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played a major role in the unification of Japan after the Warring States period (Sengoku jidai). He was actually the first of the three great "unifiers" of Japan. The other two were Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu who followed in Nobunaga's footsteps. ....

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.... powerful from the start. He was born in 1934 in Nagoya into an obscure family. His family was a sublineage of a deputy military governor (shugodai) house in Owari Province since about 1400. Though his father Nobuhide was a vassal of the Kiyosu branch of the Oda, he was actually a sengoku daimyo. The Oda were shugodai of Owari's lower four districts. As the lord of Nagoya Castle, he had the power to compete with daimyo of neighboring provinces. He made peace with Saito Dosan (neighboring daimyo) by marrying Nobunaga to Dosan's daughter. Nobuhide's abrupt death from a disease in 1551 left Nobunaga to fill his shoes at the age of seventeen. At ....