Emperor Go-Daigo: From Oki Exile to Yoshino

When his plans were discovered in 1331, Emperor Go-Daigo quickly hid the Sacred Treasures in a secluded castle on Kasagiyama. He slipped out of the palace in August, shut himself inside Kasagi Temple and raised an army. It did not last: the shogunate's forces attacked, and by the following September the temple had fallen. The next year the emperor was sent into exile far from the capital.

In 1332 Go-Daigo was sent into exile on the Oki Islands, the same remote islands where Emperor Go-Toba had once been exiled. Tradition says he made his residence at Oki Kokubun-ji. The medieval chronicle Masukagami describes it as a temple called Kokubun-ji, set a little back from the shoreline. From here, a year later, he would slip away to the mainland.

Location precision: Sources say only that he is "said to" have lodged here; the lodging is traditional, so the pin marks the temple.

In 1333 Go-Daigo escaped from Oki with the help of Nawa Nagatoshi and his family, and raised an army on Senjō Mountain in Hōki Province, also read Funanoue. The Oki governor, Sasaki Kiyotaka, attacked the mountain but failed and barely escaped with his life back to his own castle. Today the mountain has a park of cherry trees and a cherry festival every April.

Location precision: The pin marks the mountain; the sources do not name a single spot where the emperor's camp stood.

Visitor guidance: The mountain has a cherry park, and the cherry festival is held every April.

After his triumphal return to Kyoto, Go-Daigo took the throne back from Emperor Kōgon and began the Kenmu Restoration. In those years the court sat at the Reizei Tomikoji Palace. Impatient reforms, land-rights lawsuits and the exclusion of the samurai from politics caused much complaining, and his order began to fall apart. When Ashikaga's army entered Kyoto, the emperor fled to Mount Hiei; the palace burned in 1336.

Location precision: Go-Daigo's palace was the Reizei Tomikoji Palace; the pin marks Kyoto's present Imperial Palace as a stand-in for the capital.

In January 1337 Go-Daigo escaped the capital. The regalia he had handed to the Ashikaga were counterfeit, and he set up the Southern Court among the mountains of Yoshino. His temporary palace was set up at the Yoshimizu-in, with help from its priest. The site is now Yoshimizu Shrine, dedicated to Go-Daigo, and from its grounds you can see the cherries of Naka Senbon and Kami Senbon.

Location precision: Sources place the temporary palace at the Yoshimizu-in; the pin marks today's shrine.

Visitor guidance: The shrine stands on Mount Yoshino; its grounds look out over the cherry slopes.

On 18 September 1339 Go-Daigo abdicated at Yoshino in favour of his son, and he died without ever returning to Kyoto. He was buried on the hill behind the main hall of Nyoirin-ji. The Imperial Household Agency names the tomb Tō-no-o no misasagi.