Usagi Yojimbo DojoBoard

OK, I've become something of a student of Usagi-era japanese culture (thanks to the informative UY books)--and obviously the swords were a physical manifestation of the Samurai's soul. Makes sense. Quick, sharp, and deadly--everything a good Samurai should be.

So, I've got a question--What happens when the swords are damaged beyond repair or broken suddenly? Is the Samurai eternally "damned," or does he forge new swords and move on?

Just thought I'd try and make a profound post for a change.

Hm, an interesting issue. I have also thought of this when I read "Daisho". One thing is for sure: some samurais didn't view the swords as their soul, but just as their weapon.

I'm pretty sure the Japanese where pretty flexible in this matter. When one was broken, they purchased a new one. I'll have to think about it though...

Oddly enough, a similar thread has been going through the medieval recreationist's board, and the best opinion I've seen there is that "the sword is the soul of the samurai" is meant to indicate that it is amongst the various tools used to perfect the soul. The various actions connected with the sword-- polishing, drawing, cutting up bandits-- are to act as means of meditation, which leads to greater self-awareness, and thus enlightenment. If a samurai were in a different line of business, he'd have a different tool (the rake is the soul of the gardner). Remember that they're not thinking of "soul" in a Christian sense, but rather a Shinto-influenced Buddhist sense, so unless you're a giantic stinkhead you're in little danger of going anywhere more hellish than into another human life once you die. The stuff you've got, swords, shoes and skin inclusive, are all jettisonable and of little account.

On a more practical front, given the rather stressful life of a working sword... well, there's a reason they carried a spare, eh? Sword breakage was a well-known hazard of the samurai life-style, and a smart fella kept an eye on the tell-tales of fatigue (why does my sword go "clonk" instead of "ding"?). Those who weren't aware of the state of their blade were more likely to have it break at the wrong moment, which could lead rather quickly to giving up of your current collection of stuff and starting a new life... in a highly literal Buddhist sense A samurai with a broken sword and no money to replace it was cursed in a sense-- people pointing and laughing, even more trouble making money, spending WAY too much time worrying about how to get a new sword and neglecting meditation, and a pretty tough row to hoe as far as using seppuku to get out of the situation. It's not eternal damnation, but it would drag something fierce.

This is not to say that there weren't those that came at it from the other way, and assumed that the better the sword they had, the better a person they were-- I'm looking at that bullish chap in Daisho. Much the same thing happens in Christians who get a little stirred around between whether to be impressed by the church (pile of bricks and lumber) or the idea that prompted building it. Tricky thing, this philosophy... way to hard for a simple hanshi like me.

Holy crud man! that was deep!.

While a broken sword could be put back together, given the extensive amounts of folding and layering the steel in your average samurai sword has, I wonder if a reforged one would be so vastly weakened as to be useless.

I wonder if a reforged one would be so vastly weakened as to be useless.

Pretty much-- it wouldn't work any better than the scimitar made out of a broadsword in The 13th Warrior. A broken sword would likely end up:
1) trampled into the mud of the battlefield, and sometime thereafter in an archaeologists "to do" bin;
2) trampled less deeply into the mud, retrieved by body-looters, ground down, and remounted into a kickass kitchen knife (or knives);
3) collected up by the owner and...
a) carefully put into the household shrine and revered.
b) possibly remounted as a tanto.
c) thrown angrily into the river, with much cursing in Japanese regarding useless damn swords just about getting me killed!

It's not just the folding, it's the careful control of carbon-content and arrangement of the layers that makes a good sword. The beginning of of the UY story "Daisho" is actually a pretty good primer on the process, and there's a more in-depth look at the process here and here (super detailed and technical).

My thinking on this matter is that replacing the soul would be sort of what you'd call a rite of attrition - remember at least, in UY - how swordsmiths treat the sacred pair - the very soul of the samurai. It's interesting - it's something I've wondered about for a long time, myself.