Ōno Harutane served as a bushō during the Azuchi-Momoyama and early Edo periods.  He was a retainer of the Toyotomi clan.

Harutane was born as the son of Ōno Sadanaga (Sado-no-kami).

The Ōno clan originated from the village of Ōno in the Haguri District of Owari Province.

Owing to circumstances, for a period he was a rōnin, or wandering samurai, but, upon the commencement of the Siege of Ōsaka, he hurriedly joined in service of Toyotomi Hideyori.

In 1614, during the Winter Campaign of the Siege of Ōsaka, he led 5,000 troops.  In charge of the Toyotomi navy, he guarded the cargo, but, after failing to account for inclement weather, endured a major defeat to the Tokugawa navy at the Battle of Noda and Fukushima.  After having destroyed his own navy, he was scorned as a “dai-dai musha.”  He was subject to ridicule from allies as a “daidai-musha.”  A daidai is a bitter orange that is only useful as a decoration at new year’s, meaning that he gave a false impression as a warrior.  The ridicule was similar to the treatment received by Susukida Kanesuke who was assigned a group of rōnin, or wandering samurai, to defend Bakurō-ga-buchi fortress but, during the Battle of Bakurōbuchi, he committed the blunder of passing through a brothel district just as the fortress fell to the Tokugawa forces.

In 1615, at the Summer Campaign of the Siege of Ōsaka, operating as a detached division for the invasion of Kii Province, on 4/28, Harutane led 2,000 troops to attack and set fires Sakai which served as a logistics base for the Edo bakufu army.  As many as 20,000 residences were destroyed.  This event is known as the Burning of Sakai.  After the battle on 5/7, he aimed to flee from Ōsaka Castle but, on 5/21, was captured by Tokugawa forces in Kyōto.

After learning of the capture of Harutane, residents of Sakai who suffered losses in the burning made an appeal to Itakura Katsushige, the Kyōto shoshidai, or head of security, citing a case toward the end of the Heian period when Taira no Shigehira was turned over to residents of Nara after a similar attack there.  Katsushige consented to their request, and after Harutane was turned over to them, on 6/27, he was burned at the stake in Sakai.  Katsushige did not, however, take lightly their vigilante justice, and scorned them by asking whether the residents of Nara did the same to Shigehira.

According to another account, he was captured near the Great Buddha in the Tsuzuki District of Yamashiro Province, taken to Sanjōgawara in Kyōto and executed.

Harutane’s grave is at the Gatsuzō Temple in the Sakai ward of the city of Sakai.

Anecdotes

According to one legend in which he is referred to under the name of Ōno Dōken, Harutane was set on fire and, instead of turning to ash, suddenly rose and, after slashing the surrounding Tokugawa bushi with a short-sword, collapsed into a heap of ash.