The Samurai Lives On
The Art Of The Samurai Still Lives On
In today’s modern society, samurai and the art of sword fighting has an immediate appeal to many thousands of people. There has been a huge upsurge in students flocking to Dojos around the world looking to learn the art of the samurai, whether their hand combat techniques or their most famous sword fighting.
Japanese samurai swords, called katana swords are the stuff of legends. While students will first be taught with a boken or wooden mock sword they will eventually progress to a ‘live’ blade if they persist in the art. Celebrities such as Steven Seagal, who trained in Japan with Aikido master Morihei Ueshiba has brought samurai warriors and legends of samurai to the popular mind in the same way that Bruce Lee and Jacky Chan have done with Chinese Kung Fu.
The image of the modern samurai has been popularised in many a Hollywood film with one of the most epic modern tales ‘Star Wars’ using kendo practitioners to enact the light saber battles. There have also been the ancient samurai heralded in recent films like ‘The Last Samurai’. Manga cartoons are one of the biggest exporters of the samurai legends and the Japanese popular culture that has sprung up around them, both in Japan and in the rest of the world is testament to their lingering appeal.
Today there is also a booming industry for katana swords, with some handmade katanas fetching thousands of dollars to dedicated collectors or practitioners.
Most martial arts equipment stores will sell a version of the katana blade, whether a live blade or a boken, and there are many cheaply produced blades available for purchase in almost every country. The prized handmade katanas are rarer, and usually for sale to an exclusive clientele at auction or through dedicated sellers either online or by order.
Whilst the true art of the finest blade swords has been lost in history, many swordsmiths today are trying to regain the lost knowledge in order to make real samurai swords like those of legendary swordsmith Masamune.
The art of samurai sword making is also being evolved by some smiths, who have incorporated modern technologies into the process. Swordsmiths like Howard Clark have produced fine quality blades that are in such demand he stopped taking order in 2003.
So whilst the real Japanese samurai have long since vanished, we can see their enduring ghosts in the ever present fascination with their weapons and way of life, and their reincarnation in popular films, television and fiction.
And now on a less serious note, a great scene of contemporary samurai sword fighting
The Japanese Fighting Arts
A brief history of the Samurai Sword
The history of the Japanese Samuari sword is one that goes back many hundreds of years, with the first signs of the Japanese swords being traced back to around thirteen hundred years ago.
The very first blades were a basic variant of the Chinese straight bladed, double edged sword called a jian. The very first precursor to the Japanese katana was seen at around 700AD which were straight swords with a curve at the tang only. Around the tenth century saw Japan cleaving close ties with China and begin developing its own social and class divisions and it was in this time that the palace guards and gentry became the first samurai warriors, and with them developed the first real samurai swords.
The legends of samurai tell of the Emperor’s smith Amakuni who made the first fully curved blade after receiving divine inspiration from the Kami. His sword was praised by the Emperor and the tradition of the curved handmade katanas was born.
The golden period for the authentic samurai swords was between 1192 and 1573 in the Kamakura and Muromachi periods. After the near loss of Japan to the veracious Mongol invaders, the need for a virulent national defence was seen, and so sword smiths were kept very busy. The most famous of Japanese katana smiths was in this period and the legendary Masamune’s swords are still the most prized and exquisite handmade katanas the world has ever known.
It was Masamune who first perfected the art of folding the metal to create the beautiful temper line with crystals imbedded in a pearlite matrix. His remaining blades are considered priceless national heirlooms.
The Japanese samurai swords went into a dark period when the gun was introduced and the skills of the previous generation were almost lost. When this turbulent time in Japanese history was over, the Japanese katana once again rose in the exclusive hands of the privileged samurai class.
With the coming of the west and two world wars, the Japanese katana became a symbol of nationalism, and thousands were roughly produced to equip officers of the army. Since the end of World War II there has been an uptake in interest in the traditional art of samurai swords, and many smiths world wide have tried to reproduce the golden methods of tempering the blade perfected by Masamune. However hard they try, and whatever new methods are devised his still remain the ultimate blades.
