The sound of a wet towel

"My Narrow Isle: The Story of a Modern Woman in Japan"  is the first part of the autobiography of Sumie Seo Mishima. She was born in Japan at the beginning of the XXth century in a Samurai Family, and received a western type of education in the US after World War I.

The end of the XIXth and the beginning of the XXth centuries were times of great changes in Japan. The society basically switched from a feudal to a westernized capitalistic structure in a matter of 2 generations.

At the beginning of her book, the author remembers how her younger sister's old nurse - whose husband had died in the wars of the Meiji Revolution - used to say: 

"Don't ever, ever flap a wet towel to dry it when you take a bath. It gives out a sound exactly like the sound of a human head struck off!"

The old lady and many of her generation had seen many human heads cut off and be displayed by the roadside...

The old woman was trying to remind young generations of the horrors of what had happened. Unfortunately this was not enough, and the same terrible things happened again a few decades later during the invasion of China by the Japanese troops. 

The tension brewing today between China and Japan over the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands is - at least partially - fuelled by the remembrance of these atrocities. 

If we cannot learn from the past, we are doomed to repeat the same mistakes...

Terminology : Katana, Tō, Tsurugi and Ken

 

         The complexity of Japanese terminology is a constant source of aggravation and wonders... The same Character can very often be pronounced in very different ways (Also 2 different characters may have the same pronounciation...)  When it comes to sword, 2 words come back very often "To" and "Ken". 
They are found for example in Junto sono ichi (First waza of the Batto-ho set of MJER) and in Shinmyoken (9th waza of the Tachiuchi no Kurai set of MJER).
However, to make things even more complicated for us poor Gaijin, other words such as Katana and Tachi come up on a regular basis...

Let's try to clarify some of this :

The Character 刀 reads Katana in Japanese and Tō in Chinese. It is found in the Japanese words :

• Bokutō (木刀) : wooden Sword.
• Iaitō (居合刀) : sword to practice iaidō
• Nihontō (日本刀) : Japanese swords
• Battō-jutsu (抜刀術) : art of sword drawing

The Character 剣 reads Tsurugi in Japanese and Ken in Chinese. It is found in the Japanese words :

• Bokken ( 木剣) : wooden sword.
• Shinken (真⁠剣) : live (sharp) sword.
• Kendō (剣道) : way of the sword.
• Kenshi (剣士) : swordsman.

Originally 剣 (Chinese Ken; Japanese Tsurugi ) was used to designate a double-edged Sword, and 刀 (Chinese Tō; Japanese Katana ) a single-edged one. 

 

Character	Chinese	Japanese	Type of Sword
剣	Ken	Tsurugi	Double-edged
刀	Tō	Katana	Single-edged

 

 

Naginata - Tsurugi - Tanto - Uchi Katana- Tachi

Although the single-edged curved blade has been used in Japan for over a millennium, the usage of 刀 (Chinese tō ; Japanese katana - single edge sword), is much less common in pre-modern Japan (before the 1868 Meiji Restoration)  than the usage of 剣 (Chinese ken ; Japanese tsurugi - Double edged straight sword). Thus, in pre-modern Japan, swordsmanship was more often referred to as kenjutsu, kendō, kengi, gekken, and other terms rather than tōjutsu, tōhō, etc.

After the Meiji Restoration, the modernized variants of Japanese swordsmanship have been referred to exclusively with the character 剣 (ken ).

The Tsurugi  is the Japanese version of the Chinese Jian Sword - It was originally used in Japan until the Single-edged saber (Katana) was introduced around the 11th century. 

The Last Samurai was French !

I loved the Last Samurai movie, and think Tom Cruise did a great job in it.

I learned a few weeks ago, from a fellow Iaido student that the story of Nathan Algren was actually inspired from the life of an actual French Army officer named Jules Brunet.

Brunet was part of a first military Mission sent by the French government to Japan to modernize the troops of the Shogun in 1867.

Jules Brunet in 1890

In 1868, the Shogun was overthrown in the Boshin War, the Emperor Meiji was restored to full power and the French military mission was ordered to leave Japan by Imperial decree.

However, Brunet chose to remain with the faction loyal to the Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu , also favorable to the Interests of France.  He resigned - actually deserted - from the French army, and left for northern Japan with the remains of the Shogunate's armies to help them organize the resistance to the imperial troops.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jules Brunet and his Samurai Team

When the troops loyal to the Shogun were decimated, Brunet managed to board a ship and sail back to France where he was court martialed for his desertion. As he was immensely popular in France, where newspapers had published his story, he  just received a 6 month time out sentence, after which he was reinstated and promoted in the Armed Forces.