Database: The Nanatsumatsu Incident

In 1579, Oda Nobunaga had 36 people from the immediate family of Araki Murashige, and his relatives, beheaded in Kyoto. This was after having 122 ladies-in-waiting crucified and burning 388 women and 124 men to death for the crime of being in their service at Nanatsumatsu, near Amagasaki. This massacre was carried out to punish the Araki who had fled from Arioka to Amagasaki Castle and abandoned these people; the chief vassal who had been guarding Arioka Castle after Araki's escape promised to persuade Araki to surrender Amagasaki Castle in exchange for the lives of these people when Nobunaga's army attacked Arioka, but he failed to persuade Araki and fled, leaving the hostages abandoned.

It was Nobunaga's style to proclaim the corruption of enemies, as he did for the monks of Enryaku-ji on Mount Hiei (Hiei-zan) and the members of ikki of Nagashima in Ise Province. Nobunaga used this technique to expose the inability of his enemies to protect their vassals and the inhabitants of their territory. In a famous example of this strategy, he set fire to the northern part of Kyoto in 1573 to damage the prestige of Ashikaga Yoshiaki and force this shōgun to reconcile with him.