Ishikawa Goemon
Encyclopedia
was a semi-legendary Japan
ese outlaw
hero who stole gold and valuables and gave them to the poor. Goemon is notable for being boiled alive
along with his son in public after a failed assassination
attempt on the civil war-era warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi
. A large iron kettle-shaped bathtub is now called a goemonburo ("Goemon bath"). His legend continues to live on, often with greatly exaggerated ninja
skills, in contemporary Japanese popular culture
.
, his background and origins have been widely speculated upon. In his first appearance in the historical annals, in the 1642 biography of Hideyoshi
, Goemon was referred to simply as a thief. As his legend became popular, various anti-authoritarian
exploits were attributed to him, including a supposed assassination attempt against the Oda clan
warlord Oda Nobunaga
.
There are many versions of Goemon's background and accounts of his life. According to one of them, he was born as Sanada Kuranoshin in 1558 to a samurai
family in service of the powerful Miyoshi clan
in Iga Province
. In 1573, when his father (possibly Ishikawa Akashi;) was killed by the men of Ashikaga shogunate
(in some versions his mother was also killed), the 15-year-old Sanada swore revenge and began training the arts of Iga
ninjutsu
under Momochi Sandayu (Momochi Tamba). He was however forced to flee when his master discovered Sanada's romance with one of his mistresses (but not before stealing a prized sword from his teacher). Some other sources state his name as Gorokizu (五郎吉) and say he came from Kawachi Province
and was not a nukenin (runaway ninja) at all. He then moved to the neighbouring Kansai region, where he formed and led a band of thieves and bandits as Ishikawa
Goemon
, robbing the rich feudal lords, merchants and clerics, and sharing the loot with the oppressed peasants. According to another version, which also attributed a failed poisoning attempt on Nobunaga's life to Goemon, he was forced to become a robber when the ninja networks were broken up.
There are also several conflicting accounts of Goemon's public execution in front of the main gate of the Buddhist
temple Nanzen-ji
in Kyoto
, including but not limited to the following ones:
Even the very date of his death is uncertain, as some records say this took place in summer, while another dates it at October 8 (that is after middle of Japanese autumn). Before he died, Goemon wrote a famous farewell poem, saying that no matter what, there always shall be thieves. A tombstone dedicated to him is located in Daiunin temple in Kyoto.
Ishikawa Goemon is the subject of many kabuki
plays. The only one still in performance today is Kinmon Gosan no Kiri (The Golden Gate and the Paulownia
Crest), a five-act play written by Namiki Gohei
in 1778. The most famous act is "Sanmon Gosan no Kiri" ("The Temple Gate and the Paulownia Crest") in which Goemon is first seen sitting on top of the Sanmon
gate at Nanzen-ji. He is smoking an over-sized silver pipe called a kiseru
and exclaims "The spring view is worth a thousand gold pieces, or so they say, but 'tis too little, too little. These eyes of Goemon rate it worth ten thousand!" Goemon soon learns that his father, So Sokei, was killed by Mashiba Hisayoshi (a popular kabuki alias for Toyotomi Hideyoshi) and he sets off to avenge his father's death. He also appeared in the famous tale of the Forty-seven Ronin
(first staged also in 1778). In 1992 Goemon also appeared in the kabuki series of Japanese postage stamps.
There are generally two ways in which Goemon has been most often portrayed in the modern popular culture
: either a young, slender ninja, or a powerfully-built, hulking Japanese bandit. Goemon is the titular character of the long-running Legend of the Mystical Ninja (Ganbare Goemon) series of comedy-fantasy video games, as well as an anime series based on it, and was the subject of Tomoyoshi Murayama
's Shinobi no Mono novels, which in the 1960s became a film series starring Ichikawa Raizō VIII as Ishikawa in the first three of its installments (in the third one, known in English as Goemon Will Never Die, he is portrayed by Ichikawa Raizō VIII, and escapes execution while another man is bribed to be boiled in his place), and of the manga series Kaze ga Gotoku
. He also appears as a player character
in Samurai Warriors
(where he is a self-proclaimed king of thieves, wielding a giant mace and a handheld cannon, with non-playable appearances in other games in the series) and in the games Blood Warrior
, Kessen III
, Ninja Master's -Haoh-Ninpo-Cho- (as a giant bandit hero, also carrying a cannon and seeking to plunder Nobunaga's castle) and Throne of Darkness
(where he was spared by Tokugawa Ieyasu
on the condition that he would join the onimitsu
). He was also a subject of silent films such as Ishikawa Goemon Ichidaiki (1912) and Ishikawa Goemon (1920) as well as the 1930 comedy short film Ishikawa Goemon no Hoji, was the villain in the film Torawakamaru the Koga Ninja
, and appeared in the taiga drama
series Hideyoshi. In 2009, a historical-fantasy version of Goemon's story was shown in the film Goemon
, where he is portrayed by Yosuke Eguchi
and unusually shown as Nobunaga's most faithful follower and a friend/rival of the ninja Kirigakure Saizō
(both of them being students of Hattori Hanzō
), and whose own follower is Sarutobi Sasuke
. He also appeared in a chapter/episode of the manga/anime Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo as a member of the Former Maruhage Empire. Here, he's a commander of otherworldly beasts until their affection was bought by series character Don Patch. Don Patch also subjects Goemon to being boiled alive twice. He makes one more small apearance in a later chapter asking about the release dtae of Legend of the Mystical Ninja saying he can beat that game.
Characters inspired by or nicknamed after Goemon play roles in the tokusatsu
series Kamen Rider X
, in the film Abare Goemon: Rise Against the Sword (played by Toshirô Mifune
) and in the manga Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms
. GOEMON was also a nickname of a Japanese hardcore wrestler
in the Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling
and the method of poison delivery sometimes attributed to Goemon when he supposedly tried to kill Nobunaga has been featured in the film You Only Live Twice
(in an attempt to assassinate the sleeping James Bond
, killing the ninja Bond girl Aki
instead). The character Goemon Ishikawa XIII
of the manga and anime series Lupin III
, first introduced also in the 1960s, is purported to be Ishikawa Goemon's descendant (the opening sequence in the TV special Burn, Zantetsuken! shows Goemon Ishikawa XIII weeping while watching the famed kabuki performance based on his ancestor's life). He is also the ancestor of the titular character of the anime series Divergence Eve: Misaki Chronicles, appearing in two episodes.
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese outlaw
Outlaw
In historical legal systems, an outlaw is declared as outside the protection of the law. In pre-modern societies, this takes the burden of active prosecution of a criminal from the authorities. Instead, the criminal is withdrawn all legal protection, so that anyone is legally empowered to persecute...
hero who stole gold and valuables and gave them to the poor. Goemon is notable for being boiled alive
Boiling to death
Death by boiling is a method of execution in which a person is killed by being immersed in a boiling liquid such as water or oil. While not as common as other methods of execution, boiling to death has been used in many parts of Europe and Asia...
along with his son in public after a failed assassination
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
attempt on the civil war-era warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi
Toyotomi Hideyoshi
was a daimyo warrior, general and politician of the Sengoku period. He unified the political factions of Japan. He succeeded his former liege lord, Oda Nobunaga, and brought an end to the Sengoku period. The period of his rule is often called the Momoyama period, named after Hideyoshi's castle...
. A large iron kettle-shaped bathtub is now called a goemonburo ("Goemon bath"). His legend continues to live on, often with greatly exaggerated ninja
Ninja
A or was a covert agent or mercenary of feudal Japan specializing in unorthodox arts of war. The functions of the ninja included espionage, sabotage, infiltration, and assassination, as well as open combat in certain situations...
skills, in contemporary Japanese popular culture
Japanese popular culture
Japanese popular culture not only reflects the attitudes and concerns of the present but also provides a link to the past. Japanese cinema, cuisine, television programs, manga, and music all developed from older artistic and literary traditions, and many of their themes and styles of presentation...
.
Biography
There is little historical information on Goemon's life, and as he has become a folk heroFolk hero
A folk hero is a type of hero, real, fictional, or mythological. The single salient characteristic which makes a character a folk hero is the imprinting of the name, personality and deeds of the character in the popular consciousness. This presence in the popular consciousness is evidenced by...
, his background and origins have been widely speculated upon. In his first appearance in the historical annals, in the 1642 biography of Hideyoshi
Toyotomi Hideyoshi
was a daimyo warrior, general and politician of the Sengoku period. He unified the political factions of Japan. He succeeded his former liege lord, Oda Nobunaga, and brought an end to the Sengoku period. The period of his rule is often called the Momoyama period, named after Hideyoshi's castle...
, Goemon was referred to simply as a thief. As his legend became popular, various anti-authoritarian
Authoritarianism
Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
exploits were attributed to him, including a supposed assassination attempt against the Oda clan
Oda clan
The was a family of Japanese daimyo who were to become an important political force in the unification of Japan in the mid-16th century. Though they had the climax of their fame under Oda Nobunaga and fell from the spotlight soon after, several branches of the family would continue on as daimyo...
warlord Oda Nobunaga
Oda Nobunaga
was the initiator of the unification of Japan under the shogunate in the late 16th century, which ruled Japan until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. He was also a major daimyo during the Sengoku period of Japanese history. His opus was continued, completed and finalized by his successors Toyotomi...
.
There are many versions of Goemon's background and accounts of his life. According to one of them, he was born as Sanada Kuranoshin in 1558 to a samurai
Samurai
is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...
family in service of the powerful Miyoshi clan
Miyoshi clan
The Miyoshi clan is a Japanese family descended from Emperor Seiwa and the Minamoto clan . They were a cadet branch of the Ogasawara clan and the Takeda clan....
in Iga Province
Iga Province
was an old province of Japan in the area that is today western Mie Prefecture. It was sometimes called . Iga bordered on Ise, Ōmi, Yamato, and Yamashiro Provinces.-Geography:...
. In 1573, when his father (possibly Ishikawa Akashi;) was killed by the men of Ashikaga shogunate
Ashikaga shogunate
The , also known as the , was a Japanese feudal military regime, ruled by the shoguns of the Ashikaga clan.This period is also known as the Muromachi period and gets its name from Muromachi Street of Kyoto where the third shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu established his residence...
(in some versions his mother was also killed), the 15-year-old Sanada swore revenge and began training the arts of Iga
Iga-ryu
Iga-ryū 伊賀流 is a historical school of ninjutsu. It became one of the two most well-known ninja schools in Japan, along with the Kōga-ryū. The Iga-ryū originated in the Iga Province in the area around the towns of Iga and Ueno...
ninjutsu
Ninjutsu
or may be:*the arts associated with espionage and assassination in feudal Japan, see Ninja*modern schools of martial arts claiming to be based in these traditions, see Modern Schools of Ninjutsu*fictional depictions, see Ninja in popular culture...
under Momochi Sandayu (Momochi Tamba). He was however forced to flee when his master discovered Sanada's romance with one of his mistresses (but not before stealing a prized sword from his teacher). Some other sources state his name as Gorokizu (五郎吉) and say he came from Kawachi Province
Kawachi Province
was a province of Japan in the eastern part of modern Osaka Prefecture. It originally held the southwestern area that was split off into Izumi Province...
and was not a nukenin (runaway ninja) at all. He then moved to the neighbouring Kansai region, where he formed and led a band of thieves and bandits as Ishikawa
Ishikawa
-Places:*Ishikawa Prefecture*Ishikawa-gun, district, Ishikawa Prefecture*Ishikawa-gun, district, Fukushima Prefecture*Ishikawa-machi, town, Fukushima Prefecture*Ishikawa-shi, city, Okinawa Prefecture-Real people:*Alexandre Ishikawa, Brazilian director...
Goemon
Goemon
Goemon is a Japanese given name which may refer to:* Ishikawa Goemon , a legendary ninja warrior and bandit hero notable for being boiled alive after a failed assassination attempt on Toyotomi Hideyoshi....
, robbing the rich feudal lords, merchants and clerics, and sharing the loot with the oppressed peasants. According to another version, which also attributed a failed poisoning attempt on Nobunaga's life to Goemon, he was forced to become a robber when the ninja networks were broken up.
There are also several conflicting accounts of Goemon's public execution in front of the main gate of the Buddhist
Buddhism in Japan
The history of Buddhism in Japan can be roughly divided into three periods, namely the Nara period , the Heian period and the post-Heian period . Each period saw the introduction of new doctrines and upheavals in existing schools...
temple Nanzen-ji
Nanzen-ji
, or Zuiryusan Nanzen-ji, formerly , is a Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto, Japan. Emperor Kameyama established it in 1291 on the site of his previous detached palace. It is also the headquarters of the Nanzen-ji branch of Rinzai Zen...
in Kyoto
Kyoto
is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...
, including but not limited to the following ones:
- Goemon tried to assassinate Hideyoshi to avenge the death of his wife Otaki and the capture of his son, Gobei. He sneaked into Fushimi CastleFushimi Castle', also known as Momoyama Castle or Fushimi-Momoyama Castle, is a castle in Kyoto's Fushimi Ward. The current structure is a 1964 replica of the original built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi.-History:...
and entered Hideyoshi's room but knocked a bell off a table. The noise awoke the guards and Goemon was captured. He was sentenced to death by being boiled alive in an iron cauldron along with his very young son, but was able to save his son by holding him above the oil. His son was then forgiven. - Goemon wanted to kill Hideyoshi because he was a despotDespotismDespotism is a form of government in which a single entity rules with absolute power. That entity may be an individual, as in an autocracy, or it may be a group, as in an oligarchy...
. When he entered Hideyoshi's room, he was detected by a mystical incense burner. He was executed on August 24 along with his whole family by being boiled in oil. - Goemon at first has tried to save his son from the heat by holding him high above, but then suddenly plunged him deep into the boiling oil to kill him as quickly as possible. Then he stood with the body of the boy held high in the air in defiance of his enemies, until he eventually succumbed to pain and injuries and sank in the pot.
Even the very date of his death is uncertain, as some records say this took place in summer, while another dates it at October 8 (that is after middle of Japanese autumn). Before he died, Goemon wrote a famous farewell poem, saying that no matter what, there always shall be thieves. A tombstone dedicated to him is located in Daiunin temple in Kyoto.
In popular culture
Kabuki
is classical Japanese dance-drama. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate make-up worn by some of its performers.The individual kanji characters, from left to right, mean sing , dance , and skill...
plays. The only one still in performance today is Kinmon Gosan no Kiri (The Golden Gate and the Paulownia
Paulownia
Paulownia is a genus of from 6 to 17 species of plants in the monogeneric family Paulowniaceae, related to and sometimes included in the Scrophulariaceae. They are native to much of China, south to northern Laos and Vietnam, and long cultivated elsewhere in eastern Asia, notably in Japan and Korea...
Crest), a five-act play written by Namiki Gohei
Namiki Gohei
Namiki Gohei was the name of four Japanese Kabuki actors and playwrights. Only two of them were related; in Japan, it was common for artists and writers to take the name of predecessors whom they admired....
in 1778. The most famous act is "Sanmon Gosan no Kiri" ("The Temple Gate and the Paulownia Crest") in which Goemon is first seen sitting on top of the Sanmon
Sanmon
A , also called is the most important gate of a Japanese Zen Buddhist temple, and is part of the Zen shichidō garan, the group of buildings that forms the heart of a Zen Buddhist temple. It can be however often found in temples of other denominations too...
gate at Nanzen-ji. He is smoking an over-sized silver pipe called a kiseru
Kiseru
is a Japanese smoking pipe traditionally used for smoking kizami, a finely shredded tobacco product resembling human hair.The word kiseru comes from the Khmer word "ksher"....
and exclaims "The spring view is worth a thousand gold pieces, or so they say, but 'tis too little, too little. These eyes of Goemon rate it worth ten thousand!" Goemon soon learns that his father, So Sokei, was killed by Mashiba Hisayoshi (a popular kabuki alias for Toyotomi Hideyoshi) and he sets off to avenge his father's death. He also appeared in the famous tale of the Forty-seven Ronin
Forty-seven Ronin
The revenge of the , also known as the Forty-seven Samurai, the Akō vendetta, or the took place in Japan at the start of the 18th century...
(first staged also in 1778). In 1992 Goemon also appeared in the kabuki series of Japanese postage stamps.
Popular culture
Popular culture is the totality of ideas, perspectives, attitudes, memes, images and other phenomena that are deemed preferred per an informal consensus within the mainstream of a given culture, especially Western culture of the early to mid 20th century and the emerging global mainstream of the...
: either a young, slender ninja, or a powerfully-built, hulking Japanese bandit. Goemon is the titular character of the long-running Legend of the Mystical Ninja (Ganbare Goemon) series of comedy-fantasy video games, as well as an anime series based on it, and was the subject of Tomoyoshi Murayama
Tomoyoshi Murayama
was a Japanese artist, playwright and drama producer active during the Showa period of Japan.-Early life:Murayama was born in the Kanda Suehiro district of Tokyo. His father, who was a medic in the Imperial Japanese Navy, died when he was nine years old. His mother became a fervent Christian after...
's Shinobi no Mono novels, which in the 1960s became a film series starring Ichikawa Raizō VIII as Ishikawa in the first three of its installments (in the third one, known in English as Goemon Will Never Die, he is portrayed by Ichikawa Raizō VIII, and escapes execution while another man is bribed to be boiled in his place), and of the manga series Kaze ga Gotoku
Kaze ga Gotoku
is a manga series by . It was originally serialized in Weekly Shōnen Champion since October 2008 and is currently still in serialization...
. He also appears as a player character
Player character
A player character or playable character is a character in a video game or role playing game who is controlled or controllable by a player, and is typically a protagonist of the story told in the course of the game. A player character is a persona of the player who controls it. Player characters...
in Samurai Warriors
Samurai Warriors
is the first title in the series of video games created by Koei's Omega Force team based loosely around the Sengoku period of Japanese history and it is a spinoff of the Dynasty Warriors series...
(where he is a self-proclaimed king of thieves, wielding a giant mace and a handheld cannon, with non-playable appearances in other games in the series) and in the games Blood Warrior
Blood Warrior
Blood Warrior, known in Japan as , is a 1994 fighting arcade game developed by Atop and published by Kaneko. It is the successor to the 1992 fighting arcade game, Shogun Warriors, also developed by Atop and published by Kaneko...
, Kessen III
Kessen III
is a PlayStation 2 video-game produced by Koei and is based on the life of Oda Nobunaga.-Historical background:The game's time frame is roughly between the years 1550 to 1590...
, Ninja Master's -Haoh-Ninpo-Cho- (as a giant bandit hero, also carrying a cannon and seeking to plunder Nobunaga's castle) and Throne of Darkness
Throne of Darkness
Throne of Darkness is a Japanese-themed action-oriented computer role-playing game released in 2001 by Sierra Entertainment, a subsidiary of Vivendi Universal. Players control up to four different samurai at a time...
(where he was spared by Tokugawa Ieyasu
Tokugawa Ieyasu
was the founder and first shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan , which ruled from the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Ieyasu seized power in 1600, received appointment as shogun in 1603, abdicated from office in 1605, but...
on the condition that he would join the onimitsu
Oniwabanshu
The was a group of onmitsu government-employed undercover agents established by the 8th Tokugawa shogun, Tokugawa Yoshimune . They are sometimes described as "ninja".- History :...
). He was also a subject of silent films such as Ishikawa Goemon Ichidaiki (1912) and Ishikawa Goemon (1920) as well as the 1930 comedy short film Ishikawa Goemon no Hoji, was the villain in the film Torawakamaru the Koga Ninja
Torawakamaru the Koga Ninja
is a black-and-white Japanese film directed by Tadashi Sawashima....
, and appeared in the taiga drama
Taiga drama
is the name NHK gives to the annual, year-long historical fiction television series it broadcasts in Japan. Beginning in 1963 with the black-and-white Hana no Shōgai, starring kabuki actor Onoe Shōroku and Takarazuka star Awashima Chikage, the network has hired a producer, director, writer, music...
series Hideyoshi. In 2009, a historical-fantasy version of Goemon's story was shown in the film Goemon
Goemon (film)
Goemon is a 2009 Japanese historical fantasy film written and directed by Kazuaki Kiriya. It is loosely based on the story of Ishikawa Goemon, a legendary outlaw hero who stole valuables from the rich and gave them to the poor...
, where he is portrayed by Yosuke Eguchi
Yōsuke Eguchi
is a Japanese poet, actor and singer, who most recently starred in 2009 Japanese film Goemon. Since 1986, he as appeared in a number of television series and movies. He is married to the actress and pop star Chisato Moritaka, with whom he has a son and a daughter....
and unusually shown as Nobunaga's most faithful follower and a friend/rival of the ninja Kirigakure Saizō
Kirigakure Saizo
' was a legendary ninja of the final phase of the Japanese civil war. In the folklore he is one of the Sanada Ten Braves, and next to Sarutobi Sasuke, he is the most recognized of the Ten....
(both of them being students of Hattori Hanzō
Hattori Hanzo
, also known as , was a famous samurai and ninja master of the Sengoku era, credited with saving the life of Tokugawa Ieyasu and then helping him to become the ruler of united Japan. Today, he is often a subject of modern popular culture.-Biography:...
), and whose own follower is Sarutobi Sasuke
Sarutobi Sasuke
was a famous ninja in Japanese folklore. He is generally believed to be a Meiji period fictional creation based on the historical ninja ', although some argue for his actual existence.- In folklore :...
. He also appeared in a chapter/episode of the manga/anime Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo as a member of the Former Maruhage Empire. Here, he's a commander of otherworldly beasts until their affection was bought by series character Don Patch. Don Patch also subjects Goemon to being boiled alive twice. He makes one more small apearance in a later chapter asking about the release dtae of Legend of the Mystical Ninja saying he can beat that game.
Characters inspired by or nicknamed after Goemon play roles in the tokusatsu
Tokusatsu
is a Japanese term that applies to any live-action film or television drama that usually features superheroes and makes considerable use of special effects ....
series Kamen Rider X
Kamen Rider X
, translated as Masked Rider X, is a Japanese tokusatsu superhero television series. It was broadcast in 1974 on NET . It is the third entry in the Kamen Rider Series of tokusatsu shows...
, in the film Abare Goemon: Rise Against the Sword (played by Toshirô Mifune
Toshiro Mifune
Toshirō Mifune was a Japanese actor who appeared in almost 170 feature films. He is best known for his 16-film collaboration with filmmaker Akira Kurosawa, from 1948 to 1965, in works such as Rashomon, Seven Samurai, Throne of Blood, and Yojimbo...
) and in the manga Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms
Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms
is a one-volume manga written and illustrated by Fumiyo Kōno. The two connected stories were first published in Japan by Futabasha in Weekly Manga Action in 2003 and 2004, then collected in a single tankōbon volume in 2004. The stories about a family of survivors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima...
. GOEMON was also a nickname of a Japanese hardcore wrestler
Hardcore wrestling
Hardcore wrestling is a form of professional wrestling that eschews traditional concepts of match rules in favor of matches that take place in unusual environments, using foreign objects that are not normally permitted...
in the Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling
Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling
Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling was a Japanese professional wrestling promotion founded on July 28, 1989 by Atsushi Onita that specialized in hardcore wrestling involving weapons such as barbed wire and fire. They held their first show on October 6, 1989...
and the method of poison delivery sometimes attributed to Goemon when he supposedly tried to kill Nobunaga has been featured in the film You Only Live Twice
You Only Live Twice (film)
You Only Live Twice is the fifth spy film in the James Bond series, and the fifth to star Sean Connery as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. The film's screenplay was written by Roald Dahl, and loosely based on Ian Fleming's 1964 novel of the same name...
(in an attempt to assassinate the sleeping James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
, killing the ninja Bond girl Aki
Aki (James Bond)
Aki, played by Akiko Wakabayashi, is a fictional character in the 1967 James Bond film You Only Live Twice.- Creation :Aki does not appear in Ian Fleming's 1964 novel. She was originally named Suki in Roald Dahl's screenplay...
instead). The character Goemon Ishikawa XIII
Goemon Ishikawa XIII
is a fictional character created by Monkey Punch for his Lupin III series. Goemon is the thirteenth generation of renegade samurai, a descendant of the historical figure Ishikawa Goemon...
of the manga and anime series Lupin III
Lupin III
, also known as Lupin the 3rd, is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Kazuhiko Kato under the pen name of Monkey Punch. The story follows the adventures of a gang of thieves led by Arsène Lupin III, the grandson of Arsène Lupin, the gentleman thief of Maurice Leblanc's series of...
, first introduced also in the 1960s, is purported to be Ishikawa Goemon's descendant (the opening sequence in the TV special Burn, Zantetsuken! shows Goemon Ishikawa XIII weeping while watching the famed kabuki performance based on his ancestor's life). He is also the ancestor of the titular character of the anime series Divergence Eve: Misaki Chronicles, appearing in two episodes.
See also
- Hong Gildong
- Juraj JánošíkJuraj JánošíkJuraj Jánošík was a famous Slovak Carpathian Highwayman....
- Nezumi KozōNezumi KozoNezumi Kozō is the nickname of Nakamura Jirokichi , a Japanese thief and folk hero who lived in Edo during the Edo period.-Capture and tattoo:In 1822, he was caught and tattooed, and banished from Edo...
- Pancho VillaPancho VillaJosé Doroteo Arango Arámbula – better known by his pseudonym Francisco Villa or its hypocorism Pancho Villa – was one of the most prominent Mexican Revolutionary generals....
- Robin HoodRobin HoodRobin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes....