Samurai Games

Following the passing of a law in 1629, samurai on official duty were required to practice daish (wear two swords).[6] Samurai were granted kiri-sute gomen: the right to kill anyone of a lower class in certain situations. Some important samurai and other figures in Japanese history wanted others to believe all of them engaged combatants using bushido codes of martial virtues and followed various cultural ideals about what samurai should act like.[7]

Though they had predecessors in earlier military and administrative officers, the samurai truly emerged during the Kamakura shogunate, ruling from c.1185 to 1333. They became the ruling political class, with significant power but also significant responsibility. During the 13th century, the samurai proved themselves as adept warriors against the invading Mongols. During the peaceful Edo period, 1603 to 1868, they became the stewards and chamberlains of the daimyo estates, gaining managerial experience and education.

Samurai Games

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In the 1870s, samurai families comprised 5% of the population. As modern militaries emerged in the 19th century, the samurai were rendered increasingly obsolete and very expensive to maintain compared to the average conscript soldier. The Meiji Restoration ended their feudal roles, and they moved into professional and entrepreneurial roles. Their memory and weaponry remain prominent in Japanese popular culture.

In modern usage, bushi is often used as a synonym for samurai;[9][10][11] however, historical sources make it clear that bushi and samurai were distinct concepts, with the former referring to soldiers or warriors and the latter referring instead to a kind of hereditary nobility.[12][13] The word samurai is now closely associated with the middle and upper echelons of the warrior class. These warriors were usually associated with a clan and their lord, and were trained as officers in military tactics and grand strategy. While these samurai numbered less than 10% of then Japan's population,[14] their teachings can still be found today in both everyday life and in modern Japanese martial arts.

The Taih Code classified most of the Imperial bureaucrats into 12 ranks, each divided into two sub-ranks, 1st rank being the highest adviser to the emperor. Those of 6th rank and below were referred to as "samurai" and dealt with day-to-day affairs and were initially civilian public servants, in keeping with the original derivation of this word from saburau, a verb meaning 'to serve'.[17][18][19][20] Military men, however, would not be referred to as "samurai" for many more centuries.

The Heian period saw the appearance of distinctive Japanese armor and weapons. Typical examples are the tachi (long sword) and naginata (halberd) used in close combat, and the -yoroi and d-maru styles of armor. High-ranking samurai equipped with yumi (bows) and who fought on horseback wore -yoroi, while lower-ranking samurai equipped with naginata and who fought on foot wore d-maru.[22]

The victor, Taira no Kiyomori, became an imperial advisor and was the first warrior to attain such a position. He eventually seized control of the central government, establishing the first samurai-dominated government and relegating the emperor to figurehead status. However, the Taira clan was still very conservative when compared to its eventual successor, the Minamoto, and instead of expanding or strengthening its military might, the clan had its women marry emperors and exercise control through the emperor.

The Taira and the Minamoto clashed again in 1180, beginning the Genpei War, which ended in 1185. Samurai fought at the naval battle of Dan-no-ura, at the Shimonoseki Strait which separates Honshu and Kysh in 1185. The victorious Minamoto no Yoritomo established the superiority of the samurai over the aristocracy. In 1190 he visited Kyoto and in 1192 became Sei'i Taishgun, establishing the Kamakura shogunate, or Kamakura bakufu. Instead of ruling from Kyoto, he set up the shogunate in Kamakura, near his base of power. "Bakufu" means "tent government", taken from the encampments the soldiers would live in, in accordance with the Bakufu's status as a military government.[25]

After the Genpei war, Yoritomo obtained the right to appoint shugo and jit, and was allowed to organize soldiers and police, and to collect a certain amount of tax. Initially, their responsibility was restricted to arresting rebels and collecting needed army provisions and they were forbidden from interfering with Kokushi officials, but their responsibility gradually expanded. Thus, the samurai class became the political ruling power in Japan.

In the late Kamakura period, even the most senior samurai began to wear d-maru, as the heavy and elegant -yoroi were no longer respected. Until then, the body was the only part of the d-maru that was protected, but for higher-ranking samurai, the d-maru also came with a kabuto (helmet) and shoulder guards.[22] For lower-ranked samurai, the haraate was introduced, the simplest style of armor that protected only the front of the torso and the sides of the abdomen. In the late Kamakura period, a new type of armor called haramaki appeared, in which the two ends of the haraate were extended to the back to provide greater protection.[26]

Various samurai clans struggled for power during the Kamakura and Ashikaga shogunates. Zen Buddhism spread among the samurai in the 13th century and helped to shape their standards of conduct, particularly overcoming the fear of death and killing, but among the general populace Pure Land Buddhism was favored.

In 1274, the Mongol-founded Yuan dynasty in China sent a force of some 40,000 men and 900 ships to invade Japan in northern Kysh. Japan mustered a mere 10,000 samurai to meet this threat. The invading army was harassed by major thunderstorms throughout the invasion, which aided the defenders by inflicting heavy casualties. The Yuan army was eventually recalled, and the invasion was called off. The Mongol invaders used small bombs, which was likely the first appearance of bombs and gunpowder in Japan.

The thunderstorms of 1274 and the typhoon of 1281 helped the samurai defenders of Japan repel the Mongol invaders despite being vastly outnumbered. These winds became known as kami-no-Kaze, which literally translates as "wind of the gods".[29] This is often given a simplified translation as "divine wind". The kami-no-Kaze lent credence to the Japanese belief that their lands were indeed divine and under supernatural protection.

The innovations of Ssh swordsmiths in the late Kamakura period allowed them to produce Japanese swords with tougher blades than before, and during the Nanboku-ch period, dachi (large/great sword) were at their peak as weapons for the samurai.[31]

During the Nanboku-ch period, many lower-class foot soldiers called ashigaru began to participate in battles, and the popularity of haramaki increased. During the Nanboku-ch and Muromachi periods, d-maru and haramaki became the norm, and senior samurai also began to wear haramaki by adding kabuto (helmet), men-yoroi (face armor), and gauntlet.[34]

Issues of inheritance caused family strife as primogeniture became common, in contrast to the division of succession designated by law before the 14th century. Invasions of neighboring samurai territories became common to avoid infighting, and bickering among samurai was a constant problem for the Kamakura and Ashikaga shogunates.

By the end of the Sengoku period, allegiances between warriors vassals, also known as military retainers, and lords were solidified.[37] Vassals would serve lords in exchange for material and intangible advantages, in keeping with Confucian ideas brought from China between the seventh and ninth centuries.[37]These independent vassals who held land were subordinate to their superiors, who may be local lords or, in the Edo period, the shogun.[37]A vassal or samurai could expect monetary benefits, including land or money, from lords in exchange for their military services.[37]

On the battlefield, ashigaru began to fight in close formation, using yari (spear) and tanegashima. As a result, yari, yumi (bow), and tanegashima became the primary weapons on the battlefield. The naginata, which was difficult to maneuver in close formation, and the long, heavy tachi fell into disuse and were replaced by the nagamaki, which could be held short, and the short, light katana, which appeared in the Nanboku-cho period and gradually became more common. The tachi was often cut off from the hilt and shortened to make a katana. The tachi, which had become inconvenient for use on the battlefield, was transformed into a symbol of authority carried by high-ranking samurai.[39][40][41][32] Although the dachi had become even more obsolete, some daimyo dared to organize assault and kinsmen units composed entirely of large men equipped with dachi to demonstrate the bravery of their armies.[42]

The Sengoku Period was marked by the loosening of samurai culture, with people born into other social strata sometimes making a name for themselves as warriors and thus becoming de facto samurai.

Oda Nobunaga was the well-known lord of the Nagoya area (once called Owari Province) and an exceptional example of a samurai of the Sengoku period.[44] He came within a few years of, and laid down the path for his successors to follow, the reunification of Japan under a new bakufu (shogunate).

Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who became a grand minister in 1586, created a law that non-samurai were not allowed to carry weapons, which the samurai caste codified as permanent and hereditary, thereby ending the social mobility of Japan, which lasted until the dissolution of the Edo shogunate by the Meiji revolutionaries. ff782bc1db