Itsuse- Japanese DemigodDemigod

The Eastern Expedition

Itsuse no Mikoto was the eldest of four brothers born to Ugayafukiaezu no Mikoto and Tamayori-hime, herself a daughter of the sea god Watatsumi. As the senior prince, Itsuse initially led the expedition eastward from Hyūga in Tsukushi (Kyushu), seeking fertile lands to establish a new domain. The brothers advanced along the Inland Sea, gathering warriors and allies as they traveled.

When the expedition reached the region of Naniwa and advanced inland toward the mountains at Kusaka, they encountered fierce resistance from Nagasunehiko, a powerful local chieftain who commanded the approaches to the Yamato plain. The battle went badly. Itsuse was struck by an arrow in the hand during the fighting. Wounded and forced to withdraw, he recognized the reason for their defeat: as descendants of the sun goddess Amaterasu, they had been fighting eastward, directly into the sun, and this reversal of the proper cosmic order had brought them ill fortune.

Death and Its Consequence

Itsuse declared that they must not advance against the sun but should instead circle around to attack from the east, with the sun at their backs. The expedition retreated southward by sea, rounding the Kii Peninsula. But Itsuse's wound proved mortal. According to the Kojiki, he died at the sea of Chinu (near modern Izumi), lamenting that he, a warrior of divine blood, should fall to the arrow of a lesser foe. The Nihon Shoki places his death at Kamiyama in Kii Province.

His death transferred leadership to his younger brother Kamu-Yamato-Iware-Biko, the future Emperor Jimmu, who completed the long southern circuit and eventually conquered Yamato by approaching from the east. Itsuse's strategic insight, bought at the cost of his life, became the turning point of the entire founding narrative. His grave is traditionally identified at Kamayama in Wakayama Prefecture.