The Chiba were a branch family of Taira lineage who settled in Shimôsa province in the early 12th-century. They received prestigious titles and became dominant in the provincial headquarters as zaichôkanjin.
During the 1140s the Chiba clashed with Minamoto Yoshitomo over rights to certain Chiba estates, yet later supported Yoshitomo in the Hôgen Disturbance, as well as his son Yoritomo during the Gempei War and the subsequent founding of the bakufu.
The Chiba remained powerful during the Kamakura Period, but saw their power decline during the Muromachi Period. They became vassals of the Hôjô in the mid-16th Century.
References
- Initial text from Sengoku Biographical Dictionary (Samurai-Archives.com) FWSeal & CEWest, 2005
- "The Missing Minamoto in the Twelfth-Century Kanto", by Jeffrey P. Mass. Monumenta Nipponica, Vol. 19, No. 1. (Winter, 1993), pp. 121-145.