was a Japanese Buddhist monk of the Negoro-ji. He is credited with overseeing the manufacture of the first Japanese-made matchlock arquebus. He also established the of gunnery, the first school of gunnery in Japan.
Biography Tsuda Kazunaga was said to be a descendant of Kusunoki Masashige by way of (1470–1503).
In 1543, 15-year-old Tanegashima Tokitaka, lord of the island of Tanegashima, purchased two arquebuses from a pair of Portuguese adventurers whose junk had been driven off-course towards Japan by a storm at sea. Immediately a local blacksmith named was commissioned to reverse engineer the guns' matchlock firing mechanism, but he was unsuccessful and had to wait until a Portuguese gunsmith could be brought in to provide instruction.
According to the compiled in 1606, Tsuda Kazunaga purchased one of the arquebuses, becoming the owner of one of the only two European-style guns in Japan at the time. The other was retained by the Tanegashima clan. According to one version, Tsuda had been sent to acquire the gun by his older brother , an abbot of the Negoro-ji who was deeply interested in firearms.
After returning to the Negoro-ji, Tsuda turned the gun over to the resident blacksmith who succeeded in copying the matchlock mechanism and became the first gunsmith in Japan to manufacture European-style firearms. The Shibatsuji family later moved to Sakai where they became well known as firearms manufacturers.
Tsuda established the first gunnery troops of the Negoro-shū. He died in 1568.
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