Competitions

Honinbo

hoh-NEEN-boh

Citation Formats

General Reference

Sport and Games Atlas. "Honinbo." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://dev-sport.interactiveatlas.org/competitions/honinbo.

APA Style

Sport and Games Atlas. (n.d.). Honinbo. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://dev-sport.interactiveatlas.org/competitions/honinbo

BibTeX

@misc{sportandgamesatlas-honinbo,
  author = {Sport and Games Atlas},
  title = {Honinbo},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://dev-sport.interactiveatlas.org/competitions/honinbo},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

The Honinbo is Japan's oldest continuously contested go title tournament, inaugurated in 1941 following the death of the twenty-first hereditary head of the Honinbo house, a lineage of professional go players founded in the late sixteenth century by the Buddhist priest Honinbo Sansa (1559 to 1623). The modern tournament, sponsored today by the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper, carries the historical house's name and lineage rather than being a competition its earlier members personally entered.

Facts

Founding Year

1941 1

Founding Date

1941-07-18 2

Date the deciding round of the first Honinbo title tournament concluded, a three game match played 15, 17 and 18 July 1941 in which Sekiyama Riichi was confirmed as the first titleholder under the new Nihon Ki-in system; the tournament itself had begun in 1939.

Frequency

Annual. 1

Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

Honinbo Shusaku

Shusaku (1829-1862) was a celebrated player of the historical Honinbo go house in Edo-period Japan, generations before the modern annual Honinbo title tournament of the same name was established in 1941; the tournament continues the house's name and lineage rather than a competition he personally entered.

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica