Posted on 10/09/2024 11:13:47 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Four newly translated Japanese texts describe how ritual samurai beheadings were supposed to take place during the Edo period and later.
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This 1860 photo shows a samurai with a raised sword. Four newly translated texts shed light on how samurai carried out the death ritual of Seppuku. (Image credit: Heritage Images / Contributor via Getty Images) Four texts that discuss how the samurai carried out Seppuku, a ritual death in which a fellow samurai would usually behead another, have been translated into English for the first time. While the popular imagination often has the samurai stabbing themselves in the stomach and taking their own lives, this rarely happened during the Edo period (1603 to 1868).
The earliest of the four translated texts, named "The Inner Secrets of Seppuku," dates to the 17th century. "This document contains secret teachings that are traditionally only taught verbally, however they have been recorded here so that these lessons will not be forgotten and Samurai can be prepared," wrote Mizushima Yukinari, a samurai who lived between 1607 and 1697, a time when a shogun effectively ruled Japan. While the emperor was technically the ruler of Japan, the shogun held actual political control of the country. During the Edo period, the shoguns were descended from Tokugawa Ieyasu, a warlord who rose to power in Japan and became shogun in 1603.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
I wrote a paper on Samurai nearly 40 years ago.
Seppuku was modified multiple times throughout history. Originally the samurai would open their own belly and then cut their own throat if possible. This was later modified to add the second to do the beheading and then eventually instead of opening their belly they would merely place the tip of their sword or even a fan upon the belly before being beheaded.
Most don’t know that the women of samurai families had their own ritual which was basically throat cutting vs belly cutting.
Seriously, who comes up with ideas like this, surely they didn’t vote on it?
Seppuku “involved “cutting across the belly, from left to right then, pulling the knife out, repositioning it above the solar plexus and then cutting straight down to make a cross shape before removing the knife and placing it on your right knee,”
Except for the 3 or 4 % who converted to Catholicism.
Now, the whole lot is a complete mess of comic book reading wankers. Unable to reproduce. Unable to come out of a 30 year recession.
Sorry for saying something I am not supposed to. Lots of pathology going on.
I think your are exaggerating. They may be good at some things, but that doesn’t mean everything. 4% obesity, much less than the rest of the world, about 1/11th of the U.S.
They eat with two skinny sticks, meaning it would take all day and night just to get 2000 calories into them.
It’s not that hard.
Reminds me of the movie “Harakiri” in which a masterless Samurai is forced to kill himself with his own sword, the blades made of bamboo.
Thanks nick.
They also pick up the bowl, which makes all the difference
I can eat with chopsticks - very effectively. I’ve been doing it since I was fifteen.
They’re an honor-bound society, so their moral rules are a bit different from ours. It’s taken a bit of a backseat in modernity, but it made them very effective warriors in the past. The Yakuza still carry some of these traditions, and those families permeate through parts of the Japanese business and political circles - they’re not just gangsters anymore.
At least someone is trying to preserve their own culture and traditions, blemishes and all. I give them credit for accepting it. That’s more than can be said of most of our own.
Fully agree. It was anti-human and anti-individual liberty.
I guess everyone is supposed to say, “Oh, wow, what a cool disciplined culture,”
~~~
Spend a little time reading up on Bushido. It wasn’t for everyone in the culture. It was something akin to “Chivalry” for the more elite and wealthy knights in midaeval europe, but different in many ways. The code of honor and of discipline is probably very foreign to you, and to me as well (so I’m not being condesending, so you know). It’s difficult for us to relate.
Also, what you say about “he whole lot is a complete mess of comic book reading wankers. Unable to reproduce. Unable to come out of a 30 year recession.” is much more a phenomenon of the unfortunate final parts of the story arc for most western cultures. Particularly the inability to maintain a sustainable birthrate.
Another change involved when the Kaishakunin (the second) was to deliver the daki-kubi (coup de grâce).
Initially (back when being Samurai really counted for something) the Kaishakunin was to wait to strike until the condemned had completed his cuts (the number and location of which also changed over the centuries) and returned the tantō to the tray it had been offered on. In the latter Samurai era the ritual was watered down so much that all the condemned need do was to stretch out his hand as if reaching for the tantō and the Kaishakunin would strike.
Being Kaishakunin was both a great honor and a great responsibility because the condemned's obligation (to his lord, etc) was considered fulfilled once he had completed the ritual cuts. The Kaishakunin's role was to end his suffering once this ritual duty was dispatched.
And it took a swordsman of considerable skill because his duty was not to decapitate the condemned but only to sever the spinal cord but leave the head still somewhat connected to the neck. Depending on the source, this was done because it would have been in bad taste for the condemned's severed head to roll out amongst the guests present, or because if it fell off and rolled around, the head might become soiled. Since the condemned was restored to an honorable status at the moment of death, it would have been a dishonor to allow his remains to become soiled.
Done to best effect, the head would fall into the lap of the condemned, who would be sitting cross-legged in the lotus position. That way it would appear he was holding his own head.
Hadn’t read or heard of the lap bit, but had read that the best kaishakunin left the head on with just a fold of skin in the front still attached to keep it from “rolling”.
Yeah. We complain about Gen Z a lot too. Kids these days...
Even if done with best intentions, hara-kiri, the cutting part of the sepuku ritual, doesn't always go to plan, even if you split yourself open from crotch to craw. When he Japanese military surrendered at the end of WWII, Admiral Takijiro Onishi, mastermind of the Kamikaze attacks, committed sepuku as means of apologizing to the families of the young men who had killed themselves at his behest. For whatever reason he didn't use a Kaishakunin and reportedly took 15 hours to die.
Note to self: when committing hara-kiri, don't forget to bring a buddy with a BFK (and who knows how to use it).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takijir%C5%8D_%C5%8Cnishi
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