Shinobi myth

[JamesH]

Hi everyone,

 

I am not sure if this has already been addressed on this board, but for my own benefit I was hoping to find out the truth about shinobi clans, and if possible dissapate the myth of the 'Hollywood Ninja' sword.

 

I came across this from http://www.chenessinc.com/9260oniyuri.htm :

 

The blade is a shorter 23" in length to allow for faster maneuvering... However, it is housed in a regular length saya of 30". On the outside, it gives a deceptive impression that it is a regular katana... but when drawn, it clears the scabbard faster and earlier than the opponent expects due to the shorter blade length. Due to its relatively lighter blade weight, plus the extensive counter weight provided by the tsuka, it handles very fast with extensive leverage of the longer tsuka.

 

The 14" tsuka (13" not counting fuchi/kashira) with an extensive nakago is used for restraining techniques in some specific ryu-ha of Bujinkan. The extensive nakago (tang) within the long handle also makes the grip portion into a reasonably feasible section for blocking.

 

The overall appearance of the blade in and out of its saya is shown below. (I tried to include both the fullered and non-fullered version photos as much as I can to show you both variants). This is essentially a shinobi (ninja) katana... disguised to have the same appearance as a standard katana (as true ninja swords tends to be -- since it is never in anyones practice to go out of their way to reveal their own identify). (The straight bladed ninja sword is more of a Hollywood rendition of the shinobi katana).

 

(The last photo below is meant to offer a size reference with my hand holding the sword).

 

I know this will probably seem laughable to many of the more experienced member, but as I novice ... if I don't ask, I wont know :D

 

Is there ANY truth to the above? Was there any particular characteristics to swords used by shinobi?

 

 

 

James

[sanjuro]

Hi James.

 

I looked into this out of sheer curiosity some years ago. Without dragging a load of quotes into this post I can recommend a decent book on the subject. The book is an honest attempt at demystifying the whole Shinobi thing. Discussed in its pages are the shinobi clans, the art of silent kenjutsu, training methods and all about the so called ninja sword, as well as other more devious weaponry. All your answers lie in its pages. Its also a pretty good read. Whilst most books on this subject are not to be taken too seriously, this one stands out as a serious volume.

 

'The Ninja Sword' by Katsumi Toda (1986). Published by Dragon Books, ISBN 0 946062 15 3. Most martial arts supplies shops will have access to it.

[estcrh]

From the author of such highly acclaimed books as....Ninja Death Vow by Katsumi Toda and Revenge of the Shogun's ninja by Katsumi Toda!!!...but seriously James I do not think anyone on this site can answer your question with any accuracy (or they wont admit that they can). There is a site for people with an interest in all things ninja and you might find some one there who has some knowledge and or information on the subject.

 

http://dothacker.omghax.ca/index.php?PH ... 0o387uo70&

[Kevin]

I've never seen physical or historical evidence for a specifically ninja sword. As far as I know, they used whatever swords they could get their hands on. That said, (and ignoring the Bujinkan for the moment), some old ryu (can't remember which) did have, as part of their syllabus, the use a shorter sword in a longer saya. An opponent might anticipate how a sword would be drawn, used, and its effective distance, based on the length of a saya. After all, you can't see the blade and it's a reasonable assumption. The use of a shorter blade in a longer saya would therefore screw up their assumptions on distancing, leaving them at a disadvantage. Additionally the extra space below the kissaki would allow, theoretically, for keeping things in, such as the odd message, though I could see that there might be a problem in getting them out again once you'd put them in. However, it is not in the least unlikely that such a tactic would be adopted by historical ninja and thus wind up in the Bujinkan syllabus.

 

BTW, it should be noted that not all the ryu under the umbrella of the Bujinkan were ninjutsu ryu.

 

Kevin

[Kevin]

Reading through the blurb on that sword, it looks like some students in the Bujinkan have recently had the bright idea of lengthening the tsuka (and thus the nakago) in order to make certain restraints easier to apply. Actually they can be applied with a katana tsuka of standard length (e.g. you could apply them with a shin-gunto tsuka), which was no doubt the way it was done historically. Personally I'd not be too keen on such a long tsuka, though there are pictures from the Satsuma Rebellion of samurai with swords with very long tsuka.

 

Apart from that, the only really distinguishing feature of this sword is something like a short katana or a long wakizashi in a saya that looks like it houses a longer sword. As I mentioned in the previous post, that was done in some schools. However, there wasn't anything unusual in the blades themselves. After all, it probably wasn't a good idea for a smith to knock out obvious ninja swords, any more than it would have been a good idea for a ninja to have an obvious ninja sword in the house. That said, the lines between samurai and ninja were not always clear cut, and the Tokugawas used the Iga and Koga clans for various reasons, e.g. security.

 

Kevin

[sanjuro]

Eric T 99.999%

 

Fair comment about the book.... It is pretty hard to get hold of anything of substance on the whole ninja thing. Some of Katsumi Todas books have rather sensational and dramatic titles that tend to be a bit offputting. The reason we know so little about the historical ninja is that much is made of a now meaningless shinobi secrecy and in place of fact much speculation and misinformation is written.

[estcrh]

Eric T 99.999%

 

Fair comment about the book.... It is pretty hard to get hold of anything of substance on the whole ninja thing. Some of Katsumi Todas books have rather sensational and dramatic titles that tend to be a bit offputting.

Actually Keith I was sort of making a comment on why an author should put a little more thought into his titles before publishing . From what you said about Todas book I wanted to take a look at it myself since it is one I have not heard of, unfortunate that there were no free peeks that I could find but I did see a used copy for $9+shipping, cheaper then going to a movie. A lot of people wont even mention the word "ninja" for fear of never being taken seriously again but its an interesting subject and it is a valid if not over hyped part of Japanese and Samurai history.

[estcrh]

Kevin, I have always wondered why anyone would think that someone who used stealth and secrecy to his advantage (ninja) would be walking around in armor and carrying an arsenal of weapons. As to swords that appear to be longer then they really are, or are something entirely different then what they seem to be here are a couple of examples.

 

 

 

 

[jason_mazzy]

The truth of "ninja" or assasin would be held in misinformation. even in the historical past. The refrences to them scaling walls with ease or flying, or dissapearing and use of magic. That would be an assasins best friend. As a former military person, disinformation, psychological misinterpratations and confusement are tactically advantageous. Instilling fear and confusion gives you such an advantage that normal, well excecuted and trained maneuvers gain mystique and legend. Many people do not know this about the gulf war, but if you remember the lines of iraqi soldiers who would walk into a USA area and have their weapons over their heads begging for mercy had alot to do with Psy-ops. It was well distributed that USA Marines, were cannibals and would slaughter them and there families, eat and collect them for trophies. And they gave up in droves through fear. I believe ninja is based on lies and myths perpatrated to actually allow them to work more efficiently, hence the lack of credible information today.

[Kevin]

Estcrh, well you wouldn't go around clanking with a hidden armoury 99 times out of 100. Dead giveaway. :-) Specialised tools would be useful on some occasions though.

 

That first blade is sneaky. You'd imagine, from the saya, that it would have a fairly normal sugata and that the saya indicates length. Thus you have preconceptions about how it would be used. Instead you're faced with something very different and used very differently.

 

Jason, true, disinformation is useful. Nothing like an enemy who has already defeated themselves out of terror. :-) Additionally, it's a good idea to get an opponent to believe in a reality that is advantageous to you, and only see that it was all an illusion right at the crunch point, when it is too late to do anything about it. ]:-) OTOH there were tools for scaling walls and various methods of obscuring an opponent's vision so that someone appeared to disappear (some a bit like flashbangs). Some was probably plain woodcraft. I recall scaring one bunch of coppers that way years ago - it seemed to them that I'd just popped out of the ground in their midst. ]:-) One damned near peed himself cos I was 3-4 inches from his shoulder. :-D As for magic, there are links to mikkyo and some of the more arcane stuff could be regarded as 'magic' by others.

 

Kevin

[Kevin]

Stupid error - please delete.

 

Kevin

[jason_mazzy]

Jason, true, disinformation is useful. Nothing like an enemy who has already defeated themselves out of terror. :-) Additionally, it's a good idea to get an opponent to believe in a reality that is advantageous to you, and only see that it was all an illusion right at the crunch point, when it is too late to do anything about it. ]:-) OTOH there were tools for scaling walls and various methods of obscuring an opponent's vision so that someone appeared to disappear (some a bit like flashbangs). Some was probably plain woodcraft. I recall scaring one bunch of coppers that way years ago - it seemed to them that I'd just popped out of the ground in their midst. ]:-) One damned near peed himself cos I was 3-4 inches from his shoulder. :-D As for magic, there are links to mikkyo and some of the more arcane stuff could be regarded as 'magic' by others.

 

Kevin

 

That is my point. They used tools and other devices to do things like scale walls or appear, disappear or reappear, or distract so that another ninja would show up in a different place giving the illusion of the same ninja in multiple places. To the locals it would appear they had magical abilities, that bore the legends and myths we hear of today.

 

also the art of stealth and killing silently lead to the belief they were ghosts, spirits, or magical in some way.

[Kevin]

also the art of stealth and killing silently lead to the belief they were ghosts, spirits, or magical in some way.

 

Oh, I know about that firsthand. The guy who taught me woodcraft was a poacher turned gamekeeper who wound up hunting the Japanese through the jungles of places like Malaya. He scared the sugar out of anyone thinking of poaching on his patch. Just the idea of him hunting them scared folks. All sorts of tales got told about him. You'd think you were alone, no one around for miles, and he'd be round the next tree you passed, or appearing to have just materialised out of the ground. No noise at all - he'd just be there, as if he'd always been there. :-)

 

Kevin

[Wickstrom]

The only evidence of Ninja's that I have ever seen is a type of armor that had chain-mail sewn on the inside of normal peasant attire. Although stealth was probably the key to executing their missions, I think they mostly just tried to blend in with the crowd (probably carried an O-tanto or wakizashi like a regular merchant). Not like Hollywood's version where they're throwing hailstorms of shurikens and knives out of the shadows to take out their targets...

[jason_mazzy]

A ninja I am sure covered a wide range of interpritation. to group warfare such as the army rangers, to team hits like the seals or berets, and then lone assasins. A ninjas one main objective would be no one knowing he was one. Just blending in.

[estcrh]

The only evidence of Ninja's that I have ever seen is a type of armor that had chain-mail sewn on the inside

 

Yes, a kusari katabira or chain jacket with the chain hidden between layers of cloth was very common in Japan as was armored clothing in general, kikko katabira also were used. Almost impossible to spot and no noise unlike traditional armor and very effective against slashing attacks.

 

 

[Henry Wilson]

Ninja

 

I can't help thinking that this topic is being over thought. It could be as simple as people long ago were born into a certain position in life. They were expected to behave, dress, speak, live, eat, work as was dictated by their social position of birth. Not doing these things as dictated would have been regarded as disrespectful to their ancestors and would have flown in the face of any common sense.

 

The ninja new this and were willing to con and exploit situations. I would imagine that a ninja would have probably dressed as the most unobvious person, such as lowly uneducated farmer and did his or her best to act as a lowly farmer was expected to and would have used this charde to open a situation. They therefore would have been able to use a simple farm implement as a weapon just as easily as a sword. Basically they were very well train con men.

 

Because of this alternative life style I would not be surprised if the ninja came from a very contentious class of people who were known as Eta. In a Buddhist society they were lumbered with the task of working with dead animals so from what I gather were doomed anyway.

 

I can't swallow a comparison between navy seals and the SAS.

 

By the way in the KTK catalog 6 (if you can find it) there is a tsuba that some people believe might have ninja connections.

[jason_mazzy]

The comparison was a tactical one. The rangers assault in groups the seals and berets attack in teams, and then there are times for single one to one tactics. I am not comparing ninjas to the military, just stating different ways they would have attacked or used there skills.

[Henry Wilson]

A fun website.

 

http://iganinja.jp/en/about/ninja.html

[Aloof Pegasus]

 

Hatsumi Shihan, top Ninjutsu teacher. Includes some sword technique.

[Wickstrom]

Skip to 4:55 in the video Pegasus posted.

 

ouch!

[JamesH]

Thank you for all your responses.

 

I had a look at the ninja forum, but it seems it is all about function, not so much on tradition.

 

From what little I know, and can imagine, the ninja were assassins who did the dirty work. As their honor was never at stake, they could attack and kill a samurai, in situations when it would be considered dishonorable for another samurai to do so.

 

I have always felt a bit of a hole in my collection where a working shinobi blade would go. I can only imagine the number of contraptions they may have had to do what they needed to do, I guess I wanted to know if there were tactical attributes like the ones on the cheness blade, that a ninja blade would demand of a tosho at the time... after all nihonto adapted as Japanese society and external threats to it changed, so why would this be an exception.

 

Personally, I have my doubts about tosogu with shinobi links, as given the mystery and secrecy of the ninja clans, I doubt one would risk to be given away by a tsuba on his sword.

 

I will try to track down a copy of 'The Ninja Sword' by Katsumi Toda (1986), perhaps it will shed some light on this mystery.

 

 

 

James

[sanjuro]

James.

 

For what this may be worth as evidence, I had the opportunity of examining what was purported to be a shinobi gatana a few years back. The blade had a nagasa of 23 inches, short enough to be drawn from any position (over shoulder etc) the sugata was sakizori. Hamon hososugaha. Hada was Tight itame. There were no kizu in the blade that I could see. The period of manufacture was claimed to be late Momoyama. All in all it was a reasonable and serviceable blade, well made although with a somewhat coarse nakago. It was quite definately of traditional Japanese make. The collector who owned it was also fairly knowledgable and like most of us would be, a little sceptical about the shinobi origins.

The koshirae of this sword was quite interesting. Obviously very old, the saya was a dark brown Urushi slightly overlength for the blade. The extra length at the saya jiri contained a small isolated compartment which was covered by a rounded kojiri cap which clipped into place. The tsuka was leather tsuka ito wrapped and all the mounts were plain iron. But for the compartment, this sword looked like any other common sword of the period with a plain iron (Wakizashi sized although the blade was longer than most wakizashi), Mokko gata tsuba. It was not hard to believe the shinobi origins of the sword when all was taken into consideration. With reservations, I would suspect that this was the general nature and appearance of most shinobi gatana, even if this particular sword may or may not have been the real deal. After all, the nature of the shinobi warrior was to blend in, and a sword that was out of the ordinary would have caused him to stand out and possibly draw unwanted attention to the wearer.

[JamesH]

Keith,

 

Thank you kindly for sharing.

 

Yes I think indeed your experience may be as close as we may come to identifying what a shinobi nihonto may, and again may not look like. Much is as I expected, in regards to the slightly shorter nagasa with a deeper sori for a quicker draw.

 

You mentioned the blade ha rough nakago, I was hoping you could elaborate... Do you mean that it did not look well finished, or just aged poorly?

 

I was also intrigued with the fact that dating the sword back to momoyama, you did not find any kizu. I am guessing it was a very well made, whereas I thought a shinobi katana may bear a slight resemblence to satsuma, in terms of quality. Perhaps they had a dedicated smiths?

 

 

Thanks again for sharing.

 

 

James

[sanjuro]

Hi James.

 

As far as the nakago went and my description of the nakago as being rough. The nakago was aged fairly much as you would expect on a blade of the claimed vintage. It was rough however in the respect of the shinogi line not continuing for the entire length of the nakago, fading out evenly at about the halfway point just after the mekugi ana.. The nakago jiri was square cut. It had a single mekugi ana punched from both sides, not drilled. The nakago itself was left rough from finishing by a sen (no Yasuri mei at all). In all, basically not finished to the higher standard one would expect of a more formal samurai blade. That however is where the roughness ended. The fact that the blade itself had no visible kisu rather surprised me, as did the fact that the blade had at some point been repolished. These factors do seem to point to the fact that if this was indeed a shinobi gatana, then there were apparently smiths producing these blades. Whether those smiths were dedicated to producing only shinobi blades is open to conjecture of course.

But why not? The Iga ninja among others, were a very self sufficient group of families. It is not inconcievable that one or more of the members of those families served an apprenticeship or a partial apprenticeship as a tosho for just such a purpose. They certainly had blacksmiths within their small communities that worked for them and a tosho is by definition a highly specialised blacksmith. This really is one of those subjects that requires the kind of insights that due to the closed nature of the subject generally, are not freely available.

I wish I had bought that blade when I had the chance some time after I originally examined it...... I might look the guy up again after Christmas, It would make an interesting thread just for the sake of discussion....... :D

[JamesH]

Keith,

 

Thank you, very interesting indeed.

 

Please keep us posted if you get any news or pics! of the sword :D

 

 

James

[sanjuro]

James.

 

Just to put this topic to bed, as I indicated I managed to contact the owner of the sword. The sword was sold mid last year unfortunately. The worst news however is that the blade and the koshirae were subsequently split up! The blade now belongs to a Japanese collector and the koshirae to a different owner who was only interested in the slightly unusual feature of the mounting.

Unfortunately, and more so if it was the genuine article, any examination of the complete sword is now rather remote.

 

I now wish even more fervently that I had purchased it when it was available. At least in my hands it would still be intact even if only as a curiosity.

[WellsFargo]

Hello guys,

 

My apologies for digging up this old thread, but I have a wakizashi attributed to Aizu Michitoki and a board member pointed out something to me when I showed him a picture of a ware in the blade....

 

There is a 'punched' triangle on the nakago, normally covered by the habaki.

 

He knew of a sword which was "refused" by NBTHK shinsa for this same mark, as it might be a Shinobi mark and therefore making it a weapon of murderers and spies not worthy of having the title of art-sword...

 

Guys, I am a nitwit on Nihonto, so I have no clue.... but I thought it would be interesting to show a picture of it in this thread.... why not ey?

 

By the way, my sword has a NTHK kanteisho. So the NTHK shinsa didn't seem to be bothered by it.... presumably (??)

 

Greetings,

 

Jan-Wouter