Daily Yomiuri Online introduced an famous anecdote including the word "shogi" among Japanese in English.
Hideyoshi (1536-1598) liked one of Shinzaemon's scabbards so much that he decided to reward the retainer.
"I want to give you a reward. You can have anything you want," Hideyoshi said. In reply Shinzaemon said: "In that case, please give me one grain of rice today, then two grains tomorrow, and four on the day after that. Please continue to double the grains of rice for the same number of days as there are squares on a shogi board." (A shogi board has 81 squares.)
You can follow the link above to read the end of the story. Toyotomi Hideyoshi is a Sengoku Period Daimyo who unified Japan in the 16th century. I think this anecdote suggests that shogi was already popular in Japan in that century.
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