The Shinkage-ryū Sotomono of Nabeshima Naotomo (1705)

The Shinkage-ryū Sotomono (新陰流外物) of Nabeshima Naotomo (一名 進履橋 ) found in Fukui’s 1937 multi-volume work, “Secret Texts of the Tokugawa”, has thirty-three articles and a colophon.

Japanese. A reading text. Fukui’s 凡例 states the Sotomono base manuscript carried no punctuation at all — every comma and stop is his editorial supply, and so, by the same reasoning, would any kaeriten be. No kaeriten apparatus is given here: unlike the Kadensho’s, which descend from a witness, the Sotomono’s would be Fukui’s own inferences, and presenting them as the manuscript’s would misrepresent their status. Line breaks and mokuroku formatting are editorial. The text has been read against the 1937 print. Fukui’s own parenthetical glosses — しつ(失), す(素) — stand as printed.

Nabeshima Naotomo, 1705, conferred on Yamazaki Jinzaemon; epistolary 候 style throughout. Entries marked ‡ carry provisional romaji, shown in the gloss line below the title.

1. Carrying Fire at Night

Yoru no hi mochiyō no koto (夜の火持樣の事; Carrying fire at night):

“Fire at night means, before anything else, the body-fire. As to how it is made up and bound, I set down here the general outline.”¹

Take the best hemp fibre and work it soft, until it is like cotton wool. Cut it into lengths of about a shaku and roll each into a bundle four or five sun around. Take ten or fifteen of these, set them alight in a pit in the ground, and let them burn right through until nothing is left. Then cap the mouth of the pit with a bowl or something of earthenware, sealing the breath in as one does for ordinary charring, and plaster the rim of the lid well with earth so no breath escapes. Then take them out, cut them into lengths of about four sun, roll them to some three sun around, bind them in five places with bamboo sheath, and wrap them round twice more with the same. Light it at the end and keep it inside your nose-paper, and it will last about a day.

With this body-fire you take a light and apply it to a length of bamboo or the like. There may be various forms — a nose-paper tube and such would do very well. In that case, fit the tinder to a pair of fire-tongs and have it ready made up, to be used when the moment comes.

This too is no more than the general outline. Without oral transmission it cannot be managed.

Notes

胴の火 (dō-no-hi), “body-fire” — a smouldering slow-match carried on the person, kept in the fold of paper every samurai had about him. The manufacture described is charcoal-burning in miniature: combustion in a sealed pit produces a fibre that smoulders without flame.

「先大概を記す」 — the print reads 大概, not the 圖 that the article’s closing 「是も先大圖ばかりなり」 might suggest. The two expressions differ: the opening promises “the general outline”, the close apologises that it is “no more than a rough sketch”.

2. Lighting Torches and Lanterns

Taimatsu nado tomoshiyō (松明抔ともし樣; Lighting torches and lanterns):

“On lighting torches, hand-lanterns and the like. Whether you carry it on the right or the left, arrange a hand-towel or anything else to give a little shade, so that the fist holding it is hidden. Then the way ahead is visible and your own side is in darkness.”²

There is a thing called the robber’s lantern; you will know of it. It is made of pasted paper, a little smaller than an ordinary hand-lantern, with the bottom left open and the mechanism inside contrived like a swinging censer. Lit as an ordinary lantern is, it throws light only a shaku four or five sun, or two shaku, below, and not the least light escapes to the sides. Hold it by the lighted side, turn the bottom forward and lay it on its side, and the light is strong far ahead while your own position is not visible at all. It is a curious thing.

Long ago, when the Soga brothers made their night attack at the foot of Fuji, the enemy — never mind torches — set fire to straw capes and hats and umbrellas and held them out; and though this gave a very good light, the Soga men took cover behind a low brushwood fence and came out of the dark to fight, and so gained an unexpected advantage and wounded a great many. Matters of this kind are to be well attended to.

Notes

がん盜ちやうちん = 龕灯提灯 (gandō-chōchin), the dark lantern. Naotomo’s description of the internal mechanism as 廻り香爐 — a swinging censer — is precise: both use a gimbal, so the candle stays upright however the case is tilted. That is exactly what allows the lantern to be laid on its side and still burn.

The Soga example is a night-attack classic, and Naotomo’s reading of it is characteristic: the losing side had better light, and lost because of it.

3. Handling Bow and Gun ashigaru

Yumi teppō no mono tsukaiyō no koto (弓鐵炮之者つかひ樣之事; Handling bow and gun ashigaru):

“On the handling of bow and gun ashigaru. The world at large does not know it, and I shall not go into detail in writing. There is a small further teaching about how they are led.”³

When an officer of foot is leading his ashigaru in column and contact is at hand — or when they have come within a ri or two — some will fall behind on business great or small, or to change their straw sandals, and the officer stands about vaguely waiting. Those men catch up; but while he has been idling, when contact comes his line is ragged and the array poor. And if an ashigaru, whether his business was genuine or not, runs to catch up after falling behind, he arrives out of breath, or the formation is disordered; and a mere one or two men become a weakness to one’s own side.

So it is essential to have told the ashigaru beforehand, and to see that such business is finished before contact is near, and that they hold themselves in the disposition of waiting for battle.

Boldness and timidity reside in the man himself, and cannot be commanded from outside. But this matter of not falling behind is settled by habit formed in advance.

Notes

The article is about march discipline, not shooting — an unglamorous subject treated with the seriousness of a man who has commanded troops.

4. “Tengu-Toppling”

Tengu-taoshi no koto (天狗たをしの事; “Tengu-toppling”):

“On tengu-toppling. It is used above all in laying out a castle. One cannot be without this understanding for the home province’s main castle, or for a siege-castle or a field-castle; and it should be applied in open-field battle too.”⁴

For instance, in a mountain castle receiving an attack: at the front approach road and at the rear road, from the very outset — at the time the castle is laid out — it is essential to lay the roads with the thought already in mind of where great stones, great timbers, stone-engines and heavy guns can be brought to bear to greatest advantage.

Then when the enemy presses up this road, let him come close, to a chō or two, strike him steadily with stone-engines and heavy guns, and topple him as one topples a row of shōgi pieces; and for those nearer, hurl down great timbers and stones. Once you have gained a great advantage, the enemy will not come at this approach again. That being so, leave only a few of the men holding this position, add them where the footing is easy and the enemy attacks readily, and defend there — then the troops gain heart and the advantage is great.

In an open-field engagement too, apply this idea: strike with heavy guns where the enemy comes on in a mass, and when his formation breaks, meet him with mounted or foot warriors, cross spears, and settle it.

Notes

天狗たをし, “tengu-toppling” is a prepared killing ground. Approach roads laid out at the design stage so that the ground the attacker must use is already ranged. The name presumably comes from bringing down something that ought to be beyond reach.

將棊たをし refers to toppling shōgi pieces set on end in a row, the domino effect.

5. Thrusting and Cutting at a Mounted Man

Bajō no mono tsuki-kiru koto (馬上之者突切事; Thrusting and cutting at a mounted man):

“On thrusting and cutting at a man on horseback. The understanding when you are on foot and your opponent mounted: to stand and meet the enemy — whether he has spear or sword — with the horse coming head-on has been disliked from of old. If you take the horse head-on and he rides in suddenly, you will be trampled. So on the right or the left, on foot, take the mounted warrior on your flank; preferably stand to the enemy’s right, cut the horse’s legs from under him, and settle the matter after he falls.”⁵

When spears are crossed, make the mounted warrior use his spear to the right, and for thrusting and cutting too, close on the enemy’s left to settle it. Without oral transmission this is hard to convey.

6. Cutting Down at a Footman from Horseback

Bajō yori shita no mono kiri-tsuki kokoromochi no koto (馬上より下の者切突心持の事; Cutting down at a footman from horseback):

“To cut a foot warrior from horseback there is nowhere but the one place on the helmet, or the top of the gauntlet. And since for the man on foot too there is nowhere he can be cut or thrust but the helmet and the gap above the gauntlet, everywhere else is unguarded.”⁶

With this understanding, harry him as the moment allows, or have him trampled by the horse; and before he can rise, dismount, fall on him and take his head — this is the usual practice. To cut a foot warrior from horseback outright is a hard thing; and since it is likewise hard for a man on foot to cut a mounted warrior, in most cases one dismounts, takes a spear, faces him and settles it. This should be understood. On paper it is hard to convey.

Notes

The article’s conclusion is that mounted combat mostly ends on foot — a practical judgement, and one that quietly deflates the prestige of the mounted warrior. Both articles 5 and 6 arrive at the same place from opposite sides.

7. Fitting the Reins and Saddle-Front

Tazuna kurasaki no koshiraeyō no koto (手綱鞍前のこしらへ樣の事; Fitting the reins and saddle-front):

“To work a chain into the reins is the ordinary rule. If the reins are cut, a mounted warrior is like a fish out of water and is good for nothing; so working in the chain is the first consideration.”⁷

Then, so that the saddle does not turn over under you, there should be an understanding about the tightening of the girth. There are various ways of doing what is called the saddle-fastening, and done badly it will not come free. Among the saddle-fastenings there is one that secures both knees to the equipment. This gives quite exceptional freedom, but it involves rather a lot of gear, and many hold it to be of the Yano school. This too is hard to convey on paper.

8. River Crossing; the “Four-sun Pool”

Kawawatari ni yonsun-buchi no koto (川渡に四寸淵の事; River crossing; the “four-sun pool”):

“There are various ways of crossing rivers. First: where it is too deep for the horse’s feet to touch, leave the seat of the saddle, swim alongside, stroke the water with whichever hand is the better, and with the other take hold of the tassel near the pommel, and so cross. Making the horse swim is not done at all. However fine a horse it may be, where its feet will not touch it raises its head, stands upright, and swims by the man’s strength — that is the ordinary way of it.”⁸

Men hear that one crosses a river on horseback, ride straight in, and horse and man both go under. This should be well understood. There are ways of building a horse-raft, but as these are poor I do not set them down. As to what was meant by ‘the four-sun pool’ — I have forgotten.

Notes

「四寸淵の事と御座候は失念申候」 — the article’s own title names a technique the author can no longer recall. Naotomo was ninety when he wrote this. It is also a reminder of what kind of document this is: a man setting down what he still retains, as the colophon later says outright.

9. Being Grappled on Horseback ‡

Bajō nite kumi-toritsukare sōrō toki no kokoromochi, dō toritsuki-dokoro no koto (馬上にて組取付れ候時之心持同取付所之事; Being grappled on horseback):

“On the disposition when grappled on horseback. Preferably it is essential to take your opponent on your left. As to where to take hold, anywhere will do — take a grip about the enemy’s shoulder-collar, set your stirrups in a figure-of-eight tread, drive the horse on, and the essential disposition is to pull him down off his horse. Once separated from his horse the opponent is good for nothing.”⁹

That said, when he grapples he takes hold with the left hand and draws his wakizashi with the right, meaning to thrust wherever he can reach. Keep this in mind without slackening, and the essential disposition is to pull him down the instant he takes hold. Nor should you slacken in the disposition of evading the thrust. First of all, there should be an understanding of how to use the stirrup as a kick.

10. Castle-Taking: Garrison Numbers and Disposition ‡

Shirotori ninzu komemono kakkō sen’ichi no koto (城取人數籠ものかつかう專一之事; Castle-taking: garrison numbers and disposition):

“Though there are many house-schools of castle-building, I take those of the two houses, Kenshin and Shingen, before others. There are a great many military books put out by other houses, but castle-building too is transmitted from those two. Marching out, formations, battle and the rest are largely taught in the military books, while castle-building is taught with earth models; setting formal transmission aside, ordinary matters are mostly settled by the books and by oral instruction. In recent times especially it is the Shingen-school castle-building that is chiefly used — the shape of the baileys, the flanking fire from the horse-sally, the walls and so on.”¹⁰

Among the many ways of laying out one’s own residence castle, a camp castle, a field camp and the rest, the residence castle is the great matter. The understanding is this: it should be narrower than one’s estate would warrant — of three parts drop one, and close it in a little tighter than two.

This is because when the age of war comes, or when one receives a great army and after repeated field engagements is forced at last to stand siege, the general reckoning is one man to a ken; and once the outer enclosure is given up and it comes to the inner bailey, the settled reckoning is five men to a ken. Even that is only rough, because holding day and night wears the troops out until they cease to serve, so they hold the posts of their sector day and night once in three days, and the remaining two are kept as a floating reserve. Even without setting those aside, at this rate a large castle would fall short of the reckoned numbers by a tenth, and the fixed rule cannot be met.

Yet once it comes to standing siege, nothing is better than a narrow interior. Standing to and sitting to are easier, and searching out infiltrators is easier. Besides which, a narrow place gives no opening to disaffection or turncoats among one’s own men. Narrowness has many advantages, breadth many losses.

In short, that one should have a prior understanding of how to act when receiving an enemy at the commander’s residence castle is essential, and goes without saying.

Notes

「大概は軍書にて敎へ」 — the print reads 大概 and 敎へ. The sentence closes on 大形, a near-synonym, so the article uses both.

The reasoning about a deliberately undersized castle is entirely manpower-driven and Naotomo shows his arithmetic: five men per ken, a three-day rotation, two in reserve, therefore a shortfall of a tenth. The security argument about turncoats is added second, almost as a bonus.

11. Laying Out the Bailey

Maru no toriyō no koto (丸の取樣の事; Laying out the bailey):

“In laying out a bailey the square is taken as the base. For interior space nothing beats the round; but because commands are hard to convey to the samurai and ashigaru holding it, the four-sided square comes first.”¹¹

For instance, the perimeter of a four-mat room is six ken. The perimeter of a four-and-a-half-mat room is also six ken; so the number of men defending is the same length of wall, and yet if the interior is square it is half a mat larger. If that is so with a mere four mats — the outer measure identical, the interior half a mat larger — then at a hundred ken the gain is enormous.

That is the general reckoning. But mountain castles are steep, so there is much convenience in using flanking fire, and the first thing is that there be no obstruction to sallying out from within. However steep it may be on all four sides, if palisades are set in layers at the sally-gate and the enemy holds it even with a small force, standing siege is to no purpose, and in the end one is starved out and taken.

Castle-building and castle-attacking carry a great deal of oral transmission and cannot well be set down in a single piece. What cannot be conveyed except orally I do not attempt to write.

Notes

The four-mat calculation is a genuine argument and it is correct — for a fixed perimeter, the square encloses more than the elongated rectangle — but note what Naotomo is actually optimising. The round encloses most of all, and he rejects it because you cannot give orders round a curve. Defensive geometry loses to command and control.

The 解題 misprints 丸 as 九 in its list.

12. Height and Dimensions of the Wall ‡

Hei no takasa sun no koto (屏の高サ寸の事; Height and dimensions of the wall):

“The height of the wall is not fixed. For a residence castle or a mountain castle, five shaku or thereabouts will do. This too is a precaution against the enemy raising a siege-tower and looking down into the castle, hence five shaku or so; where that is not the case, four shaku five sun will serve. It should of course be judged according to the place.”¹²

In castle-building there is what is called the discard-bailey: one looks down from the main castle, chooses thoroughly firm ground, and takes a bailey there. This too has a great deal of instruction attached to it.

13. Judging Enfilade

Yokoya no katte fumbetsu no koto (橫矢の勝手分別の事; Judging enfilade):

“In laying out a castle, judging the convenience of flanking fire is the first thing to understand. Defend only to the front and, however many stone-engines and heavy guns you have, the approach is easily made. The matter of flanking fire is all in the earth models used for castle-building; look at the models and it needs no oral transmission — you will grasp the general shape well enough.”¹³

14. Cutting Gun-Ports ‡

Teppō no yazama kiriyō no koto (鐵炮之矢さま切樣之事; Cutting gun-ports):

“The height should be judged by the place. Take the flat-hill castle as the standard and suit the rest to the ground. As to the width and height of the port: the inner clearance six sun high and four sun across, splayed inward in a figure-of-eight, is as it should be.”¹⁴

Likewise, the thickness of the wall is generally made by packing small stones inside, boarding both faces, and finishing over with white clay. Done so, the wall should be somewhere between seven, eight and nine sun thick. Even at eight sun, a heavy gun of about fifty me will not go through. Stone-engines are another matter.

15. Placing the Second Rank in a Night Attack ‡

Youchi ni no me okiyō no koto (夜討二之目置樣之事; Placing the second rank in a night attack):

“In a night attack too, the second rank is the chief thing. Pick out men of proved service and the other stalwart warriors and set the second rank a little back, at one, two or three chō. If the first rank charges and gains all the advantage one could wish, so much the better. But if they fail and the vanguard is broken, urge your own men on and command the whole force: the battle is won — go in without a second or a third thought and break them. The commander of the second line should take a spear himself, advance in front, rally them at once, and settle the issue.”¹⁵

Whatever has gone before, if the vanguard is routed, the formation broken, and the enemy comes on in pursuit, nine times in ten the second rank wins.

If the enemy commander is also a man of proved service, he will check the long pursuit, think of the second rank, and withdraw early. In that case your own second rank, being a firm line, must certainly not advance. Hold the battle in mind, do not disorder the formation, watch the enemy’s dispositions and draw the men off quietly. If in the meantime there is a change in the enemy, strike at once — but here too, do not pursue far. Even so, if the lie of the ground makes swift pursuit advantageous, or if the enemy runs up against rock, or a narrow road, or a marsh, then pursue swiftly into the difficult ground. But consider that he may have an ambush laid. Turn the matter over carefully so as not to fall into it, and do not slacken.

Notes

The standing title is printed 夜討二之目置樣之事 — 二之目, the second rank, as the body’s repeated 二ノ目 and 二之目 lead one to expect.

The whole article is about the reserve, not the assault — where to place it, when it must not move, and how to disengage. The one moment of direct speech in the text is the lie a commander tells his broken vanguard.

16. Reading ki

Ki o miru kokoromochi no koto (氣を見心持之事; Reading ki):

“It is not the ki (氣) of heaven. Without oral transmission it is hard to convey. When Kongming marched out from Chengdu to strike Wei, the season of heaven was unfavourable; and yet he went out, and died while encamped facing Sima Yi. On this there is a great deal of oral transmission.”¹⁶

Notes

The phrase「天之氣にあらず」is interesting. Naotomo opens by ruling out the obvious reading — 氣 as celestial signs, weather, the portents a commander might consult — and then declines to say what he does mean. The Zhūgě Liang example makes the point negatively: the season was against him, he went anyway, and he died; so the reading of 天の氣 explains nothing about the outcome either way.

Compare this to the Kadensho’s 機を見る. There Munenori uses 機, while Naotomo uses 氣, and the two are homophones. Whether Naotomo is reaching for the same doctrine under the other graph, or something entirely separate, or was written down incorrectly by the person taking his dictation, cannot be told from a sixty-four-character article that withholds its content. See the ki glossary in the Kadensho treatment.

Shokatsu Ryō (諸葛亮; Zhūgě Liàng), 181–234, styled Kōmei (孔明; Kǒngmíng) — chancellor of Shu Han, the state based at Chengdu, and by the seventeenth century the byword throughout East Asia for strategic foresight. Shiba I (司馬懿; Sīmǎ Yì), 179–251, styled Chūtatsu (仲達; Zhòngdá) — the Wei commander opposing him, and grandfather of the founder of the Jin dynasty.

Zhūgě Liang mounted a series of northern expeditions (北伐) against Wei from 228 onward, the last of them in 234. He advanced through the Xie Valley to the Wuzhang Plains (五丈原; Gojōgen), on the south bank of the Wei River in what is now Shaanxi. Naotomo’s 成都出陣 is loose — the campaigns staged from Hanzhong, the forward base, rather than from the capital — but “out of Shu” is the sense.

Sima Yi’s method was refusal. He entrenched and declined battle, calculating that Shu’s supply lines across the mountains would fail before his own position did. Zhūgě Liang tried to provoke an engagement, most famously by sending him women’s clothing as an insult; Sima Yi answered by requesting imperial permission to attack, whereupon Cao Rui despatched Xin Pi with authority to forbid it — which gave him political cover for the caution he intended anyway. The armies faced each other for an extended period of time. Zhūgě Liang fell ill and died in camp in the eighth month of 234, aged fifty-four, and the Shu army withdrew.

The aftermath supplied two proverbs:

1. As Sima Yi pursued, the Shu rearguard turned as though to give battle and he broke off, suspecting Zhūgě Liang was alive — hence 死諸葛走生仲達, “a dead Zhūgě put the living Zhongda to flight.”
2. Inspecting the abandoned camp afterwards, he is said to have called his opponent 天下奇才, a rare talent of the age.

Article 16 opens by ruling out one reading — 天之氣にあらず, it is not the ki of heaven — and then withholds the positive content. The Zhūgě Liang case is what stands in place of the definition, and it works by demolition. Zhūgě Liang was the reader of portents; the season of heaven stood against him; he marched anyway, and died facing an opponent who simply refused to move. Whatever 氣 he means, the man most celebrated for reading the heavens was not saved by having read them. The example rules out the obvious sense without supplying the intended one, which is consistent with the article’s closing 是に付大に口傳有之.

The bare events above are in Chen Shou’s Sānguózhì (三國志, c. 280s) with Péi Sōngzhī’s commentary. But the elaboration in which Zhūgě Liang foreknows his death — the Seven-Star Lamp rite, ruined when Wèi Yán bursts in and overturns the principal lamp — belongs to the fourteenth-century novel Sānguó yǎnyì, not to the histories. That matters for dating: Konan Bunzan’s Japanese Tsūzoku Sangokushi (通俗三國志) appeared 1689–92, roughly fifteen years before Naotomo wrote in 1705. So the novel’s version was freshly available to him in Japanese, and his 天の時惡し — which implies foreknowledge of unfavourable timing rather than merely unfavourable timing — reads more like the novel than the chronicle. Worth flagging in the note rather than asserting, since he gives no source.

17. Spear Encounters

Yariai no koto (鑓相之事; Spear encounters):

“In spear encounters, an understanding of the spear, the cross-spear, and the single flavour of long and short is of course required. However, since I have not so much as learned the sword of this school’s heihō in proper form, still less do I know this school’s spear. I have practised the other schools’ spear and cross-spear a little, but that is a somewhat different line of approach. Even so, I believe I have told you of it directly.”¹⁷

There are a great many plain-spear guards, but there is nothing beyond three — upper, middle and lower — and the two guards of yin and yang. From these everything issues, and matters of working and the rest are according to how one polishes them, as you will already understand.

For the cross-spear, attend to the cross-arms; for the naginata, attend to the curve. This too you will already understand, but on paper it will not come across. Nor have I settled it to my own satisfaction in writing. On this there is oral transmission still.

Notes

A daimyo who had received the Edo Yagyū transmission says he has not properly learned even the school’s sword, and therefore certainly not its spear. This is likely modesty or the conventional deprecation of sōrō-style correspondence.

18. Dealing with Staff and Cudgel

Jō bō nado no aishirai no koto (杖棒等之あいしらひの事; Dealing with staff and cudgel):

“As to dealing with the staff, the cudgel, the tsukubō, the sasumata and so on — I believe I have spoken of this in person too. When you stand with a sword against a staff or cudgel, the staff should be met with the disposition of matching blades. When you face a thing like a cudgel or tsukubō, cut it away with the sword; and if you think of it as a contest, they say you will simply be beaten.”¹⁸

That being so, since there is no other way, press right in, strike close, and cut one-handed — and one or two times in ten you will win, so they say. This is what one does because there is nothing else to be done.

There are five things in heihō against which nothing can be done. Of these, short against long is the present case, and there is no help for it:

1. few against many
2. short against long
3. missile weapons
4. trickery
5. a disparity of nerve

These five have been handed down from of old as things against which nothing can be done, and I have told you so many times. Since ours is the case of long and short, there is no need to go into detail.

Notes

The honesty of the article is its most striking feature. Naotomo does not claim a technique against the staff; he says there isn’t one, gives the odds at one or two in ten, and files the whole problem under things that cannot be done. 「是は致樣無之に付ての仕形にて候」 — this is what one does because there is nothing else. This is a very different perspective than in modern times, when adherents of the jo concern themselves as a life-long pursuit with how to defeat a swordsman. Here, in 1705, the staff is seen as a superior weapon.

19. Seated Indoors

Iai no zashiki nite kokoromochi no koto (居相之座敷にて心持之事; Seated indoors):

“There are various ways of drawing the sword. Attend to how it is set down; there should be an understanding according to the seat and the moment.”¹⁹

There are times when it should be set with the scabbard-tip to the left. This is because, when an enemy cuts unexpectedly, you take the hilt and block him, then hold the scabbard with the left hand and draw with the right — a good arrangement. There are also times to set it on the right. If, for instance, someone comes suddenly from the right and cuts, you take the hilt with the right hand, block the cutting sword with the scabbard, and may draw and strike from there.

In any case the first thing is to attend and not slacken — as the military books say, hold the battle in mind. In short: that there be no slackening. That is the whole of it.

20. Thrusting with the wakizashi

Wakizashi nite tsukiyō tsuki-dokoro no koto (脇指にて突樣突所之事; Thrusting with the wakizashi):

“With a short wakizashi one relies wholly on thrusting; cutting is out of the question. Even with a medium or long wakizashi, at close quarters the intention to cut is bad: when you cut, it may be taken from you, or it may fail to cut — there are many losses. At close quarters, in every case, thrust; and if you and he run each other through together, there is no escaping it. With that resolve, courage arises in the mind and one’s actions are the braver.”²⁰

That said, even at close quarters there are times to cut with a medium wakizashi. As to where to thrust — preferably the belly. This is not fixed but goes as the encounter goes; one does not thrust the two arms or the thighs.

Again, since an opponent with the same understanding will favour thrusting at close quarters, keep it in mind, evade his point, and with the disposition of the single flavour of long and short, take him with no-sword. When thrusting from your own side, the essential disposition is not to be taken hold of by him. It is hard to show on paper.

There are various ways of evading when a man comes at you with a wakizashi and takes hold. The same as the preceding article. Without oral transmission it cannot be set down.

Notes

Here, mutō (無刀) is seen in a practical setting. Munenori devotes the entire third volume of the Kadensho to mutō; here it appears in a single clause as one option among several at knife range. The two uses are not in conflict, but the contrast in register is instructive — for Naotomo it is a technique, for Munenori a doctrine.

Chotan-ichimi(長短の一味; — long and short are the same (flavor)) appears here and at §17, and is the nearest thing to a theoretical term in the whole document.

The final paragraph is an untitled addendum which Fukui’s 解題 does not count as a separate article.

21. Where to Seat Oneself in a Room

Zashiki naori-dokoro no koto (座敷直り所之事; Where to seat oneself in a room):

“As to where to seat oneself, attend to everything there is — sliding doors, screens and the rest. However well-guarded a room, one obviously does not sit where one is conspicuous and hemmed in as to escape.”²¹

So even if the place is a poor one and there are doors or screens behind — an unwelcome thing — if you attend, and resolve that someone may come out unexpectedly, that is beyond comparison better than sitting where there is a wall behind you and no cause for concern, and slackening.

Or again, whatever there is in the room — a screen or anything else — it is essential to resolve that with it you can block and make some play: never mind spear, naginata and sword, even against missile weapons to some extent. It is not that one expects to gain any advantage by it. But since, if you are simply taken with no resistance at all, or cut down, there is no help for it — then, having upheld the warrior’s way and not slackened, to be made captive by the enemy leaves less to regret. That is the reason for the resolve.

Notes

The reasoning at the close is unusual and quite bleak. The screen will not save you and Naotomo says so. Its value is that resisting with it changes what your capture means. 「悔少き故」 — because there is less to regret.

22. Attention on Entering a Doorway

Hairiguchi no kokoro no tsukeyō no koto (這入口の心の付樣の事; Attention on entering a doorway):

“When entering a doorway and the like, if you are unthinking about it you are often taken captive by an enemy. So when caution is called for, attend to right and left; and if there is someone cutting, block him first even with the scabbard still on, then draw and match him at the second move and settle it — such is the resolve to keep in mind.”²²

And if a man closes with you, keep in mind the working of striking him where he can be struck with the fist, or with the foot, or a foot-lock and the like. In passing a doorway or a place of concealment, this understanding is right in every case. This too is so that one attends and does not slacken.

23. Attention to Whatever Comes Alongside

Soba e yoru mono ni kokoro no tsuke-dokoro no koto (側へ寄ル物に心の付所之事; Attention to whatever comes alongside):

“As to things that come up beside you — never mind people, attend to anything at all. The same as before. Even a dog or a cat, whatever comes, the essential disposition is somehow to keep it on your left. Never mind a man: even with an animal, if you keep it on your right and it springs at you, you may be startled, which is unsightly. Keep it on the left and it is not so bad.”²³

Here too, if there are times when it cannot be helped and it must be on the right, then however slight the enemy, do not slacken in the disposition of keeping him on the right. The disposition of right and left is the first thing.

Notes

「見苦敷物にて候」— being startled by a cat is unsightly. The reasoning is about composure in company, not about the cat.

24. When There Are Two Opponents

Aite futari aru toki no kokoromochi no koto (相手二人有時之心持之事; When there are two opponents):

“For this there is a way of doing it. Whether two or three, it is the same. Without oral transmission it is hard to convey. To attend to two in the same way cannot be done.”²⁴

25. Walking with Someone Behind You ‡

Atomuki ni dōdō no kokoromochi no koto (跡向キに同道の心持之事; Walking with someone behind you):

“The same as before. One cannot guard behind in the same way. As with the disposition for two opponents above: since one cannot guard a companion at one’s back in the same way, of the two men one should keep a little distance and attend to the nearer. Without oral transmission it cannot be managed.”²⁵

26. Placement When Two Travel Together

Futari tsurete yuku toki no okiyō no koto (二人連て行時之置樣之事; Placement when two travel together):

“This too differs not in the least from the two preceding articles.”²⁶

Notes

§26 is the shortest article in the text at fifteen characters and consists entirely of a cross-reference. §§24–26 form a block on the same problem — that attention cannot be divided evenly — with the answer withheld to oral transmission in each case.

27. Going Against a Man Carrying a Light

Hi o mochi sōrō mono ni kakariyō no koto (火を持候者に掛り樣之事; Going against a man carrying a light):

“Generally, since the light is carried in the left hand, it is the same whether torch or lantern. There is advantage in putting the light out — and loss in it too. Consider cutting the fist that holds it. When it becomes pitch dark, neither side can gain.”²⁷

The essential disposition is to turn the light to your own use. The understanding is this: take cover behind anything at all, and by the light beyond, the enemy’s side is clearly visible while your own, being in the shadow of what you have taken as a shield, is not distinctly seen. On the contrary, the enemy’s fire becomes your light, and there is much advantage in it. This disposition is essential.

Notes

The article closes the circle with §2 above. There, the point was to shade your own light; here it is to use the enemy’s. Both rest on the same observation, that the man holding the light is the man who can be seen.

28. Bearing When You Lie in Wait

Hito machite utsu kokoromochi no koto (人待て打心持之事; Bearing when you lie in wait):

“It cannot be settled in one piece; but since in lying in wait the disposition is that courage is on your side and weakness on the enemy’s, it is essential to take the initiative from your side and strike.”²⁸

Those who go out as an execution party under a lord’s command succeed eight or nine times in ten; failure is rare. This too is because courage naturally attends them while the enemy has the mind of timidity. If the man is a fugitive, matters of coming from the right or the left should be judged according to the place.

29. Bearing When You Are the One Waited For

Hito ni matarete no kokoromochi no koto (人にまたれての心持之事; Bearing when you are the one waited for):

“This is the reverse of the preceding article: the enemy has courage and you are to have timidity. Bearing that in mind — if you know there is someone lying in wait, it goes without saying. If you have such knowledge, then from the moment you leave your lodging make your preparation well, and settle beforehand the resolve that though those waiting to strike you be many, you will not give a single step. And if, on going out and coming to the moment, your temper is such that in the end you set upon them first from your own side, you may on the contrary gain the victory.”²⁹

Notes

The articles §§28–29 are a matched pair and the second inverts the first exactly: the advantage lies with whoever holds the initiative, not with whoever chose the ground. Note 下作 — preparation — the same term the Kadensho uses as 下作り at §§3, 12 and 26.

30. Where to Cut a Man

Hito o kiru tokoro kokoromochi no koto (人を切所心持之事; Where to cut a man):

“First the neck; second, between the eyes — if blood gets into his eyes, victory comes easily. Third, the right forearm. Everyone knows this; but without such resolve, when the moment comes one simply goes as the encounter goes, and the resolve is unclear. For this reason the matter is settled in the mind as above.”³⁰

Or with spear and cross-spear, the chief thing is the gaze called the two stars — on both eyes. Thrusting the mouth, called the wind-hole, is also good. It is not that one particularly favours these two places; there is a teaching that one favours reaching along the line of the face with the spear-point. Without oral transmission it is hard to convey. The same holds for the sword.

Notes

This article glosses a term the Kadensho withholds. The term nihoshi (二星; two stars) appears three times in the Kadensho — in articles §§10 and 13 — always as a bare mokuroku entry with its content reserved for oral transmission (子細は可口傳). Here Naotomo states it plainly: 二星とて兩眼に目付候 — the two stars are the gaze on both eyes.

That is a genuine cross-text gain, and it should be recorded with its limits. The two documents are a century apart, one Edo Yagyū and one a Kyushu daimyo’s own compilation, so this establishes what 二星 meant to Naotomo, not necessarily what it meant to Munenori. But it is external evidence for a term the Kadensho deliberately conceals, and the conventional reading of 二星 as the opponent’s two eyes now has an attestation rather than only an inference behind it.

31. Going Against a Man with a Bow

Yumi o motaru mono ni kakariyō, dō kiri-dokoro no koto (弓を持たる者に掛り樣同切所の事; Going against a man with a bow):

“It is handed down that beyond five or six ken a man with a bow can hardly hit, that there is little penetration, and that the target area is small. Of course there are bows and bows, and there may be strong archers not inferior to a gun; but such are hardly one in ten. On the whole, few men shoot properly at five or ten ken. This concerns standing against such a bow.”³¹

An arrow loosed at ten or fifteen ken rarely hits, and even if it does, it will hardly go right through. And when he has loosed the first arrow and is nocking the second, since you have come closer he looses in ever greater haste — so much the less to be feared.

So when you go against an archer, turn the body edge-on on both sides, with the disposition of making the target area small; press straight in; and with sword and wakizashi as in the disposition for stopping arrows, set the two crossed as a shield and go in without hesitation.

Then — though the breadth of a man’s body is commonly given as four sun, take it as five to be safe; and since the two swords are within that, the target area is exceedingly small. Especially with an arrow loosed in haste, hits come three times in ten. Beyond that it is a matter of luck; so press straight in, and if you cut even the bow he holds, then with the bow he relied on cut and his spirit failing him it comes to swordplay, and you win handily — so it is handed down.

Notes

This article also glosses the Kadensho. The phrase 身をひとへになす appears in the Kadensho in article §12 as a bare mokuroku entry with no explanation. Here the same phrase carries its purpose attached: 身をひとへになし矢つぼ少キ樣の心持 — turn the body edge-on so as to make the target area small.

The estimate of an archer’s effective threat is strikingly low and the whole article is a demonstration that a bow is beatable by walking at it — the reverse of the usual respect accorded missile weapons, which §18 lists among the things nothing can be done about. Naotomo does not remark on the tension between the two, but the former article is a standard proverb he uses as an example, focusing on engaging the staff, and this is a specific missive on missile weapons.

32. Spear and naginata Reversed in a Confined Place

Sebaki tokoro nite yari naginata torinaoshi kiri-tsuki kokoromochi no koto (せばき所にて鑓長刀取直切突心持の事; Spear and naginata reversed in a confined place):

“In a narrow place, or inside a thicket or brush, when someone comes after you in sudden pursuit — if things are such that you can reverse your grip on spear, naginata or cross-spear, there is nothing to be said. But if that cannot be done, and while you are hampered by the long weapon and flustered this way and that the enemy closes in a rush, an unlooked-for defeat follows, so they say.”³²

If the opponent sets on you suddenly and there is no time to reverse the grip, then with spear or cross-spear it is as it always was; but with a naginata, take it by the head, turn it straight back, treat the spear’s butt-cap as the true blade, and so settle it. The master’s teaching is that spear and cross-spear as they stand are not much different from a formal bout, and that when entering with a cross-spear, even being entered upon with a plain spear is unlikely to be a defeat.

Notes

This article stands in the body with its own title but is absent from the 解題’s list of thirty-two, and is the source of the count discrepancy between the catalogue and the text. The phrase 「師の說に候」 is “the master’s teaching”. This is one of very few places where Naotomo attributes a point to a teacher rather than to hearsay (由) or to his own practice. It also speaks in very practical terms, despite Naotomo saying he has not mastered the sword fully or Shinkage spear.

33. Stopping Arrows

Yadome no koto (矢留の事; Stopping arrows):

“Stopping an arrow with the sword. One sets sword and wakizashi crosswise. According to the place, a bow cannot be shot at all; and on that there is a teaching about how to shoot. All of it is generally done by training. With the sword it does not work against numbers; but against two or three there is a way of doing it. Against some opponents it cannot be done. Oral transmission.”³³

Notes

Fukui’s last article ends the text as most of the others do: with a limit stated and the remedy withheld.

奧書 — Colophon

“That this scroll is called Shinrikyō, the Bridge of Presenting the Shoe: Zhāng Liáng presented the shoe to the Duke of Yellow Stone at the bridge and thereafter received the Way of war; and by Zhāng Liáng’s plans the Founding Emperor brought the realm to order, and the house of Han was preserved four hundred years. Taking that sense, it was named Shinrikyō. Make this one scroll a bridge, and cross by it into the Way of heihō.”³⁴

The writing of the Sotomono above is, as of now, without the least discrepancy. Thus. In this one volume I have written out in rough outline such of the articles as I myself retain. The remainder I shall communicate later. Twenty-first day, sixth month, Hōei 2, cock year [1705] Naotomo To Yamazaki Jinzaemon.

Notes

The name is wrong in the print. The body reads 曾石公; the figure is 黄石公, the Duke of Yellow Stone, who tested Zhāng Liáng by dropping his shoe from the bridge at Xiàpī and repeatedly making him fetch it, then gave him the Tàigōng bīngfǎ. Fukui’s 解題 gives 赤松子, which is wrong in a different way — Chì Sōngzǐ is the immortal Zhāng Liáng is said to have followed after retiring, not the figure at the bridge. Neither has been emended.

It is important to note that Munenori’s 1632 colophon in the Kadensho uses the title Shinrikyō (進履橋) for an entirely different text — the school’s root kata-mokuroku received by Sekishūsai from Kamiizumi. The two works, Munenori’s and Naotomo’s share a title and nothing else. This one is a Nabeshima-house composition of 1705, and the Zhāng Liáng etymology given here is Naotomo’s own account of why he chose the name.

The phrase「我等覺之分」”such as I myself retain” emphasizes this is a record of what an old man could still recall, not a systematic transmission.