Customer Reviews

Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

On a first encounter with "Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior," I was so distracted by the vast number of mispelled Japanese names that I made it no further than the fifth page and quickly consigned the book to a remote shelf. For a second encounter, I approached Clive Sinclaire's book determined to overlook both the spelling issues and the relatively weak and inappropriately sentimental first chapter that outlines a history of the Japanese warrior. This time, I jumped straight to chapter two and concentrated instead on the book's strengths.

And these strengths are notable. As most customer reviewers have here noted, the book provides outstanding introductory material on various classes of Japanese weapons as well as traditional armor. A combination of photographed artifacts, annotated line drawings, and excellent captions make learning from this book particularly easy. Edo-period woodblock prints, moreover, are used to good effect in showing the weapons as they were used in premodern times. Needless to say, the primary appeal of Sinclaire's book will be to that large body of people who enthusiastically study Japanese martial arts and military history. However, "Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior" also merits a place on the bookshelf of anyone generally interested in Japanese culture or more specifically tasked, for example, with decoding the military activities depicted in Japanese art.

Sinclaire's work has a nice tie-in with the classic and current Asian movies with samurai or samurai-like characters. Coming to Japan about the eighth century from the Asian mainland, in Japan's insular, closed, society, the samurai weaponry took on their own distinctive design and use. The samurai class and its weapons both for warfare and ceremonial purposes remained a central, influential part of Japanese society until World War II. This study is at once comprehensive and succinct, with the pleasing and informative visual elements of color photographs, including close-ups, of samurai weapons, scenes from historical art work, and antique tinted photographs. Most are familiar with the Japanese samurai swords. But the less familiar armor, spears, bow and arrow, and even guns in the past couple of centuries receive equal attention.

This history of Japanese samurai and its philosophy and military ideas is covered in Samurai, a fine title that is packed with over two hundred color photos and illustrations of Samurai weapons and armor. This reference is a 'must' for any who want to study the weaponry and sentiments of samurai: the history is impressive and the ideas and photos unparalleled.

I recently received a copy of Samurai The Weapons and Sprit of the Japanese Warrior by Clive Sinclaire. I was pleasantly surprised in that I quickly saw that this book will fill a vacant but important niche in the World of Nihonto collection. The first fifth of the book is general history of the Samurai. The other chapters of the book go into the areas of Japanese armor, swords, polearms, archery and guns. Those chapters are 66 pages long for Nihonto and 8 pages for archery. Each chapter mixes history along with the fundamentals and technical aspects of the subject.
I think that this is an important book for the newcomer to Nihonto or Japanese armor or Japanese matchlocks to have. It will give them a tremendous background in the World of the Samurai. I also feel that many if not most of the Old Time Collectors will benefit from reading it to fill in some of the voids.

This book was published by Salamander Press of London (...) There are 144 pages and over 250 photos (mostly in color). It measures 10 1/2 inches - 36.8 cm. wide X 11 1/4 inches - 38.8 cm tall.

Congratulations on a job well done Clive. I would have never been able to tie such a loosely knit group of subjects together anywhere near as well.

This should probably be considered the best book to buy when interested in Japanese swords. It is a great 1st book, but will also interest more seasonned collectors.

Mr. Sinclaire is the Chairman and a 30 year veteran of the To-Ken Society of Great Britain. He is also a 4th Dan Kendo practitioner. As such, Mr. Sinclaire is able to appreciate both the beauty and balance of fine Japanese swords.

The book is organized as follow:
1 - What is a Samurai?
2 - The Samurai's Armour
3 - A brief history of Japanese swords
4 - The sword of the samurai (Nihon-to)
5 - Polearms (Yari, Naginata and Nagamaki)
6 - Archery (Yumi and Ya)
7 - Guns of the Samurai (Tanegashima)
Plus a glossary, bibliography, etc.

The book presents a vast quantity of pictures, displaying many swords, fittings, other weapon, and other art pieces such as woodblock prints. There's at least 1 picture per page, and probably an average of 2 - many pages have up to 5 pictures.

The book is also heavy on hard data, especially historical. On the other hand, the book is lighter in terms of construction methods and associated crafts. For those, Kapp & Yoshihara's book "The Craft of the Japanese Sword" is a must have.

This is in my mind a better entry level book than Irvine's. Sato's book might be slightly richer if your interest is only and purely on blades as opposed to other weapons, the history of Japan, and the culture of the samurai.

Highly recommended!

Although it mainly generalizes aspects of Japanese military history, this volume contains a large quantity of excellent color photos of the very finest of traditional weapons. Swords, polearms, and archery specimens are displayed within. For the student of Japanese martial-culture, here is a brilliant coffee-table tome, thoroughly illustrated.

I have been collecting books on both the History of Samurai and their weapons for several years now and this stands as one of the most beautiful books in my collection. Clive Sinclaire is a collector with a wealth of knowledge and this book has been written accordingly. Accompanied by some truly beautiful photographs, this book stands proud in my bookshelf, easily one of the best I have purchased.

This book should possibly be titled "Clive Sinclaire on the Samurai" as it is an all inclusive discussion on many aspects of the Samurai. Included in this excellent book are a discussion of what a Samurai really was, including the traditions associated with such a warrior. The book also discusses the various weapons he would have normally used, and also the armor he used. The text is easily readable and understandable, the illustrations, the majority in color, are large and clear. This is a "coffee table" sized book, which unlike most "coffee table" books provides succinct knowledge for the most serious collector of Nihon-to and artifacts normally associated with the Samurai.

Mr. Sinclaire's knowledge of the subject is beyond reproach, and I found this book enlightening and wonderful.

I happened to run across the book Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior by Clive Sinclaire at the library, and it caught my eye. I've long been fascinated by Japanese culture, and I thought this would be an interesting read related to the true essence of a samurai's existence. It's not the most riveting material I've ever read, but it's definitely comprehensive and valuable if you are deeply interested in Japanese weaponry for historical or collection purposes.

Contents:
What is a Samurai?; The Samurai's Armour; A Brief history of Japanese Swords; The Sword of the Samurai (Nihon-to); Polearms (Yari, Naginata, and Nagamaki); Archery (Yumi and Ya); Guns of the Samurai (Tanegashima); Glossary; Bibliography; Index

The vast amount of the material here deals with the sword, the most common and important part of a samurai's arsenal. Sinclaire goes into quite a bit of detail related to the history of swordsmithing over the years, as well as the different styles of swords that evolved over time. I hadn't ever given much thought as to how evolving forms of armed combat caused the sword to shift from stabbing to slicing instruments. Sinclaire also includes a large number of illustrations and photos to document much of his information. Seeing sword blades stripped of all their ornaments gave me a greater appreciation for what care and craftsmanship went into them. If I were ever to start collecting Japanese weaponry, this would be a book that would reside on my shelf. But from the perspective of a relatively uninformed reader, the material was a bit hard to follow with all the detailed historical references. I'm guessing it was due to the unfamiliar Japanese names, and the difficulty that a Western reader would have in keeping them straight when presented with hundreds of years of history in a relatively short number of pages.

If this is an area of interest for you, it'd be hard to go wrong by reading this book. If you're only mildly interested in the subject, you'll probably end up skimming by the end and studying the detailed photographs.

I gave this as a gift. It covers all different parts of samurai history and costume. It does spend a lot of time on weapons whereas I bought it mainly for the costume part of it.