Initiation to the art of War: A preliminary text of the Takenouchi school
Initiation to the art of War: A preliminary text of the Takenouchi school

Summary/Abstract: In premodern Japan the warrior class (samurai) was placed at the top of society and martial arts were considered the basis of their education. Therefore martial arts schools played an important role in forming the way of thinking of warriors, and as these schools expressed their views on technique, morality and philosophy through issuing handbooks, documents and teaching material (densho), research of densho is perhaps the best way to understand the teachings and inner workings of schools. In the present article the author attempts to examine one of the basic texts of an important school of the jūjutsu branch of Japanese martial arts, the Takenouchi-ryū, to provide an understanding of the structure and content of a typical densho.

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