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Honinbo

The story of go’s oldest tournament

THE EARLY YEARS

本因坊戦

by

John Fairbairn

From the GoGoD Archives

Buy the full book at gobooks.com

Description

The Honinbo Tournament is go’s oldest annual tournament. By trial and error it set the standards for every tournament since.

This book describes in detail how it came about, and goes carefully through each of the early years in the 1940s and 1950s, and each year’s changes. The games of each title match up to and including Term 6 are given with rich commentaries (32 games), showcasing also the most famous players and anecdotes featured in the highest level of go.

About the Author

Writer and translator John Fairbairn is one of the partnership with T Mark Hall that jointly produced the GoGoD (Games of Go on Disc) database and go encyclopaedia, now continued, after Mark’s untimely death in 2013, as Games of Go on Download (database only) – see website for details.

He has written or translated many go books, especially on historical aspects. He is a frequent guest at international seminars, and his paper on the game’s historical relations between China and England won first prize at the 2014 Hangzhou Weiqi Symposium.

He lives in London and has played go for fifty years.

Text (c) by John Fairbairn

Cover design (c) by Alison Fairbairn

All rights reserved.
Reproduction in whole or in part is prohibited.

Contents

Items not highlighted in the Contents page are available in the full version.

Introduction

Origins

Term 1
Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2
Title match, Game 3
Title match, Game 4
Title match, Game 5
Title match, Game 6

Term 2
Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2

Term 3
(First match)
Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2
Title match, Game 3
Title match, Game 4
Title match, Game 5
Title match, Game 6
(Second match)
Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2

Honinbo vs Fujisawa Kuranosuke, 1
Honinbo vs Fujisawa Kuranosuke, 2

Term 4
Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2
Title match, Game 3
Title match, Game 4
Title match, Game 5

Term 5
Yamabe-Hashimoto tengen game

Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2
Title match, Game 3
Title match, Game 4

Term 6
Title match, Game 1
Title match, Game 2
Title match, Game 3
Title match, Game 4
Kato-Habu game
Title match, Game 5
Title match, Game 6
Title match, Game 7

Honinbos and 8-dans Tournament

Honinbo title winners

Appendix – Books by John Fairbairn

Cover

Book description

About the author

Buy This Book

About Go Books

INTRODUCTION

In previous books I have surveyed the professional go world from Meiji times, that is the late 19th century, to after World War II. It has been a patchwork affair rather than a chronological survey, with the history of the era forming the background to detailed descriptions covering the careers of the likes of Honinbo Shuei, Honinbo Shusai and Go Seigen and their distinguished opponents.

There are still some additions to that period I would like to make (for example, Go’s matches with Iwamoto Kaoru and Hashimoto Utaro), but for the present I have decided to move on to the immediate post-war period, and to look at the world’s oldest, and still running, go tournament.

Japan’s Honinbo Tournament is that. This book describes how it came about, and then goes through each of the early years in detail. All the title-match games are given here with commentary. Several other landmark games are given for play-through. Although not given here, all the league and preliminary games mentioned, where they survive, are given in the GoGoD database, which is also incorporated in SmartGo Kifu.

Because it was the first, the Honinbo organisers had to discover how best to do it as they went along, and so there were many changes in format, komi and time allowances. The reasons for the changes are all explained here.

Because it was the main event, players saved up many fuseki and joseki novelties to spring on opponents in Honinbo title games. These too can be followed easily here as comprehensive commentaries on each and every title-match game are given.

This was the highest level of go and so of course features many famous players. Biographies and anecdotes are included.

Obviously the name of the tournament derives from the Honinbo family, the most prestigious of the families of the Edo period which served the Japanese shogun’s court. Then, the Honinbo was selected by the incumbent as his heir, and once that heir succeeded he remained as head of the family until death or retirement.

But here the focus is entirely on the modern title, which is awarded annually to the winner of a title match open to members, even foreign-born players, of one of the Japanese professional organisations.

The long history of this event, now in its 70th year as I write in 2015, has ensured a rich array of players, games, and anecdotes, which eventually I hope to cover in full, but the present book – complete in itself – spans only the initial six terms. The book can be viewed either as a reference work or as a continuous narrative that takes the reader through a fascinating period of professional go.

The commentaries are all based on professional opinions but have been tailored for easy reading, by adding background colour and by using the interactive SmartGo format, by any level of amateur players.

I believe that go commentaries reached their peak in the 1950s. Before that, from the 1920s when go publishing began to blossom, there was much trial and error as the best format was devised and new technical terms suitable for amateurs were coined.

Although the war interrupted the process, after the war, once economic recovery kicked in, there was a new, strong stimulus, and longer commentaries became common. Despite the emphasis on recovery, many activities were more leisurely then, and this was reflected in go. Since go was being developed as the national game, there was an unashamed stress on its intellectual aspects, and greater awareness of western culture provoked an interest, too, in go’s psychological aspects.

I have therefore plumped for a leisurely and discursive style which touches on all these aspects.

Treatment is not quite uniform as the war years restricted how much was written about games then, and some data (such as dates and times used) were even lost. But in general I have included many references to how long was spent on certain moves because available time affects the way even pros play. Older games with very long limits have a different feel from modern games. I felt it was interesting to remind readers of this by stressing the time element.

Similar considerations apply to changes in komi, of course, and I also thought it was worth charting the structural changes and the reasons behind them. After all, the Honinbo Tournament has probably influenced every other go event since it began.

A reminder that, to avoid figure clutter and as per a common convention, moves in game figures during commentary are generally shown numbered with repeated modulo 100, so that 101 will appear as 1, and 215 as 15, and so on. But within the text, the full move numbers are used.

Also, spoiler alert: if you prefer not to know the result of a match until you have played through the games, skip the introductory section for each term until you are ready. I have taken the view that the outcomes are generally known, and I believe most people would like the salient data for each term brought together in a single package, but a bypass is possible.

Similarly, after each title-game commentary I have repeated the game in a single figure “for review”. If you are just wanting to enjoy the Honinbo story chronologically – in which case (if you are like me) you may well also not want to know the result of each game until the last moment – it is probably best to dive into the commentary straightaway, because that is where the “colour” is. But if you are trying to improve, I gather from chess teachers that one very good procedure is to play through a game three times: first straight through without commentary (but ideally taking notes); second time compare the commentary with your own notes; lastly read through the game moves alone again, trying to recall as much as possible of the commentary.

But either way, the Honinbo Tournament offers the richest fare for every taste.

John Fairbairn
London
January 2015

TERM 5

The most distinctive features of this term were:

(1) the introduction into the preliminaries of a repêchage (double elimination) system in which a player survived until he scored two losses – this reflected concern that the strongest player had to be the Honinbo, and he should not be eliminated after one piece of possible bad luck;

(2) settling on a league as the way of finding the challenger; and

(3) a best-of-seven title match, all games with komi. The latter novelty in a sense had to be put on the back burner as Hashimoto Utaro took the title from Iwamoto Kaoru 4–0 (Iwamoto had not been in good form ever since his drubbing from Go Seigen in their ten-game match, even though it had finished over a year ago).

This, however, was naturally also a great fillip to the emerging Kansai go movement, whose separate presence naturally also became another permanent feature, though not until Term 6.

Yet another novelty, if minor, was the presence of famous novelist Hino Ashihei as an observer in the title match. This was the start of a tradition (since discontinued) of having men of letters reporting on the match for the Mainichi Shinbun. Kurahashi Takejiro covered Game 2, and when the match moved to Osaka, two writers from the Kansai stepped in.

5-dan Preliminary

At the start of the long road, each hopeful played three games, with ten hours each and 4½ komi. Those scoring two losses dropped out. There were six players from Tokyo and two from the Nihon Ki-in’s Kansai (Osaka) and Central (Nagoya) branches combined.

In the event of ties in the final placings, Oteai results were used.

In the course of this preliminary, Miyashita, Kajiwara and Sakai were promoted to 6-dan.

Round 1: Takahashi Shigeyuki beat Nakagawa Arata; Miyashita Shuyo beat Mukai Kazuo; Nakamura Yutaro beat Miwa Yoshiro; Koizumi Shigeo beat Kajiwara Takeo.

Round 2: Precise pairings not known, but Miyashita and Takahashi ended with two wins, Kajiwara, Nakamura, Mukai and Koizumi had 1–1. Miwa scored 0–2 and so dropped out.

Round 3: Again, precise details are lost (and only one game survives) but Miyashita, Kajiwara, Takahashi, Nakamura and Koizumi ended on 2–1. The last game was on 5 August 1949. Kajiwara and Takahashi were deemed to qualify for the 6 & 7-dan Preliminary.

From one surviving game it is known that there was, addition, a Kansai Preliminary, which also involved Central branch (Nagoya) players. The only known results are that Sakai Michiharu (from Nagoya and even by then 6-dan) beat Sumino Takeshi, Kubouchi Shuchi, Segawa Yoshio and Sometani Kazuo. He and Suzuki Kensho (= Suzuki Etsuo) thus qualified for the 6 & 7-dan Preliminary.

6 & 7-dan Preliminary

It started with fourteen players, and again those with two losses were to drop out. Time limits were once more ten hours each, 4½ komi.

Three rounds were played, as a result of which Hasegawa, Hayashi, Takagawa and Suzuki qualified for the league along with the three seeded 8-dans, Hashimoto Utaro, Fujisawa Kuranosuke and Kitani Minoru.

For the most part only pairings are known. The few results known are shown. Two games survive.

Round 1: Hayashi Yutaro 7-dan – Kajiwara Takeo 6-dan; Takagawa Kaku 7-dan beat Hasegawa Akira 7-dan; Mitsuhara Itaro 7-dan lost to Shimamura Toshihiro 6-dan; Hosokawa Senjin 7-dan beat Sakai Michiharu 6-dan; Shinohara Masami 6-dan beat Fukuda Masayoshi 6-dan; Takahashi Shigeyuki 6-dan – Suzuki Kensho 5-dan; Murashima Yoshinori 6-dan lost to Nabeshima Ichiro 6-dan.

Round 2: Hayashi – Nabeshima; Fukuda lost to Shimamura; Hasegawa beat Murashima; Shinohara – Suzuki; Mitsuhara Itaro lost to Kajiwara; Takagawa beat Sakai; Hosokawa – Takahashi.

By this stage, Mitsuhara, Fukuda, Murashima and Sakai had dropped out through scoring two losses.

Round 3: Takagawa – Nabeshima; Hayashi – Kajiwara; Shimamura – Takahashi; Hosokawa – Suzuki; Hasegawa beat Shinohara.

Challengers' League

Schedule summary

* The challengers' league spanned 19 October 1949 ~ 9 March 1950.

* Title match:

- Game 1: 28 March 1950 at the Nihon Ki-in, Takanawa, Tokyo

- Game 2: 7 April 1950 at the Nihon Ki-in, Takanawa, Tokyo

- Game 3: 20 April 1950 at the Kansai Ki-in, Saikudani, Tennoji-ku, Osaka

- Game 4: 26 April 1950 at the Kansai Ki-in, Saikudani, Tennoji-ku, Osaka

Title-match commentaries

Both Hashimoto and Iwamoto were of course fully introduced in their Term 3 encounter.

* Game 1

* Game 2

* Game 3

* Game 4

5th Honinbo Title Match, Game 1

Hashimoto Utaro (White) vs Iwamoto Kaoru

28~30 March 1950, at the Nihon Ki-in, Takanawa, Tokyo

Hashimoto was still evacuated to his hometown of Takarazuka. Nowadays a dormitory town for Osaka and Kobe, it was then still mainly a venue for tourists drawn by the spas and the hugely famous all-female Takarazuka Revue – think Folies Bergère or Ziegfeld Follies, or whatever is the polar opposite of kabuki!

But he was far from relaxing. As the strongest player in the Kansai (West Japan), the burden of leadership had been cast upon him.

The Nihon Ki-in had already opened their Kansai branch in August 1946. That was then in a leased building at Chikuzenbashi, a small bridge in the West ward of Osaka. Because most players then were still, like Hashimoto, billeted out in the countryside and suburbs, travel was a major obstacle to taking part in the Oteai. The Nihon Ki-in’s solution was to offer a Western Oteai in Osaka, and over thirty players took part. But at the same time they were trying to rebuild their Tokyo base and so levied half a million yen on the Kansai (to be collected from business leaders, of course).

Naturally enough, the Kansai players felt they needed money just as much as Tokyo and jibbed at sending such a large amount to their rivals. Their first counter-proposal was to split the money between Tokyo and Osaka. Tokyo went along with this, and so each player began fund raising. There was strong local support and so this was not actually too hard. In fact they raised one million yen – not a huge amount, perhaps, on the basis that a copy of Kido magazine cost 50 yen, although property prices were rather low.

But with the money collected, the mood changed, and not just among the players. Indeed, the main resistance was from business leaders. Osaka had been the economic powerhouse of Japan before the war and being looked down on by the politicians and civil servants in Tokyo had long been a source of resentment. This simmering rivalry with Tokyo flared up and the consensus became that if the money was to be given to Tokyo, then Tokyo had to use it in Osaka.

The upshot was that no money was sent to Tokyo and a new Kansai headquarters was built at Saikudani in the Tennoji ward of Osaka, by procuring a large house that had escaped war damage. Since a legal entity was required for that, the Nihon Ki-in gave the local players permission to form the Kansai Ki-in, with the official inauguration ceremony being held on 27 June 1948. In the summer of the following year, the Kansai Ki-in also began publishing its own magazine, originally called Go but soon renamed to Igo Shincho.

This separation of powers began building up a momentum of its own. In January 1950, in an effort to quell this momentum, a committee was set up to explore means of reconciliation.

In February, the Mainichi Shinbun sponsored an East-West Japan match featuring twelve top players. The games were played at the neutral venue of Nagoya, halfway between Tokyo and Osaka. The Tokyo side won 7–5.

Apparently as a sign of the rampant animosity, Yamabe Toshiro began his game against the top Kansai player, Hashimoto Utaro, on the centre point, even though three grades junior. Hashimoto quickly slapped down a knight’s move reply, and went on to win (komi was used).

(The game is given below. As will be seen, it took place just before the Honinbo title match started.)

Yamabe (B) vs Hashimoto, 1950–02–11 (1–234)
ko: 107, 166, 169, 172; 174: connects; ko: 175, 180, 183, 186; 188: connects ko

Nevertheless, the main Tokyo-based Oteai in the first half of 1950 was also run on East-West lines, again in the hope of promoting goodwill.

What these activities did, however, was to confirm to Kansai-based pros, who had the inconvenience of long travel and finding lodgings in Tokyo, that the Kansai Ki-in was their natural home. But their independence was constrained in two main ways.

One was that the approval of the Nihon Ki-in in Tokyo was needed for high-level promotions. The other was that the issue of diplomas to amateurs (a major source of income) was limited, for the Kansai Ki-in, to Osaka, Kyoto, Hyogo, Wakayama, Nara, Shiga and Okayama prefectures. The Nihon Ki-in held sway everywhere else.

A new factor was the present Honinbo title match, which pitted a Kansai man against a Tokyo stalwart. Before seeing what role that played, let us look at each of the games played against that backdrop. But if you do wish to skip ahead, here is the link.

Term 5, Game 1 (1–18); 4½ komi

Recall that it was now a best-of-seven games, but still with 4½ points komi.

Game 1 was greeted by a day of leaden clouds as the game party gathered in an eight-mat room on the upstairs floor of the Nihon Ki-in.

The party included Hino Ashihei (1907~1960), who had recently won fame as a war novelist. He became the first man of letters to be an “observer” – a colour writer – at a Honinbo game.

In 1937 Hino had won the Akutagawa Prize for his marvellously titled novel “Tales of Excrement and Urine” (糞尿譚), which was written while he was serving in the Japanese army in China. This earned him promotion to the information corps where he wrote widely about the daily lives of Japanese soldiers. His war novels, one of which sold over a million copies, later made him nationally famous.

Such writers had previously been used in Go Seigen’s matches, but this was a first for an ordinary tournament. Presumably Hino did well enough, as he was invited to write also about a Go Seigen match game with Fujisawa Kuranosuke the following year.

Hashimoto took his place at the six-inch kaya board, Hino noted, resplendent in traditional costume, brimming with health and affably making conversation all round. There was no sign of strain on him.

Iwamoto, as the Honinbo, took a handful of stones for nigiri and ended up with Black. Play then began, unusually late, at a quarter to ten.

Play was slow in the opening, both players taking just under an hour of their thirteen-hour allowance for the first eighteen moves, bringing us up to the lunch break. Hashimoto even took his time over his first move, gazing at Iwamoto’s komoku as he held his right hand over his brazier and smoked a cigarette with his left hand, occasionally looking out of the window. After twelve minutes he decided on a move at the star point.

Up to move 9 both players were freely chatting to each other, but Hino, new boy on the block, felt constrained not to join in – even if no-one else mentioned it, he was aware that these two players had already faced off for the Honinbo title in the Atom Bomb game, and so had formed a special bond. Conceivably it was thoughts of Hiroshima that were making the players move so slowly, although both had already come to terms with the past and had indicated that they wished to play each other again in that city.

White 10, leaving off from the lower right corner, was an invitation to start fighting. Iwamoto picked up the gauntlet even though ladders favour White here and the presence of White 8 also looms large. Actually, though, White 8 had been a novelty, never to be repeated.

Term 5, Game 1 (19–33)

Takahashi Shigeyuki 5-dan, Fujisawa Hideyuki 5-dan and a group of young players were speculating downstairs about where Iwamoto might play Black 19, and the main focus, in light of the corner enclosure in the top right, was on the jump to A.

Upstairs Iwamoto was engaged in his first long ponder of the game, and spent twenty-seven minutes before choosing the diagonal move. His thinking was to threaten to attack rather than to attack directly, while preparing for action in the centre around the centre point. Black 21 had the same thinking. This vaguer way of playing, which implies a more confused fight, reflected the presence of komi.

With Black 29 the sword was actually wielded.

After Black 33, Hashimoto rested his fan on his lap and craned round to the observer to say, “Hmm, it’s difficult. I don’t know what to do.” He settled down for a fifty-five minute think, almost doubling the time he had used so far (Iwamoto had already used over three hours). Finally, at five thirty, he sealed his next move.

They then went off to dine, all together. Iwamoto was a great fan of sake. Hashimoto, much more abstemious, laughed as he recounted how Iwamoto even drank alcohol made from vinegar during the Atom Bomb game in Hiroshima.

Term 5, Game 1 (34–50)

The diagonal block at White 34 was the sealed move revealed on Day 2, another cloudy day. Hashimoto played it because he decided he just couldn’t allow Black to slide into the corner, and everyone else seemed to agree. The drawback, of course, was that it induced Black 35, which has an impact on White’s group in the centre. That made the exchange of White 36 and Black 37 natural. White then shifted focus to the left side to take the last big point at White 40.

Iwamoto was still reluctant to allow the game to become close territorially, because of the komi, and so kept his own focus on the centre. He was clearly operating with a zoom lens as he started reducing at Black 41.

Although they were munching cakes and peeling oranges as they played, there was a strong sense of a battle of contrasting wills – a portentous feeling that was subtly matched by the budding cherry tree outside. A mood slightly spoiled when Hashimoto decided to nip things in the bud with pre-emptive defence at White 50.

But a film director would surely have recouped something from the strange fact that after move 50 the times used by both players were exactly 5:0 and 5:0!

Would he have changed real life back to portentous art? Because in real life, when one of the players asked – as they often did – the young scorekeeper Kada Katsuji 2-dan how much time had been used and he revealed the strange figures, everyone burst out laughing.

Term 5, Game 1 (51–59)

Despite some rather slow play by Iwamoto in this phase, he afterwards revealed that he was unhappy with almost all of his moves: Black 53, 57 and 59. He concluded he ought to have played 57 at once. Nevertheless, even played later Black 57 made Hashimoto look uncomfortable and he was visibly relieved when Black switched to the block at 59 turning White 56 into a forcing move (it had been intended to forestall a Black move at A).

Despite Hashimoto’s relief over the exchange at the top, he did not feel out of the woods yet. It is clear that the left side is soon going to become the focus of some hard fighting, and Black, having already chosen a centre game, is likely to feel more comfortable with that. And so, with times taken having reached six hours thirty-one minutes for Black and five hours fifty-eight for White after move 59, White settled down to spend thirty-eight minutes on White 60, which meant that that became the sealed move on Day 2.

Term 5, Game 1 (60–82)

The clouds clearly threatened to give forth rain on Day 3, but for the time being the flowers made a brave show in the Ki-in’s garden.

Hashimoto’s unsealed move showed he had decided to seal off the corner with White 60, a move which ensured he had a connection at White 64. He was hunkering down for a battle of attrition, a slow battle reflected in even slower play.

Iwamoto was more concerned with the left side than the top, but several times placed his hand in his bowl to grasp a stone to play Black 67, only to let it drop back. “I just don’t know,” he wailed. And as he gazed, Hashimoto likewise kept his gaze firmly on the left side. The pair were so quiet that the ticking clock dominated the room.

After fifty-five minutes Iwamoto finally plumped for Black 67 as a deep slide. Hashimoto didn’t hesitate over applying the wire-cutter at White 68, so that at last the phoney war on the left side became a contact battle that was likely to affect the rest of the board in waves. Iwamoto’s reaction was to stand up for a trip to the toilet and to remark, “It’s become interesting, hasn’t it?”

The price of getting in White 70 was having to play White 72 and 74 to live in the corner, but of course he was well aware that the Tennozan – the hill on which the battle would eventually be decided – was in the centre.

Times at this point: Black 9h 0; White 8h 25.

Term 5, Game 1 (83–110)

Although the fighting on the left side is desperate at times, it is obvious with a bird’s eye view that whoever gets to play first on the right side will have a huge advantage. It turned out to be White. Looking at why, Black 89 was one reason. This would apparently have been better at A, a general feeling that Iwamoto himself afterwards agreed with. He may have been trying too hard to read out something definite – he spent twenty-two minutes on this move.

Black 91 and so on is a forcing sequence in sente, but something of a side issue, and making White alive meant that Black 97 became a dreadful move, far too slow and allowing White to risk the bad aji. Instead of this Black had to play on the right at B. That might even have given Black a leisurely victory.

Black 97 allows White 98, which connects his two groups. Of course Iwamoto at the time felt that this was just making the group to be slaughtered twice as big, as it is still thin and eyeless. But Black himself needs to think about eyes and aji – hence Black 101 – and there is the simple fact that had Black played on the right side, the White group in the centre would have remained thin and eyeless. In short, it was a missed opportunity.

Black also erred with Black 103, according to the downstairs group, which had swelled and strengthened to include Maeda Nobuaki 7-dan and Kajiwara Takeo 6-dan. They felt (strongly) that Black had to push in at 108 so as to make use of the Black thickness in the upper right. Instead he ended up being forced, as well as surrendering White 110 on the right. Afterwards Iwamoto agreed that the game had been decided here.

Nevertheless, Hashimoto was not feeling confident, and for that reason he extended two points up the right side instead of just one.

Times: Black 10h 29; White 9h 45.

Term 5, Game 1 (111–130)

Black 113 is a big move, and part of the reason why Hashimoto had hesitated over what to do on the right side. But he was lucky that Iwamoto answered White 114 rather oddly at Black 115. That was his own opinion. The position really called for hane at the head of two stones, he said.

With few places left to play, the centre is going to be decisive. Since White is the one with the weak group there, Black should feel confident, but again Iwamoto missed an opportunity. Biting off the White stone with 129 was obviously satisfying, but it was gote and letting White get yet another Tennozan point at 130 was inexcusable.

Iwamoto was feeling the strain and was mutttering to himself – chit-chat between the players had long ceased, and the room had become clammy as rain began to fall.

At 9 p.m. both players had a couple of hours left, so time was not a major issue. White 130 had effectively settled the game anyway.

Term 5, Game 1 (131–200)
100: connects

The slide at 155 essentially was Black’s last chance, and he played it with a decisive thump. Hashimoto answered it unhesitatingly.

Black then mopped up a few points in sente, mainly to improve his aji, before playing Black 163, perhaps surprisingly big as it was worth about nine points. But White 170 was also big, and White 180 was worth over seven points.

Black 181 was as much about ensuring connection as about taking points in the centre, of course.

Term 5, Game 1 (201–256)
36: takes

The endgame moves were played out rapidly and the game was concluded after 256 moves at 11.34.

At the end neither player had used his full time allowance: White had forty-eight minutes left and Black nineteen minutes. But White also had more points, and had won by 7½ points. The match score was thus 1–0 to Hashimoto.

As both players cleared the board to replay the game for the post mortem, the rain appropriately stopped.

Term 5, Game 1 (full game for review; 4½ komi)
200: connects; 235 at 57; 236 at 180; 256 at 6

Honinbo title winners

The Early Years
1 1941 Sekiyama Riichi 3–3 Kato Shin
2 1943 Hashimoto Utaro 1–0 Sekiyama Riichi
3a 1945 Hashimoto Utaro 3–3 Iwamoto Kaoru
3b 1946 Iwamoto Kaoru 2–0 Hashimoto Utaro
4 1947 Iwamoto Kaoru 3–2 Kitani Minoru
5 1950 Hashimoto Utaro 4–0 Iwamoto Kaoru
6 1951 Hashimoto Utaro 4–3 Sakata Eio

The Age of Takagawa
7 1952 Takagawa Kaku 4–1 Hashimoto Utaro
8 1953 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Kitani Minoru
9 1954 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Sugiuchi Masao
10 1955 Takagawa Kaku 4–0 Shimamura Toshihiro
11 1956 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Shimamura Toshihiro
12 1957 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Fujisawa Hosai
13 1958 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Sugiuchi Masao
14 1959 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Kitani Minoru
15 1960 Takagawa Kaku 4–2 Fujisawa Hideyuki

The Age of Sakata
16 1961 Sakata Eio 4–1 Takagawa Kaku
17 1962 Sakata Eio 4–1 Handa Dogen
18 1963 Sakata Eio 4–2 Takagawa Kaku
19 1964 Sakata Eio 4–0 Takagawa Kaku
20 1965 Sakata Eio 4–0 Yamabe Toshiro
21 1966 Sakata Eio 4–0 Fujisawa Hideyuki
22 1967 Sakata Eio 4–1 Rin Kaiho

The Era of Youth
23 1968 Rin Kaiho 4–3 Sakata Eio
24 1969 Rin Kaiho 4–2 Kato Masao
25 1970 Rin Kaiho 4–0 Sakata Eio
26 1971 Ishida Yoshio 4–2 Rin Kaiho
27 1972 Ishida Yoshio 4–3 Rin Kaiho
28 1973 Ishida Yoshio 4–0 Rin Kaiho

The Era of the Kitani School I
29 1974 Ishida Yoshio 4–3 Takemiya Masaki
30 1975 Ishida Yoshio 4–3 Sakata Eio
31 1976 Takemiya Masaki 4–1 Ishida Yoshio
32 1977 Kato Masao 4–1 Takemiya Masaki
33 1978 Kato Masao 4–3 Ishida Yoshio
34 1979 Kato Masao 4–1 Rin Kaiho
35 1980 Takemiya Masaki 4–1 Kato Masao

The Era of the Kitani School II
36 1981 Cho Chikun 4–2 Takemiya Masaki
37 1982 Cho Chikun 4–2 Kobayashi Koichi
38 1983 Rin Kaiho 4–3 Cho Chikun
39 1984 Rin Kaiho 4–1 Awaji Shuzo
40 1985 Takemiya Masaki 4–1 Rin Kaiho
41 1986 Takemiya Masaki 4–1 Yamashiro Hiroshi
42 1987 Takemiya Masaki 4–0 Yamashiro Hiroshi
43 1988 Takemiya Masaki 4–3 Otake Hideo

The Age of Cho Chikun
44 1989 Cho Chikun 4–0 Takemiya Masaki
45 1990 Cho Chikun 4–3 Kobayashi Koichi
46 1991 Cho Chikun 4–2 Kobayashi Koichi
47 1992 Cho Chikun 4–3 Kobayashi Koichi
48 1993 Cho Chikun 4–1 Yamashiro Hiroshi
49 1994 Cho Chikun 4–3 Kataoka Satoshi
50 1995 Cho Chikun 4–1 Kato Masao
51 1996 Cho Chikun 4–2 Ryu Shikun
52 1997 Cho Chikun 4–0 Kato Masao
53 1998 Cho Chikun 4–2 O Rissei

The Turn of the Century
54 1999 Cho Sonjin 4–2 Cho Chikun
55 2000 O Meien 4–2 Cho Sonjin
56 2001 O Meien 4–3 Cho U
57 2002 Kato Masao 4–2 O Meien
58 2003 Cho U 4–2 Kato Masao
59 2004 Cho U 4–2 Yoda Norimoto

The Age of the Nihon Ki-in Branches
60 2005 Takao Shinji 4–1 Cho U
61 2006 Takao Shinji 4–2 Yamada Kimio
62 2007 Takao Shinji 4–1 Yoda Norimoto
63 2008 Hane Naoki 4–3 Takao Shinji
64 2009 Hane Naoki 4–2 Takao Shinji
65 2010 Yamashita Keigo 4–1 Hane Naoki
66 2011 Yamashita Keigo 4–3 Hane Naoki

The Age of Iyama Yuta
67 2012 Iyama Yuta 4–3 Yamashita Keigo
68 2013 Iyama Yuta 4–3 Takao Shinji
69 2014 Iyama Yuta 4–1 Ida Atsushi
70 2015 Iyama Yuta 4–1 Yamashita Keigo
71 2016 Iyama Yuta 4–1 Takao Shinji
72 2017 Iyama Yuta 4–0 Motoki Katsuya
73 2018 Iyama Yuta 4–1 Yamashita Keigo
74 2019 Iyama Yuta 4–2 Kono Rin
75 2020 Iyama Yuta 4–1 Shibano Toramaru
76 2021 Iyama Yuta 4–3 Shibano Toramaru
77 2022 Iyama Yuta 4–0 Ichiriki Ryo
78 2023 Ichiriki Ryo 4–3 Iyama Yuta