Yoarashi Okinu
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c. 1845
Yoarashi Okinu | |
|---|---|
夜嵐 おきぬ | |
| Born | Harada Kinu (原田 きぬ) c. 1845 Various theories exist: Awa Province, Edo, or Jōgashima, Miura Peninsula, Japan |
| Died | March 28, 1872 (aged 27) Japan |
Cause of death | Execution by decapitation |
| Other names | Kamakura Koharu, Hanayo, Shingetsu-in |
| Citizenship | Japanese |
| Occupations | Geisha, poisoner |
| Years active | Late Edo period - early Meiji period |
| Known for | Poisoning Kobayashi Kinpei, and her sensationalized story. |
Criminal status | Executed |
| Children | 1 (by Arashi Rikaku) |
| Parent | Various theories exist. |
| Motive | Passion, jealousy, and possibly financial gain. |
| Conviction | Murder |
| Criminal charge | Murder by poisoning |
| Penalty | Death by decapitation |
Capture status | Arrested |
| Comments | Her story has been heavily fictionalized. |
| Details | |
| Victims | Kobayashi Kinpei |
| Date | March 2, 1871 |
| Country | Japan |
| Killed | 1 |
| Weapons | Poison |
Yoarashi Okinu (夜嵐 おきぬ, c. 1845[1] – March 28, 1872) is the moniker of Harada Kinu (原田 きぬ), who was a Japanese female poisoner and geisha and lived from the end of the Edo era to the beginning of the Meiji era. Her nickname Yoarashi means night-storm in Japanese.
Her early life is generally undocumented and has produced many ideas and opinion. Some sources assert that she was a daughter of a samurai of Awa Province, or she was born in Edo. There is another opinion that she was a daughter of Sajiro, a fisherman who lived on the island of Jōgashima at the tip of the Miura Peninsula. According to a non-fiction writer Atsushi Hachisu, she sold herself into geisha because her family was poor, and she worked as a geisha.[1] There is another opinion that she was an employee at the decorative collar shop in the Nakamise neighborhood in front of Sensō-ji.
As she was beautiful, people in the Edo longed for her. She became a mistress of Ōkubo Tadayori (大久保忠順) in the capital Edo.[1] He was the daimyō of the Karasuyama Domain in Shimotsuke Province, which was rated at thirty thousand koku. Ōkubo had a son, the successor to the Ōkubo family, by her. However, he hated her, and abandoned her in the Meiji Restoration.[1]
She became a mistress of Kobayashi Kinpei, but she paid for sex with kabuki actor Arashi Rikaku, and then fell in love with him, so she killed Kobayashi with poison on March 2, 1871. Rikaku harbored her but they were arrested. She was sentenced to death, and she was executed by decapitation after she had a child by Rikaku.
Rikaku was sentenced to 3 years in prison, and he was released in September 1874.[2] He became kabuki actor Ichikawa Gonjūrō after his release.