page_title: Toyotomi Hideyoshi
section_title: Early life (1537–1558)
hierarchical_section_title: Toyotomi Hideyoshi / Early life (1537–1558)
caption_attribution_description: 日本語: 豊公誕生之地碑
context_page_description: Toyotomi Hideyoshi was a Japanese daimyō and politician of the late Sengoku period regarded as the second "Great Unifier" of Japan.
  Hideyoshi rose from a peasant background as a retainer of the prominent lord Oda Nobunaga to become one of the most powerful men in Japan. Hideyoshi succeeded Nobunaga after the Honnō-ji Incident in 1582 and continued Nobunaga's campaign to unite Japan that led to the closing of the Sengoku period. Hideyoshi became the de facto leader of Japan and acquired the prestigious positions of Chancellor of the Realm and Imperial Regent by the mid-1580s. Hideyoshi launched the Japanese invasions of Korea in 1592 to initial success, but eventual military stalemate damaged his prestige before his death in 1598. Hideyoshi's young son and successor Toyotomi Hideyori was displaced by Tokugawa Ieyasu at the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 which would lead to the founding of the Tokugawa Shogunate.
  Hideyoshi's rule covers most of the Azuchi–Momoyama period of Japan, partially named after his castle, Momoyama Castle.
context_section_description: Very little is known for certain about Toyotomi Hideyoshi before 1570, when he begins to appear in surviving documents and letters. His autobiography starts in 1577, but in it, Hideyoshi spoke very little about his past. 
  According to tradition, Hideyoshi was born on 17 March 1537 in Nakamura, Owari Province (present-day Nakamura Ward, Nagoya), in the middle of the chaotic Sengoku period under the collapsed Ashikaga Shogunate. Hideyoshi had no traceable samurai lineage, and his father Yaemon was an ashigaru – a peasant employed by the samurai as a foot soldier. Hideyoshi had no surname, and his childhood given name was Hiyoshi-maru (日吉丸) ("Bounty of the Sun") although variations exist. Yaemon died in 1543 when Hideyoshi was 7-years-old, the younger of two children, his sibling being an older sister.
  Many legends describe Hideyoshi being sent to study at a temple as a young man, but he rejected temple life and went in search of adventure. Under the name Kinoshita Tōkichirō (木下 藤吉郎), he first joined the Imagawa clan as a servant to a local ruler named Matsushita Yukitsuna (松下之綱). Hideyoshi traveled all the way to the lands of Imagawa Yoshimoto, the daimyō (feudal lord) based in Suruga Province, and served there for a time, only to abscond with a sum of money entrusted to him by Matsushita Yukitsuna.
caption: Nakamura Park in Nagoya, traditionally regarded as Hideyoshi's birthplace.
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