We have already helped bring one neglected player of the past back to life in this series - Yamamoto Genkichi. Now we resurrect yet another, probably even more substantial, contemporary: Hattori Inshuku.
Inshuku is not quite as neglected as Genkichi, probably because he founded the Hattori school, which was close to being a fifth official go family. He was allowed to participate in Castle Games, for example. Yet few people could place him in the pantheon of great players, even though his statuette would be one of the larger ones.
This is how the compiler of Zain Danso, Ando Nyoi, praised him:
"When Inshuku was still called Intetsu, people nicknamed him Demon Intetsu and his name was renowned in go circles. For his skill at go was hailed as undeniably that of a demon spirit. He was truly a star of the Bunsei and Tenpo eras. In the Kyoho and Horeki eras, shogi had Ito Sokan. Because his skill at the game had reached a spiritual level, people called him the Demon Sokan. These two men may be described as a matching pair of Demon Generals in go and shogi."
Inshuku was born in Horeki 11 (1761) as the son of Nogyo Tasuke in Esaki village in Mino Province, now a suburb of Ogaki City in Gifu Prefecture. He was apparently a gifted child, and, again according to Ando Nyoi:
"As a child he used to go to school at the Rikkoji temple in Danji and among the priests there was one who knew a little about go. One day he taught Inshuku how to play. This was his first step on the Way of Go, for being blessed with heavenly gifts he advanced considerably from game to game, and after several games even the priest was noticeably inferior to him. Having earned the sympathy of a friend of the priest, a rich merchant called Watanabe from Shibaharakita village in the same province, he was eventually able to set off with his encouragement on the road to studying in Edo. This was truly a case of sending someone into a lion's den. Inshuku went to Edo and entered the school of the 7th Inoue Inseki (Shuntatsu). By dint of his strenuous efforts day and night, at the age of 35 he was promoted to 6-dan in Kansei 8 (1796), and on the recommendation of the 8th Inseki (Intatsu) he was allowed to play in the Castle Games."
The final part of this encomium implies that Inshuku joined the Castle Games in 1796. In fact his first such game seems to have been with the 11th Hayashi, Genbi, 23 years later in Bunsei 2 (1819). The 8th Inseki did write a letter of recommendation - it is in the old records of the Inoue family - but there is no game record or other document extant which indicates that Inshuku took part in the Castle Games then.
The late years of the 10th Honinbo, Satsugen, that is the Kansei, Kyowa and Bunka eras (1789-1818), coincided with appreciable advances in the go world and a host of strong players appeared. The oldest ranking list of Japanese go players is General Handicapping List of Horeki 8 (1758), but that is really just a list of regional players, or semi-professionals.
The first list to focus on the four official families and to give all their pupils was the one by the famous poet Ota Tan (pen names Nanpo and Shokusanjin; 1749-1823) that appeared in his 50-volume essay collection Ichiwa Ichigen, this part appearing in Bunka 2 (1805).
The list was as follows, omitting the 2-dans and below (but the numbers are for all the dan players in the school):
Ota started his book in 1795, which probably explains why Inshuku (or Intetsu) is shown as 5-dan, and the province shown seems wrong, but the overall picture remains clear: there were 64 players that today would rank as professionals, around one fifth of the current total (interestingly the proportion relative to the total population - about 30 million then - remains about the same). And it can be seen that Inshuku was very much part of the upper stratum even in such a golden age.
Just before he became 6-dan, he was pitted against rising young star Miyashige Genjo, the future Honinbo, in several games over the period Kansei 6 and 7 (1794-5). With White Inshuku scored 5-7, and with Black he scored 3-0.
Against Genjo's famous rival Yasui Chitoku, Inshuku's score then was 3-2 with White and 2-1 with Black. No wonder he was seen as a demon.
Inshuku's effect on the go world went much wider, though.
The 9th Inseki, Shunsaku, died suddenly in the eighth month of Bunka 7 (1810). He had appointed an heir, Insa, from the same Yamazaki family as Honinbo Dosaku. But there were problems that inhibited Insa from achieving the stature required as head of one of the official families. He was a retainer of the Karatsu domain and had already left Edo to serve the Mizuno family there. He was only 5-dan, and never got beyond 6-dan. Without a high-ranking leader, the Inoue family faced a great loss of prestige. It was Inshuku who rescued them.
Having been a pupil of Inseki VII, he saw it as his duty to take over responsibility for the Inoues' hopes for the next generation. He had a star pupil, who was to become Inoue Gen'an Inseki, future great rival of Honinbo Jowa, Inshuku had made him his pupil at the age of five with the distinctive honour of giving him his own original pupil name, Hattori Intetsu. On Insa's accession in 1810, Inshuku formally adopted his pupil and changed his name to Rittetsu. At the same time he brought up another gifted youngster, the future Hattori Yusetsu. Yusetsu was to take over the headship of the Hattori family on Inshuku's death, and he in turn was succeeded by Hattori Seitetsu, for whom Gen'an acted as teacher and so paid his dues to his teacher.
Both Yusetsu and Seitetsu reached 7-dan, the highest grade practicably available to them, and appeared in Castle Games. Such was the measure of the house that Inshuku built.
But Gen'an was the real star, and when the plea eventually came - as Inshuku knew it would - from Inseki X to make Gen'an his heir, the semi-official Hattori family duly deferred to the official Inoue family.
Inshuku himself was promoted to 7-dan in 1819, when he was 58. This is when he first appeared in Castle Games. There was no precedent for this - a player from outside the official families appearing before the Shogun. It came about with the support of the Inoue family, of course, but against strong opposition from the other families. The decisive factor appear to have been the mediation of Lord Kyogoku of Suo, the Commissioner of Shrines and Temples, who also had responsibility for the Imperial go and shogi offices. He successfully sought the Shogun's approval through Kyoyo, the chief priest of the Zojoji temple in Shiba. The priest was especially close to the Shogun's family, for many members of the Tokugawa dynasty were buried in his temple's precincts.
Inshuku himself referred to this in the preface to one of his books ("Now that in my unworthy late years, I have had the good fortune to be added to the extremities of the Imperial go institution..."), which seems to confirm that it was his first appearance, and that the reference in Zain Danso is misleading. But he was able to continue appearing for a further 18 years before he retired in 1836.
At a time when average life expectancy was about 43, he survived to the ripe old age of 81 in 1842.
Even that does not exhaust hs contributions to go, since he produced three valued books. The first was Ekiki Ekihan (more usually just known as Ekihan - Go Praxis), published in 1809 under the name Hattori Intetsu. It presents mainly fuseki positions but with some games. These include his 21-game match with Yamamoto Genkichi.
Onko Chishin Goroku, published in 1819, also under the name Hattori Intetsu (despite the publication date it was probably written in 1801), presented opening positions, problems and rather more games. The title refers to a Confucian saying and means "Go records [helping us] to respect the old to know the new."
Finally, under the name Hattori Inshuku, he published Okigo Jizai, a very large manual (510 pages) on handicap game openings, in 1824.
All of these were what we would now call best sellers. The latter, despite its bulk, also sold for an especially long time, probably because it was written specifically for amateurs, as is explained in its preface but as is also obvious from the unusual (at the time) presentation of variation diagrams.
Here is a selection of a dozen games by this remarkable man.
