Heres a little more on the path of the samurai, which will probably be the most numerous:
Each Samurai will start in the ranks of the ashiragu (\"inexperienced\"), when he (or she) has proven his (or her) valour in combat and strengthened his (or her) honour he (or she) will be acepted in the ranks of the samurai. Each samurai will be adressed with one of these weapons:
The sword
Samurai were the only people allowed to carry two swords, a pair called the daisho, (the \"long and short\") as a badge of their unique warrior status. These two weapons, the long katana and the shorter wakizashi, were worn together although rarely used as a pair of weapons in combat. Miyamoto Musashi, the sword-saint and writer of the best-known book on swordsmanship, A Book of Five Rings, was unusual in that his \"Two Heavens\" fighting style did use two swords at the same time. One other sword is worth mentioning at this point, the no dachi. These enormous two-handed weapons were only ever used on foot.
The samurai used the katana to defend as well as attack and as a result never adopted shields, unlike the knights of Europe. They never needed to, because of the superb metalwork in the katana was good enough to act in both capacities
A samurai sword was carefully constructed out of many layers of steel and iron. The two would be hammered out and folded over many times to produce a \"sandwich\" of many layers. Each repeated forging doubled the number of layers of metal in a sword, in some cases 2?? ? 4,194,304 ? layers of metal would be the result. The maximum number of folds recorded is some 2?? (or 10,736,461,824!) layers of forged metal. This gave the sword enormous strength when the iron and steel were welded together. The iron at the sides and back edge gave flexibility to the blade, while the steel core could be hardened to make a perfect edge.
The final process in the forging was particularly clever. The blade was coated with clay built up to a different thickness across the blade: thin at the cutting edge and thick towards the back. When the sword ? in its clay overcoat ? was heated and then quenched, it cooled at different speeds and the metal crystals in each part in the blade ended up as different sizes. They were large where the clay had been thick, which meant that they were flexible, but small at the cutting edge, so they would form a hard edge that could be sharpened. Once the sword blade was polished, the change from the softer steel and the harder edge could show up as the yakiba, a line that resembles a breaking wave. Once the blade had been signed by the smith and hilt and guard fitted, the sword was ready for use.
The result of all of this was a sword that could cut a man in two ? literally. Occasionally condemned criminals were used to test new swords, but it was more common to use a bundle of rushes and bamboo or to use corpses. Some swords had details of their testing carved into the tang (the piece of the sword inside the hilt).
Thanks to the resilience of such a blade, a samurai could block and turn blows that would have shattered any ordinary steel weapon. Its razor sharp edge gave him the ability to cut through an opponent right down to the bone. These two contrasting qualities were the result of the skills and experience that Japanese sword smiths had accumulated over centuries. No other sword, even the famous blades from Toledo in Spain, ever equalled these Japanese weapons. The katana is still probably the best hand-to-hand weapon ever produced.
The Spear and the polearm
The naginata looks remarkably like a quarterstaff with a large sword blade fixed to one end. The sohei warrior monks particularly favoured them, but in the hands of a skilled man (which is to say a samurai) they were devastating against almost any opponent. During the Sengoku period the naginata fell out of widespread use as the yari became a popular weapon with the clans.
As with all Japanese weapons, skilled craftsmen often made yari. The yari?s shaft was often of oak, surrounded by bamboo laminations and then whole covered with weatherproof lacquer. A razor-sharp blade completed the spear. Originally, the yari was about 3 or 4 metres in length, but as the Sengoku period continued, it became longer as the daimyo experimented with its tactical use. The Date family, for example, equipped their men with 5.4 metre (around 18 feet) yari.
The daimyo came to see the yari as a valuable \"offensively\" defensive weapon, the theory being that enemy warriors couldn?t get into close combat past a row of sharp blades at the end of a long spear.
The Bow
Archery was the skill that the early samurai prized above all others, even more than swordsmanship. They even used the term \"The Way of Horse and Bow\" to describe their military calling. This dates back to the time when samurai were primarily cavalry soldiers and fought as mounted archers. Over the centuries two slow evolutions took place so that cavalry became primarily armed with spears and many other samurai took to fighting as foot soldiers. Using the bow well, however, remained the mark of a well-trained and disciplined warrior.
A samurai bow looks ungainly as the handgrip is not central, but two-thirds of the distance along the bow, with the longer section above the handgrip. This odd appearance was quite deliberate, because it allowed a much more powerful bow to be easily used from horseback. The short lower section could easily be swung across a horse?s neck so that the samurai could fire at any target. A symmetrical bow would have been smaller (and therefore less powerful) or been ungainly for mounted use. The bow itself was carefully laminated from deciduous wood and bamboo and then bound for extra strength. The whole thing was carefully lacquered to keep out damp. Stringing a bow could take the combined effort of several men, so the whole bow had enormous power.
The level of skill that a samurai archer could achieve was the product of long years of practice. Samurai were expected to hit small targets while riding at full gallop. This is a skill that is still demonstrated today at yamasame festivals.
Arrows came in many types, but the most unusual were signalling arrows that had a large wooden whistle fitted to the head. These made a warbling noise as they flew through the air and were fired at the start of battle to attract the attention of kami, or spirits, to witness the brave deeds that were about to be performed. Fire arrows were also popular, particularly during sieges.
/thanks for your time
/Vassago
