naginata & ninja's

[mononokifool]

i read somewere that the naginata was not used by samurai but by hte samurai's wife for protection of the house while the husband was gone. if i have read wronge please corect me, i just want my info to be correct.


on the other hand just to save room of the site i woul dlike to put this question in with this one. my sensei and i were talking about ninja's. he basicly said that everybody has hyped them up to be more than they seem to be. he says that they were actualy just lame samurai who couldnt get a job so they would get paid to dress like a cominer and sneak a stab i the back or just poisen there food. he said this with distaist becasue this takes all of the honor out of the samurai by killing whil the other person never has a chance.

[nice gaijin]

The weapon is light and easy to use, even for the elderly, which is why it became associated with women and wives, and is still a popular martial art for women, like kendo. When a woman married into a family of warriors, she had to bring her own Naginata. After they became the equivalent of housewives for their Samurai husbands, they would indeed stay at home, and they had their own Naginata to protect their family.

There have been famous women Samurai, before the confucian concepts of the subserviant, obedient wife took hold. Even so the Naginata became increasingly associated with women. The weapon was originally used by guards, not Samurai; the reason for its shape is to allow a soldier on foot fight someone mounted on a horse. In 1550, when the gun came to Japan, it replaced the Naginata in warfare.

Ninja were spies, they were trained for stealth which made them excellent for gathering information or stealing valuable items from enemies. Tokugawa Ieyasu was the first lord that hired ninjas, his favorite was a man named Hattori Hanzo (yes, the name that was stolen for the sword maker in Kill Bill), who was not a not a killer. It was the Samurai who were sent out to kill people, not the ninja. Your sensei's disgust for ninja seems misguided; they were spies, not assassins. Also, the ninja disappeared altogether during the Edo period, and only resurfaced again as entertainment. Doing a google search for "ninja" on the internet shows just how many misconceptions about ninja there are in the western world.

[Oyakata]

Ninja were spies, they were trained for stealth which made them excellent for gathering information or stealing valuable items from enemies. Tokugawa Ieyasu was the first lord that hired ninjas, his favorite was a man named Hattori Hanzo (yes, the name that was stolen for the sword maker in Kill Bill), who was not a not a killer. It was the Samurai who were sent out to kill people, not the ninja. Your sensei's disgust for ninja seems misguided; they were spies, not assassins. Also, the ninja disappeared altogether during the Edo period, and only resurfaced again as entertainment. Doing a google search for "ninja" on the internet shows just how many misconceptions about ninja there are in the western world.

The question of how to think about ninja is really a fascinating one. It's tough to say what they were 'like' because they filled a particular role that doesn't 100% map with what we have today. But probably something of a mix of spy, scout, and recon (rec) is the right way to think about it. But it does seem that ninja were hired for assassination attempts - see for instance historical episodes of assassination attempts on Nobunaga's life, which are believed to have been executed (pardon) by ninja.

It's also probably not the case that Ieyasu was the first person to 'hire' ninja. They existed for long before Ieyasu; which by definition means that their services were availed of by many before him. From my own research I'm aware that Nobunaga used the services of ninja or 'former' ninja or 'those associated with ninja'. Perhaps most famously is Tomo Naganobu 伴長信, who is said to have been with Nobunaga to the end at Honnouji.　Also the important Nobunaga underling Takigawa Kazumasa 滝川一益 is sometimes believed to have been associated with ninja.

Oyakata
www.odanobunaga.com

[nice gaijin]

thanks for the clarification, oyakata. What I meant to say was that Tokugawa Ieyasu was the first (tmk) shogun to recognize the usefulness of ninja in gathering intelligence.

Informative site, is it yours?

[Harvey]

Here are the REAL ninja.

http://www.realultimatepower.net

But seriously, I went to a Ninja house in Iga.

http://www.japannewbie.com/archives/000179.html

[Oyakata]

thanks for the clarification, oyakata. What I meant to say was that Tokugawa Ieyasu was the first (tmk) shogun to recognize the usefulness of ninja in gathering intelligence.

Ah - ok. First shogun is probably right. First daimyo is probably less clear.

Ninja are a fascinating topic including all of the misconceptions that exist, both in Japan and in the west. It's very hard to pin down accurate or reasonable historical information.


Informative site, is it yours?

Not so sure. It's more like a hobby of mine. But I hope some people will find it interesting and informative - and I hope to keep adding to it little by little.

Oyakata

[fardatxo]

Hi!

I'm a new user and this is my first post in this forum. Sorry for my terrible english :worried:

I have a question related to this subject. Ninjitsu and Budotaijutsu: are the same martial art?

Thanks!

[pipokun]

Hi!

I'm a new user and this is my first post in this forum. Sorry for my terrible english :worried:

I have a question related to this subject. Ninjitsu and Budotaijutsu: are the same martial art?

Thanks!

Hi. I know a bit about Karate and Judo, but not the taijutsu. An English guy give you a lot of info about the art in the following site.
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/bj1/bugei/bjbugei.htm


To Oyakata,
You've got a really nice site.
As oyakata pointed out, the Tokugawa shogunate must be the first shogunate that incorporated Ninja into the system. But I suppose shoguns in the muromachi shogunate also used ninja as well. So difficult to guess who the first.
Just before the Honnoji insident, Akechi Mitsuhide held a renga poem party with poets at a mountain in Kyoto. Was the poet a ninja? Nobody knows...

[fardatxo]

Thanks a lot pipokun. In the dojo where I practise Aikido, Budotaijutsu is taught too. The system of training is very similar to ours: without katas, and the techniques practiced by pairs all the time. I had these doubt about Ninjitsu and Budotaijusu. Thanks again.

[pipokun]

I really regret quiting practicing in Karate just before 2 dan.

Hope that I'd see you in the K-1 or Pride here in the future.
Keep practicing!

[Oyakata]

To Oyakata,
You've got a really nice site.

Thanks! I really just started to pull it together about a year and a half ago, but haven't worked on it for a while. I just add information whenever I get around to it. Someday it'll be pretty good I hope.

As oyakata pointed out, the Tokugawa shogunate must be the first shogunate that incorporated Ninja into the system. But I suppose shoguns in the muromachi shogunate also used ninja as well. So difficult to guess who the first.

Some of this depends on what you consider a 'ninja'. There were certainly scouts, assassins, rumor-spreaders, and other characters used throughout history. But are these what you would consider 'ninja'?

Just before the Honnoji insident, Akechi Mitsuhide held a renga poem party with poets at a mountain in Kyoto. Was the poet a ninja? Nobody knows...

I have never heard this interpretation before. Very interesting! Can you tell me more about why you think they may have been ninja?


Oyakata

[pipokun]

I should have said that the poet might act like a Ninja.
I've got little dark side image on Ninja like in Ninja movies such as mysterious Nijustu arts, assassins or conspiracy, but I suppose ninja was a sort of engineer with their political, scientific or strategic knowledge.
The renga poet played an important roll in terms of collecting info upon the political situation after taking advantage of their networking. For example, at the time of the Onin war, some renga poets stayed in Kanto region without clear-cut purposes. Some say that they spied out the situation there at the request of the Shogunate.

Satomura Joha, the renga poet at the Akechi's poem party was said to know all parties, Oda, the Court, the Shogunate and of course, Akechi then, and I heard Oda gave him disgrace on his poet.
One reasonable explanation goes that Akechi climbed the mountain for his strategic point of view, i.e. to confirm the landscape of Kyoto before his advancement to the Honnoji temple. But I wonder if Akechi needed the poet master having close relationship with the court. I agree with one theory that Satomura was like a mediator between the Court and Akechi.

I heard some Kyoto people don't have any bad image against Akechi at all. It might be a good idea to invite more Kyoto people after I trumpet the Edo/Kamakura cuture too much here. :)