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What suggests this is a woman?
the title
I’m Japanese and am not sure if it’s really a woman
The site I got this pic from said the subject was a woman
Do you have the URL?
I’m a bit skeptical because this “woman” wears a male clothing with a sword for men and a male hairstyle. Whoever wrote the caption, I guess, is unaware of this mismatch. The author is not a professional historian who underwent a scholarly training as such.
I thus believe it’s a man.
Was it common for women to have swords, or was this only for the photograph? Thank you for posting this.
The picture is of a samurai man. The hairstyle is Chonmage and he is wearing Hakama. Hakama may be worn by men or women and may resemble a skirt but male styles actually have two legs, like trousers- see aikido practitioners today.
No, samurai women did not usually carry swords in feudal Japan but they would carry daggers which were deadly enough, and they were taught and expected to fight , usually in a home defence capacity. If you have the stomach for it, the history of Nakano Takeko, from the very end of the samurai era, contemporaneous with this photo, shows a woman samurai fighting and dying in battle in manner equal to any man.
Thank you, this was a fascinating read, and thank you for pointing me towards more to find out. Very cool indeed.
That’s what I thought at first, but it doesn’t look like the top of the subject’s head is shaved.
Actually, chonmage without shave was common (among men).
Thanks for your input on this subject.
Interesting, I’ve never heard that.
Ronin, samurai who did not serve a Lord, were not required to shave their heads. This became an easy way to identify such men. [1]: 211
A complex question, and one I can only answer with limited knowledge of the subject. As far as I understand, it goes something like this:
In the 1500s in Japan, it became increasingly common for noblewomen to be armed and trained in the use of arms to fight in the constant wars of the period. During the long period of peace in the 1600s and 1700s and 1800s, it became less common, but remained acceptable for women to be trained in the use of arms for ritual/recreational purposes, but no longer for warfare. This picture was taken in the 1870s, the Meiji period, just as/before Japan adopted 19th century European standards, so this was the ‘last hurrah’ of armed women in Japan.
After this, traditional weaponry declined as a whole, to the point of samurai turning in their swords to the government, and in the 1930s, when Japan decided they wanted to reintroduce traditional swordsmanship to army officers, they had to stamp out cheap swords on an industrial scale because so many had been lost or destroyed since the Meiji-period.
