Satake Yoshinao (佐竹義直)
Yoshinao SATAKE (1612 - May 31, 1656) was a person in the Edo period. He was the fifth son of Yoshishige SATAKE (the eighteenth family head), a sengoku daimyo (Japanese territorial lord in the Sengoku period) in Hitachi Province. His real mother was from the Hosoya clan. His another name was Yoshitsugu. His childhood name was Shinwakamaru. His common name was Hikojiro.
Yoshinao was born as the fifth son of Yoshishige SATAKE after his father's death in 1612. He was adopted by Yoshikado SATAKE of the Northern House, one of four Satake families. In July 1621, he was adopted by Yoshinobu SATAKE(Ukyo no daibu) (Master of the Western Capital Offices), his eldest brother and the lord of Kubota Domain, Dewa Province. This was because Yoshinobu had no legitimate child. Moreover, Yoshihiro ASHINA, Sadataka IWAKI, and Nobuie TAGAYA (Nobutaka IWAKI) who were his other brothers and children of the lawful wife had been adopted by other families. Yoshinao had the privilege to have an audience with Shogun Hidetada TOKUGAWA the same year, on November 14, 1621.
He was disinherited on March 21, 1626. According to the 'History of the Satake family', Yoshinao fell asleep during seeing sarugaku (form of theater popular in Japan during the 11th to 14th centuries) and provoked his foster father Yoshinobu. Yoshinao departed Edo on March 23 and arrived in Akita on April 2. Soon he entered Ichijo-in Temple in the castle town and became a priest. He was allowed to leave Akita to climb up Koya-san Mountain on August 3, 1628. After that Yoshinao restored the Tacchu Sonju-in Temple of Ninna-ji Temple in Kyoto, and became a chief priest. According to the 'Total Genealogy of Satake clan of the Minamoto family', he died in the leap April 8, 1656 at the age of forty-seven (it is said that he was born in 1610). He had no lawful wife and children.
Moreover, it is said that he was conveniently named 'Yoshitsugu' in later years not to be mixed up with Yoshinao SATAKE, the family head of the Eastern House of Satake. It is written as 'Yoshinao' even in 'Kansei Choshu Shokafu' (genealogies of vassals in Edo Bakufu), the official genealogy of the bakufu. A father of the lawful wife of Shigetaka IWAKI, the second lord of the Kameda domain of Dewa Province (Edo period) can be raised as a confusing case. Though the lawful wife of Shigetaka IWAKI was a daughter of Yoshinao SATAKE, this is Yoshinao of the Eastern House of Satake (Genrokuro) and different from Yoshinao of the head family of Satake (Hikojiro) in this article.