【67-6】最初の犠牲は対馬！ついに具体化するモンゴルの日本侵攻計画【COTEN RADIO モンゴル帝国襲来編6】

The Shogunate's Defense Preparations—From Land Registries to Debt Forgiveness

After the Mongols (Yuan dynasty) completed their grip on Goryeo, they set the invasion date in July 1274. The actual landing came three months later, in October. Having steeled itself for war after receiving a second, more belligerent letter from Kublai Khan, the Kamakura shogunate had already set preparations in motion.

Three specific measures were taken. First, it ordered the submission of **Otabumi (大田文)**, land registries documenting who held which plots and in what amounts. When investigators checked these records against reality, they found enormous discrepancies: estates had been subdivided among brothers through inheritance, and some nominal gokenin had effectively ceased to be gokenin after pledging or selling their land. Second, the shogunate banned further sale or transfer of land originally granted as a reward from the shogun. Third, it issued an edict allowing gokenin to reclaim land forfeited to pay debts—effectively authorizing debt default.

None of these measures carried real teeth. As historian Fukai observed, "governance was completely dysfunctional." Some gokenin heeded the orders; others ignored them, especially the further they were from Kamakura. These edicts were less law than proclamation.

Conventional vs. Revisionist History—Troop Numbers and the "Divine Wind"

Two competing accounts of the invasion exist. The conventional account puts Mongol forces at 20,000, Korean forces at more than 10,000, and the fleet at 900 warships. Professor Hattori of Kyushu University, however, argues the true figure was closer to 10,000—matching the scale of a force used in a later pacification campaign—a nearly threefold difference.

The single biggest revision concerns the **divine wind (kamikaze)**. The story that a typhoon destroyed the Mongol fleet and saved Japan appears in junior-high school textbooks, but virtually every historian today rejects it. What actually determined the outcome is the central question of this episode.

The First to Fall: Tsushima

The Mongol-Goryeo combined force left Happo (합포) on the southern tip of the Korean peninsula and **reached Tsushima in a single day**—roughly 80 kilometers away, only 50 kilometers from the peninsula's tip.

Tsushima was under the jurisdiction of the Shōni (少弐) clan, but the island's actual defense fell to the deputy military governor, **Sukekuni (助国)**. He commanded roughly 100 cavalry—around **300 fighters in total** including infantry—against a force numbering in the tens of thousands (at minimum 10,000 even in the revisionist account). They fought valiantly and were annihilated. The podcast compared them to "Leonidas and his 300 Spartans."

The Yuan forces burned Sasuura. Nichiren's letters record that women were gathered, had holes pierced through their hands, were strung on rope, and tied to the ships—though this is second-hand information and its accuracy remains uncertain. The opening sequence of the video game *Ghost of Tsushima* depicts this battle, showing the Mongol fleet crashing onto the shore.

Professor Hattori also notes that many Tsushima residents had long-standing ties with Goryeo, and whether island-wide intense fighting actually took place is debatable.

From Iki to Hakata Bay—An Unprecedented Call to Arms

Using Tsushima as a supply base, the Yuan forces spent roughly a week pushing on to **Iki**, where similar tragedy unfolded. In Hakata Bay, Kyushu gokenin detected the approaching fleet by the **large quantities of horse manure floating in the water**—the Mongols had transported horses by ship. (A historical scroll also confirms that Mongol cavalry horses had their tails wrapped and tied, apparently to keep them clean during the voyage.)

Upon receiving this report, the shogunate issued an extraordinary order: **all warriors—not just gokenin—were to fight**. In Hizen Province (roughly present-day Saga and Nagasaki), there were 279 warrior households, but only 72—about one-quarter—held formal vassal ties to the shogunate. The remaining three-quarters were ordinarily beyond its reach; the crisis was so severe that the shogunate appealed through nobles and religious institutions to bring them into the fight.

The long-term consequence was significant: warriors who distinguished themselves could be granted gokenin status as reward, giving the shogunate a mechanism to absorb fighters previously outside its lord-vassal network and deepen its centralization. It was through all of this that the Yuan-Goryeo combined forces finally landed at **Momochihara (百道原)** on the western shore of Hakata Bay.