LEGENDS OF THE SAMURAI

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Attacking from the "sanctuary" of Buddhist temples, they were constant headaches to any warlord and even the emperor who tried to control their actions. From the Nanboku-chō period to the Muromachi period, large groups of infantrymen became more active in battle, close combat became more important, and the naginata and tachi, which had been used since the Heian period, were used more. He became excellent at kizeme—mentally dominating an opponent without killing him; he stopped participating in duels to the death. Through this book Sato describes men accomplished in martial arts, warrior-commanders in battle, and samurai's own views of themselves. Nobunaga was so impressed by Yasuke's strength and size—recorded as roughly 188 centimeters (6ft 2in) tall—that he made him his personal retainer and bodyguard.

He then defeated his major rival in the region, Imagawa Yoshimoto, in 1560, and in 1561 he went on to attack Mino Province, the southern part of modern-day Gifu Prefecture—a name it received from Nobunaga himself when he took Inabayama Castle and renamed it Gifu Castle in 1567.

Coming of age just after the end of the Warring States Period (1467-1590), there's debate over which specific battles Musashi engaged in, and even on which side, with some placing him on the losing side of the Battle of Sekigahara (1600), which cemented the dominance of the Tokugawa, while others say he was fighting elsewhere at the time. In 1612, when he was about 30 years old, Musashi sought a match with Ganryu Sasaki Kojiro, a sword stylist. The outbreak of the Onin War, which began in 1467 and lasted about 10 years, devastated Kyoto and brought down the power of the Ashikaga Shogunate.

Musashi's father was an accomplished swordsman serving the lord of Takeyama Castle, which overlooked the village. While he was defeated by his cousin Yoritomo (who went on to found the Kamakura Shogunate), it's recorded that Tomoe unhorsed, pinned and decapitated Yoritomo's strongest warrior at the Battle of Awazu in 1184. Hailed in his day as the greatest warrior in Japan, Sanada Yukimura (1567-1615) battled valiantly against the tumultuous beginnings of Tokugawa rule over the nation.While the emperor was still the ruler, powerful clans around Kyoto assumed positions as ministers, and their relatives bought positions as magistrates. It features three interconnected games united under its banner: Samurai Legends, Samurai Lands, and Samurai Rising. His book Gorin no sho, variously translated as The Book of Five Rings, the Book of Five Elements or Essays on the Five Circles, is considered a classic. In 1612 he fought his most famous duel , which was against Sasaki Kojiro on the tiny island of Funajima, situated in the Kanmon Straits between Japan's main island and Kyushu.

Unforgiving of challenges to his power, in 1587 Hideyoshi banished the Christian missionaries who had begun to make inroads in Kyushu, and while Nobunaga had welcomed such missionaries to counter the troublesome influence of warrior monks, Hideyoshi would go on to crucify 26 missionaries and Christian converts in 1597.

Many of the excerpts are by men of letters, rather than hardened soldiers, so there is a wide range of viewpoints that provides a contemporary view of warrior society, ending in the first half of the eighteenth century.