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Ninja
A , or was a spy and infiltrator in pre-modern Japan. The functions of a ninja included siege and infiltration, ambush, reconnaissance, espionage, deception, and later bodyguarding.Kawakami, pp. 21–22 Antecedents may have existed as early as the 12th century. There is little evidence that they were assassins. In the unrest of the Sengoku period, '' jizamurai'' families, that is, elite peasant-warriors, in Iga Province and the adjacent Kōka District formed ''ikki'' – "revolts" or "leagues" – as a means of self-defense. They became known for their military activities in the nearby regions and sold their services as mercenaries and spies. It is from these areas that much of the knowledge regarding the ninja is drawn. Following the Tokugawa shogunate in the 17th century, the ninja faded into obscurity. A number of ''shinobi'' manuals, often based on Chinese military philosophy, were written in the 17th and 18th centuries, most notably the '' Bansenshūkai'' (1676).; b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ninjas In Popular Culture
In the history of Japan, ninja (also known as shinobi) operated as espionage, spies, assassins, or thieves; they formed their own caste outside the usual Economics of feudal Japan, feudal social categories such as lords, samurai, and serfdom, serfs. Ninja often appear as stock characters in Japanese popular culture, Japanese and global popular culture. History Ninjas first entered popular culture in the Edo period. In modern Japan, ninja are a national myth that stems from Folklore, folk tales and continues through modern day popular culture. Though many Japanese warriors performed amazing feats, there is no evidence that any of them were supernatural. Some of the folk tales are based on historical figures, such as a ''daimyō'' (lord) challenging a ninja to prove his worth by stealing his pillow or weapon while he slept. Legendary abilities Superhuman or supernatural powers were sometimes associated with the ninja. Such powers include flight, invisibility, shapeshifting, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kunoichi
is a Japanese term for . In popular culture, it is often used for female ninja or practitioner of ninjutsu (''ninpo''). The term was largely popularized by novelist Futaro Yamada in his novel in 1964. Although kunoichi have appeared in numerous creative works, including novels, TV-dramas, movies, and manga, Mie University historians have concluded that there are no historical records of female ninja performing reconnaissance and subversive activities in the same manner as their male counterparts. However, the late 17th century ninja handbook '' Bansenshukai'' describes a technique called in which a female is used for infiltration and information-gathering, which Seiko Fujita considered evidence of female ninja activity. Etymology The term is thought to derive from the names of characters that resemble the three strokes in the Japanese kanji character for in the following stroke order: * " く" is a hiragana character pronounced " ku" * " ノ" is a katakana character pr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iga Province
was a Provinces of Japan, province of Japan located in what is today part of western Mie Prefecture.Louis-Frédéric, Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "Iga" in . Its abbreviated name was . Iga is classified as one of the provinces of the Tōkaidō (region), Tōkaidō. Under the ''Engishiki'' classification system, Iga was ranked as an "inferior country" ( ''gekoku'') and a "near country" ( ''kingoku''). Iga was bordered by Ise Province, Ise to the east and south, Ōmi Province, Ōmi to the north, Yamato Province, Yamato to the west and south, and Yamashiro Province to the northwest. It roughly coincides with the modern municipalities of Iga, Mie, Iga and Nabari, Mie, Nabari in Mie Prefecture as well as Yagyu in Nara Prefecture. Surrounded by mountains, historically, Iga Province was rather inaccessible due to extremely poor road conditions. However, the area is now relatively easy to access from nearby Nara, Nara, Nara and Kyoto, as well as the larger cities of Osaka and Na ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
History Of Japan
The first human inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago have been traced to the Japanese Paleolithic, Paleolithic, around 38–39,000 years ago. The Jōmon period, named after its cord-marked pottery, was followed by the Yayoi period in the first millennium BC when new inventions were introduced from Asia. During this period, the first known written reference to Japan was recorded in the Chinese ''Book of Han'' in the first century AD. Around the 3rd century BC, the Yayoi people from the continent immigrated to the Japanese archipelago and introduced iron technology and agricultural civilization. Because they had an agricultural civilization, the population of the Yayoi began to grow rapidly and ultimately overwhelmed the Jōmon period, Jōmon people, natives of the Japanese archipelago who were hunter-gatherers. Between the fourth and ninth centuries, Japan's many kingdoms and tribes gradually came to be unified under a centralized government, nominally controlled by the Empe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kōka District, Shiga
was a district located in Shiga Prefecture, Japan. As of 2003, the district had an estimated population of 147,928 and a density of 267.90 persons per km2. The total area was 552.18 km2. From circa 1460 until 1574, during the Sengoku period, the district was effectively independent of centralized state control and operated as the '' Kōka-gun Chūsō'', a military confederacy of '' jizamurai'' and other warrior families that became known as ninja. During this period it formed an alliance with its southern neighbor, the ''Iga Sokoku Ikki'', a similar independent confederacy of ninja families. Both alliance and the ''ikki'' ended when Oda Nobunaga was a Japanese ''daimyō'' and one of the leading figures of the Sengoku period, Sengoku and Azuchi-Momoyama periods. He was the and regarded as the first "Great Unifier" of Japan. He is sometimes referred as the "Demon Daimyō" and "Demo ... defeated Kōka and compelled it to be a vassal. Towns and villages Before th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jizamurai
The were lower-ranking provincial samurai that emerged in 15th-century Japan Muromachi period. The definition was rather broad and the term ''jizamurai'' included landholding military aristocracy as well as independent peasant farmers. They alternated between warfare and using their relatively small plots of land for intensive and diversified forms of agriculture. They came from the powerful , who owned farmland and held leadership positions in their villages, and became vassals of and later . One of the primary causes for the rise in the number of smaller landholders was a decline in the custom of primogeniture. Towards the end of the Kamakura period, inheritance began to be split among a ruler's sons, making each heir's holdings, and thus their power, smaller. Though many ''jizamurai'' were members of the military aristocracy, they were considered to be lower in status compared to the samurai who ruled in castles and cities. Over time, many of these smaller fiefs came to be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sino-Japanese Vocabulary
Sino-Japanese vocabulary, also known as , is a subset of Japanese vocabulary that originated in Chinese language, Chinese or was created from elements borrowed from Chinese. Most Sino-Japanese words were borrowed in the 5th–9th centuries AD, from Early Middle Chinese into Old Japanese. Some grammatical structures and sentence patterns can also be identified as Sino-Japanese. is one of three broad categories into which the Japanese vocabulary is divided. The others are native Japanese vocabulary (''yamato kotoba'') and borrowings from other, mainly Western languages (''gairaigo''). It has been estimated that about 60% of the words contained in modern Japanese dictionaries are ', and that about 18–20% of words used in common speech are '. The usage of such words also increases in formal or literary contexts, and in expressions of abstract or complex ideas. ', the use of Chinese-derived words in Japanese, is to be distinguished from ''kanbun'', which is historical Classical Chin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bansenshūkai
''Bansenshūkai'' (, ''Ten Thousand Rivers Flowing Together to form an Ocean'') (Also pronounced Mansenshukai) is a 1676 Japanese book containing a collection of knowledge from the clans in the Iga Province, Iga and Kōka, Shiga, Kōga regions that had been devoted to the training of ninja."The Book of Ninja: ''The first complete translation of the Bansenshukai''", 2013, Antony Cummins & Yoshie Minami ''Bansenshūkai'' summarizes the main points of the three volumes of the original Ninjutsu book ''Kanrinseiyō'' (間林清陽), and was written by selecting only those that fit the times. In the beginning of ''Bansenshūkai'', the existence of the original text ''Kanrinseiyō'' was mentioned, but its existence had not been confirmed for a long time. However, in June 2022, a manuscript of the second volume of ''Kanrinseiyō'' copied in 1748 was found. Compilation The book was compiled by Fujibayashi Yasutake in 1676, in the early years of the Tokugawa shogunate, to preserve the knowle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Espionage
Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering, as a subfield of the intelligence field, is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information ( intelligence). A person who commits espionage on a mission-specific contract is called an ''espionage agent'' or ''spy''. A person who commits espionage as a fully employed officer of a government is called an intelligence officer. Any individual or spy ring (a cooperating group of spies), in the service of a government, company, criminal organization, or independent operation, can commit espionage. The practice is clandestine, as it is by definition unwelcome. In some circumstances, it may be a legal tool of law enforcement and in others, it may be illegal and punishable by law. Espionage is often part of an institutional effort by a government or commercial concern. However, the term tends to be associated with state spying on potential or actual enemies for military purposes. Spying involving corporations is known as c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Japanese Macaque
The Japanese macaque (''Macaca fuscata''), also known as the snow monkey, is a terrestrial Old World monkey species that is native to Japan. Colloquially, they are referred to as "snow monkeys" because some live in areas where snow covers the ground for months each year – no other non-human primate lives farther north, nor in a colder climate. Individuals have brownish grey fur, pinkish-red faces, and short tails. Two subspecies are known. In Japan, the species is known as ''Nihonzaru'' (ニホンザル, a combination of ''Nihon'' 日本 "Japan" + ''saru'' 猿 "monkey") to distinguish it from other primates, but the Japanese macaque is very familiar in Japan—as it is the only species of monkey in Japan—so when Japanese people simply say ''saru'', they usually have the Japanese macaque in mind. Physical characteristics The Japanese macaque is sexual dimorphism, sexually dimorphic. Males weigh on average , while females average .Fooden J, Aimi M. (2005) "Systematic revie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Colloquialism
Colloquialism (also called ''colloquial language'', ''colloquial speech'', ''everyday language'', or ''general parlance'') is the linguistic style used for casual and informal communication. It is the most common form of speech in conversation among persons in friendship, familial, intimate, and other informal contexts. Colloquialism is characterized by the usage of figurative language, contractions, filler words, interjections, and other informalities such as slang. In contrast to formal and professional communications, colloquial speech does not adhere to grammar and syntax rules and thus may be considered inappropriate and impolite in situations and settings where etiquette is expected or required. It has a rapidly changing lexicon and can also be distinguished by its usage of formulations with incomplete logical and syntactic ordering. Definition Colloquialism is distinct from formal speech or formal writing.colloquial. (n.d.) Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Ret ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
