Gunbai: Ancient Japanese Warfare

Defeating Late Japanese Armor - Tosei Gusoku (当世具足 ) A section of the famous ukiyo - e  "ten brave takeda warriors" - 武田勇士揃 by Utagawa Sadahide. This was an article that was requested and one that I've really enjoyed writing, although it took a lot of efforts and researches. It is a follow up of my complete analysis of the heaviest possible configuration worn by a wealthy samurai during the late 16th century, Tosei Gusoku (当世具足) - Body Coverage Explained ; if you haven't read it yet, I highly suggest you to do so in order to better understand this topic. So today I will cover the various way to specifically deal with that type of configuration and how it was done historically during the Sengoku period. Before start, I will do a quick recap on the main weakspots of the armor: A sketch of the most protective possible configuration of a late 16th century tosei gusoku. I'm not an artist but all the armor pieces you see are based on real pieces found in ...

Iron and Steel Technology in Japanese Arms & Armors - Part 4: Armor making A shop of a armor makers in the Edo period, from   職人尽絵. After discussing how swords and blades in general were made in the last part of my series, in this article I will try to explain how plates for armors were made in the 16th century. If you are already familiar with my series, you will already know that these posts are exclusively made with the late Muromachi and Azuchi-Momoyama period in mind; in fact despite few scattered evidences, plates weren't used to make armors up until the mid 15th century as I have explained in detail here. Unlike with Japanese swords, the information on Japanese armor making seems to be quite rare and scarce , and on top of that, very few metallurgical studies exist both in English and in Japanese, so it is fair to said that this field is still a work in progress. As usual ,  before I start, here the disclaimer; I might have missed somethi...