Shinchō Kōki

Shinchō Kōki or Nobunaga Kōki (Japanese: 信長公記; lit. 'The Chronicle of Nobunaga') is a chronicle of Oda Nobunaga, a daimyo of Japan's Sengoku period. It is also called Shinchō Ki (信長記) or Nobunaga Ki. It was compiled after Nobunaga's death by Ōta Gyūichi (太田牛一), a vassal of Nobunaga, based on his notes and diary.

The original was written by about 1598. It consists of a total of 16 volumes, including the main 15 volumes and the first volume. The main volumes covers the 15 years from 1568, when Nobunaga entered Kyoto with Ashikaga Yoshiaki, the 15th shogun of the Muromachi Shogunate (later banished from Kyoto by Nobunaga), to 1582, when he died in the Honnō-ji Incident. The first volume summarizes his life from his childhood, when he was called "Kipphōshi", until he went to Kyoto. Each volume of the main series covers one year, and there are 15 volumes in total, covering 15 years of information. It is an excellent resource for learning about Oda Nobunaga, but research into him only began in earnest in Japan around 1965, which is a relatively recent development. So there are many things we don't understand.

The chronicle contains not only subjects related to Nobunaga, but also murders, human trafficking, corruption, document forgery, and other street topics not directly related to Nobunaga, providing an insight into the public mood of the time. Because it contains many stories that are unrelated to Nobunaga, and because the beginning of the first volume of the main story states, "This record is a record of the social conditions in which Oda Nobunaga lived from 1568 onwards," some have suggested that this document is a record of the society in which Nobunaga lived, and not just a record of Oda Nobunaga.