Ask an enthusiast on Japanese history

Wrymouth3

Wrymouth3

Emperor
Joined
Sep 21, 2011
Messages
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Location
Fort Lauderale, Florida
Because the WH forum has been kind of mediocre and dull for a while, I was thinking of a new idea. Ask each other about historical eras we know a good bit about. With that said, I decided to start a thread on the above topic. Ask away!
 
I've asked that in the History Questions Not Worth A Thread, but since you seem more knowledgeable:

Is the Divine Wind story true? Were there actual Mongol invasions upon Japan?
 
Ooooh, I've been wanting to delve into Japanese history for a while, for some reason I find it really fascinating. I just finished the only book I could find on the Imjin war, the one by Stephen Turnbull (there was another one, The Imjin War: Japan's Sixteenth-Century Invasion of Korea and Attempt to Conquer China, but not even my university library has it. Which is sad, seems more comprehensive and academic).

Could you recommend some good books on various periods? Sengoku is always interesting, but there's plenty of other periods that I know so little about, nor where to start, so anything is good!
 
Joecoolyo said:
Ooooh, I've been wanting to delve into Japanese history for a while, for some reason I find it really fascinating. I just finished the only book I could find on the Imjin war, the one by Stephen Turnbull (there was another one, The Imjin War: Japan's Sixteenth-Century Invasion of Korea and Attempt to Conquer China, but not even my university library has it. Which is sad, seems more comprehensive and academic).

Could you recommend some good books on various periods? Sengoku is always interesting, but there's plenty of other periods that I know so little about, nor where to start, so anything is good!
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, Stephen Turnbull is the only person who covers the period in great extension, but the problem is that he basically only covers stuff like battle tactics and important officers and rulers. He is a purist of military history in the sense, I also believe he got in trouble a few years back for plagarism on a medieval topic. He's not bad, you just have to be very cautious with him.
 
Tolni said:
I've asked that in the History Questions Not Worth A Thread, but since you seem more knowledgeable:

Is the Divine Wind story true? Were there actual Mongol invasions upon Japan?
Click to expand...

The Divine Wind story is partially true, the primary sources are wonky, but there is indeed reason to believe that heavy waves and severe rain could have damaged the poorly contructed ships. When I say poorly constructed, historians argue that the ships were intentionally sabatoged by Han Chinese and Korean laborers who were forced into hard physical work on these vessels. The invasions did occur, some soldiers did indeed land, but were systimatically slaughtered by prepared squads of Daimyo.
 
Wrymouth3 said:
Unfortunately, Stephen Turnbull is the only person who covers the period in great extension, but the problem is that he basically only covers stuff like battle tactics and important officers and rulers. He is a purist of military history in the sense, I also believe he got in trouble a few years back for plagarism on a medieval topic. He's not bad, you just have to be very cautious with him.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's what kind of turned me off his other books (not the plagiarism, but the pure military history).

It's a shame there isn't much else on the period. Could you recommend any books in general, from any period?
 
Joecoolyo said:
Yeah, that's what kind of turned me off his other books (not the plagiarism, but the pure military history).

It's a shame there isn't much else on the period. Could you recommend any books in general, from any period?
Click to expand...

Donald Keene is a very good Japanese historian, although IIRC he's not a specialist of the Sengoku period, however he does cover it in a mostly primary source collection book. I believe it's called Sources of Japanese Tradition or something of the sort. I read it about 3 years ago, and it was very very good.
 
But Professor Wry is it true that the Japanese are the greatest most honorableiest warriors in the history of mankind who could absolutely beat any other warriors from any period according to Spike TV?
 
Luckymoose said:
But Professor Wry is it true that the Japanese are the greatest most honorableiest warriors in the history of mankind who could absolutely beat any other warriors from any period according to Spike TV?
Click to expand...

No answer?, Mr. Wry?
Got a question: The 3 greatest shogun of all time, according to their valor in battle, honor, and accomplishments, both military and political.
Do you believe the samurai were more chivalrous than the European knights? (yes)
I'm a fan of the Samurai and in general, the idea of Honorable Militarism.
 
I find interesting the system whereby emperors would retire so they could become more powerful. There were scores who did this, including some empresses, starting with the empress Jito in (supposedly) the seventh century.

Shirakawa effectively ruled Japan for four decades as a cloistered emperor.
 
Cheezy the Wiz said:
Are you familiar with Yagyu Munenori? What do you think of his philosophy?
Click to expand...

I read his book together with book of five rings long long time ago, and I really fascinated by Yagyu work at that time. He explain about the order of society in the analogy of the sword: the wielded sword to restore the order, the sheathed sword to keep the order, sword without sword the order is established. And the book is not thick at all, you can finish it in one sit.
 
Luckymoose said:
But Professor Wry is it true that the Japanese are the greatest most honorableiest warriors in the history of mankind who could absolutely beat any other warriors from any period according to Spike TV?
Click to expand...

In a similar style:

The IJN: overrated navy, or the most overrated navy?
 
The IJN did pretty damned good, compared to what they were up against. The Japanese were more overrated in the air than on the sea.
 
Surface ship against surface ship, the USN, and all our allies, were unimpressive against the IJN in most engagements. But the war as a whole, most engagements were air and submarine.
 
Here's a question: Hokkaido was separate from the rest of Japan for a long time, but you don't hear about Kyushu and Shikoku having separate identities from the main island, Honshu. Did they ever evolve separate identites, or were the three integrated from early times?
 
sydhe said:
Here's a question: Hokkaido was separate from the rest of Japan for a long time, but you don't hear about Kyushu and Shikoku having separate identities from the main island, Honshu. Did they ever evolve separate identites, or were the three integrated from early times?
Click to expand...

Kyushu had some sort of separate identity to be sure, they for the most part controlled the Okinawan kingdoms as a tributary state and also had their own different set of ideals, not really a different culture though. The daimyo on the island were much more prone to violent outbreak against the daimyo of Honshu, you can see this with the Shimazu. Shikoku on the other hand I would say was mostly always integrated, although from what I understand they also have a much different dialect.
 
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