giving her over to the enemy. Both Genya and Hayato refused to carry out the order to change religion, but Tadaoki is believed to have respected them so much that he was unable to take decisive action to punish them.

According to reports from Jesuit missionaries to Rome, on September 8, 1619, Tadao Tadao ordered the beheading of the Hay of Kagayama because he refused to apostate. He also exiled Kenya Hosiya and his family from the small warehouse where the Hosokawa family’s castle was located to the countryside to live with unknown farmers and criminals.

Researchers at the Eisei Bunko Research Center * of Kumamoto University discovered a letter related to these orders while analyzing the archives of the first member of the Hosokawa family, “Matsui Family Documents.”

The sender Rokuzaemon Yano and the other three are the officials responsible for the custody of Genya Ogasawara, while the recipient Okinaga Matsui is the first retainer of the Hosokawa family and the chief administrative officer of the Ogura area.

Matsui Family Documents
Matsui Family Documents. Photo: Kumamoto University Library

[Translation reordered for presentation.]

We have received Lord Tadaoki’s decrees.

  1. The Death Penalty (Martyrdom) for Hayato Kagayama:

We understand that the order to execute Hayato Kagayama was given last night (September 8).

  1. Spare the Genya Ogasawara Family:

We immediately informed Genya Ogasawara that our Lord decided to save his life in gratitude for Genya’s father’s fealty. In response, Genya said, “I am so grateful to my Lord that I am at a loss for words.” When we informed him of the Lord’s intention to spare the lives of his family, including his children, he expressed his heartfelt gratitude and wrote a letter of reply to our Lord. In addition, Genya said to us, “Please, the three of you, express very carefully my gratitude to Lord Tadaoki.” Please keep this in mind.

  1. Management of Genya Ogasawara’s family:

We ordered local village officials to keep a close watch on Genya, and to seize him and inform us immediately if he tries to escape from the confinement area. If it is difficult to seize him, we understand it is not a problem to execute him. If any abnormalities occur we shall report them as soon as they occur.

5:00 PM on the 9th of September,
From: Rokuzaemon Yano, Jinbei Yoshida and Ihei Tomishima,
To: First Retainer Okinaga Matsui

Professor Tsuguyo Inaba said following about this historical document: “Until now, we could only learn about the martyrdom of Hayato Kagayama and the punishment of Genya Ogasawara from the reports of Jesuit missionaries from Rome, and we could not eliminate information uncertainty. However, with the discovery of primary historical documents created by the organization that handed down the punishment, the Hosokawa family, more facts are now known. The punishment of the two men is now thought to have been carried out in the immediate aftermath of the “Great Martyrdom of Genna in Kyoto” (1619), one of the greatest incidents in the history of Japanese suppression of Christianity, by Tadaoki, who felt threatened by it. This was a shocking and decisive suppression of Christian retainers and vassals among leading feudal lords. After that point, daimyo and samurai within the family were forbidden from being Christian. This primary historical document demonstrates removal of Christians from the ruling class structure, and is a great historical discovery for Japanese Christianity.”

Items 1 and 3 of this letter are almost identical to the reports sent to Rome, but item 2 has never been seen before in any historical document. Genya Ogasawara’s father protected the honor of his lord’s wife, Gracia, by not letting her be taken hostage during the Battle of Sekigahara. After her death, he died a martyr close by. This document clearly shows that Lord Hosokawa highly valued Genya’s father’s loyalty. However, the Genya Ogasawara and his family were ostracized by Hosokawa because they would not renounce their faith.

Eventually they would all be executed in Kumamoto in December 1635.

Related Articles

Researchers reveal the 4,500-year-old network of funerary avenues in Arabian Peninsula

15 January 2022

15 January 2022

Archaeologists from the University of Western Australia (UWA) have determined that people living in ancient northwest Arabia built long-distance “funerary...

A Celtiberian city more than 2000 years old found in Spain

16 July 2023

16 July 2023

The Polytechnic University of Madrid announced the discovery of a Roman camp and the Celtiberian city of Titiakos in the...

New Discoveries of Sanxingdui Ancient City to be Announced

19 March 2021

19 March 2021

Sanxingdui, which literally means “Stacks of Three Stars”, is a cultural relic of the Kingdom of Shu in ancient China....

Researchers discover America’s oldest mine

23 May 2022

23 May 2022

Archaeological digs headed by Wyoming’s state archaeologist and including University of Wyoming experts have revealed that people began producing red...

1,500-year-old baptistery found in Kadı Castle-Anaia Mound in western Turkey

3 December 2021

3 December 2021

A baptistery, estimated to have been built in the 5th century AD, was unearthed in the Kadı Castle-Anaia Mound in...

Rock Ship of Masuda, Japan’s mysterious monolith

17 April 2023

17 April 2023

Located in the Takaichi District of Nara Prefecture, Japan, the village of Asuka is famous for its mysterious stones. The...

Enigmas Roman Dodecahedron Uncovered by Amateur Archaeologists in the UK

24 January 2024

24 January 2024

Amateur archaeologists have unearthed a striking Roman dodecahedron in the serene countryside of Norton Disney, England, a mysterious class of...

Archaeologists Uncover Rare Trojan War-Era Armor from 1200 BCE in Czechia

22 July 2025

22 July 2025

A remarkable archaeological discovery in South Moravia has brought new insights into Bronze Age Europe and its warrior elites. The...

Scenes of Warriors from 6th Century BC on a Slate Plaque Discovered at Tartessian Site in Spain

6 June 2024

6 June 2024

Archaeologists representing Spain’s National Research Council (CSIC) excavating at the archaeological site of Casas del Turunuelo have uncovered a slate...

Ancient ceremonial chariot found in Pompeii

27 February 2021

27 February 2021

The Archaeological Park announced that a gorgeous Roman chariot was found “almost intact” near Pompeii, where it was buried, calling...

A 7,500-year-old settlement has been discovered in Turkey’s Domuztepe Mound

11 September 2021

11 September 2021

During the most recent excavations at Domuztepe Mound in the Türkoğlu district of southern Turkey’s Kahramanmaraş province, a settlement and...

On the eastern shore of the Marmara Sea, off the coast of Yalova, a 1700-year-old Shipwreck was discovered

23 August 2023

23 August 2023

A 1700-year-old shipwreck was discovered during maritime police training dives in the province of Yalova, located on the east coast...

Researchers Say that Neanderthals Had the Same Hearing Capacity as Humans

1 March 2021

1 March 2021

Virtual reconstructions of Neanderthal ears show that had the same physical capacity for hearing as modern humans, and by inference...

Israeli researchers uncover earliest evidence silver used as currency in Levant

9 January 2023

9 January 2023

On Sunday, Israeli archaeologists revealed that they had found the earliest proof of silver being used as money in the...

19 funerary tombs from Roman times were discovered in Tartus, Syria

27 May 2022

27 May 2022

During search and excavation operations in the archaeological area of Amrit in Tartus, Syria, a joint excavation team from the...