APEC’s Delegation from the Great Beyond: Castle’s Samurai Ghosts

Sharply dressed business executive Yoshimi Maeda does not look like the kind of person to worry about witches and warlocks.

But Maeda, insists that Osaka Castle is haunted, and he worries that, when Asia-Pacific leaders meet there today to approve a blueprint to open up trade in the region over the next 25 years, they may fall foul of its resident spirits.

“Legend has it that anybody who works in or near the castle will be cursed by evil spirits,” said Maeda, 30, who works in a skyscraper overlooking the medieval castle.

Local people have various theories about the origins of the ghosts that reportedly roam near the guest house and castle, originally built by peasant-turned-warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1583 before he unified feudal Japan seven years later.

Hiroshi Horii, an officer based at a police box in the shadow of the castle, reckons its spirits are the ghosts of defeated samurai and courtiers who committed hara-kiri ritual suicide--by plunging swords into their stomachs--after a famous battle in 1615.

Others insist that the castle and its grounds are haunted by the ghosts of samurai killed in 1665 when a thunderbolt hit the castle’s main tower, burning it to the ground.

And some local residents say the area was already haunted before the castle was even built. They say the area is frequented by the ghosts of monks and priests killed during a 1570-1580 siege of a giant temple that stood on the site of the castle.

Masanori Sumi, head priest at Hokoku Shrine on the castle’s grounds, said, either way, “the castle is a place of death.”