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Japanese ashigaru firing hinawajū.Night-shooting practice, using ropes to maintain proper firing elevation. Tanegashima (), most often called in Japanese and sometimes in English hinawajū (火縄銃, "matchlock gun"), was a type of matchlock-configured [1] arquebus [2] firearm introduced to Japan through the Portuguese Empire in 1543. [3]
Isolation did not decrease the production of guns in Japan—on the contrary, there is evidence of around 200 gunsmiths in Japan by the end of the Edo period. But the social life of firearms had changed: as the historian David L. Howell has argued, for many in Japanese society, the gun had become less a weapon than a farm implement for scaring ...
The matchlock, or tanegashima by comparison was easier to use. It did not rely on physical strength or regular practice to be effective. In addition the firearms could be stockpiled in great numbers when not required. As such, samurai and professional soldiers would train the lower classes in hōjutsu.
Ashigaru wearing armor and jingasa firing tanegashima (Japanese matchlocks). Ashigaru (足軽, "light of foot") were infantry employed by the samurai class of feudal Japan.The first known reference to ashigaru was in the 14th century, [1] but it was during the Ashikaga shogunate (Muromachi period) that the use of ashigaru became prevalent by various warring factions.
Tsujigiri (辻斬り or 辻斬, literally "crossroads killing") is a Japanese term for a practice when a samurai, after receiving a new katana or developing a new fighting style or weapon, tests its effectiveness by attacking a human opponent, usually a random defenseless passer-by, in many cases during night time. [1]
The ninjatō (忍者刀), ninjaken (忍者剣), or shinobigatana (忍刀), [2] is alleged to be the preferred weapon of the shinobi of feudal Japan, described in one 21st-century portrayal as carried on the person's back, specifically horizontally at a height of around that of the person's waist.
But, one of the key advantages of the weapon was that unlike bows, which required years of training largely available only to the samurai class, guns could be used by relatively untrained footmen. Samurai stuck to their swords and their bows, engaging in cavalry or infantry tactics, while the ashigaru wielded the guns. Some militant Buddhist ...
Samurai holding a kanabō The kanabō ( 金砕棒 , kanasaibō ) (literally "metal stick" or "metal club") is a spiked or studded two-handed war club used in feudal Japan by samurai . Other related weapons of this type are the nyoibō , konsaibō , [ 1 ] [ 2 ] tetsubō ( 鉄棒 ) , and ararebō . [ 3 ]