The samurai of feudal Japan are well known in popular culture, yet the popular image of a samurai is merely a snapshot of centuries of evolution for this mighty warrior class. Here we will explore how the samurai developed from the beginning of their rule in the Kamakura Period.Beginning and EndA colorized photograph from 1860 of three samurai equipped with a variety of armor and weapons. Source: Wikimedia CommonsPicture two men, one from the mid-to-late 12th century, the other from the late 17th to 18th century. Both men are samurai, but aside from that, they appear very different. The first man, for instance, would consider the name samurai an insult. He, in ornate o-yoroi armor and open-faced helmet, would call himself a Bushi, or warrior. He is a mounted archer using a yumi bow with a great sword, a tachi, strapped to his back, but he is also familiar with other weapons such as the naginata polearm.The second man may appear a closer fit to the popular image of a samurai. He also uses the term Bushi but considers samurai an appropriate rank for his social class and standing. His armor is less ornate but better designed for hand-to-hand melees and more powerful weapons. Though also familiar with the same weaponry as the first man, he may also use a tanegashima musket, and instead of a tachi on his back, he carries two swords at his waist. These, usually a katana and the smaller wakizashi, are symbols of his status and rank to be worn at all times, as is his right.The fascinating differences between these two men are not just about appearance either. Their identities, customs, legal status, and privileges dramatically shifted as the samurais domination of Japan developed and solidified over the centuries. Yet fascinatingly, while history changed so much between both mens lifetimes, one thing that remained almost identical was their principles of honor and devotion to their way of life.Political Origins: The Kamakura and Ashikaga ShogunatesA depiction of the Kamakura and early Ashikaga shogunate samurai, both nobles on horseback in o-yoroi style armor and their naginata armed attendants, 16th century. Source: Wikimedia CommonsNow that we have the before and after fully in mind, we can explore the samurais evolution, beginning with their political and societal development. The samurai emerged during the 8th to 9th centuries when the imperial court in Kyoto appointed several noble families to govern the provinces and conquer the Emishi people of northern Japan.With the emperor also abolishing the expensive armies of militia conscripts, the new provincial nobility raised their own private armies of skilled warriors and retainers. Both the retainers and nobles were part of what we now know as the samurai. However, both called themselves Bushi, as the word samurai came from a term for a domestic servant that later became used as a reference to the new warrior retainers.Over the years, the provincial families sought to assert themselves in the face of the increasingly insular imperial court nobility. In 1180, the Genpei War erupted between the Minamoto Clan and the Taira Clan over control of the imperial court, with the Minamoto eventually emerging victorious in 1185. The family head, Minamoto Yoritomo, took the title of Shogun (an archaic term meaning general in charge of defeating foreigners), and founded a new government in his hometown of Kamakura.Though the emperor remained in Kyoto as a figurehead, the Kamakura Shogunate truly ruled Japan and appointed samurai to run the imperial administration of the provinces.Scene from the Genpei war, screen. Source: Wikimedia CommonsHowever, by the 14th century, internal intrigue and the costly defense of Japan against two Mongol invasions caused the Kamakura Shogunate to collapse. In 1336, the enterprising samurai Ashikaga Takauji founded a new Shogunate in Kyoto itself.The Ashikaga Shogunate stabilized its power by decentralizing the state and abolishing the old imperial provincial land administration in favor of the provincial samurai owning the land outright. The noble families had branched out into many new samurai clans who owned and governed their provinces as their personal fiefdoms. Minor samurai owned or managed provincial estates on behalf of their province-owning great lords known as the Daimyo, who, in theory, served the Shogun.The Sengoku Jidai and the Edo PeriodA Sengoku period battle between Takeda Shingen and Uesugi Kenshin, two of the most notorious rival Daimyo of the time. Source: Wikimedia CommonsIn 1467, a dispute over the Shoguns succession led to the devastating decade-long nin War, which destroyed the Shogunates authority. For the next century after the war ended, Japan was embroiled in the Sengoku Jidai, literally the time of warring states.Notorious Daimyo such as Takeda Shingen and Uesugi Kenshin paid lip service to the Shogun while squabbling among themselves for land and power. Meanwhile, in some regions, peasant farmers and Jizamurai (independent landholding samurai) formed self-governing confederations called Ikki, while similar uprisings of militant Buddhist congregations, Ikk-Ikki, established fortified temples across Japan.After more than a century of constant conflict, one Daimyo, Oda Nobunaga, finally seized Kyoto, deposed the Shogun, and began pacifying the other Daimyo and Ikki confederations. The reunification was completed by his successor, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, in 1590.Hideyoshi tried to direct the energy of the war-hungry samurai outside of Japan by organizing an invasion of Korea. However, the invasion failed in 1598 with Hideyoshi dying shortly after, threatening a return to civil chaos. However, another of Nobunagas followers and the third of Japans great unifiers, Tokugawa Ieyasu, took power for himself in 1615 and founded a new Shogunate based in Edo, modern-day Tokyo.So began the Edo Period, when the Tokugawa Shoguns reorganized Japanese society and closed Japan off to any foreigners. Their peaceful regime made samurai become more bureaucrats than warriors, though they still trained with arms and maintained their cultural notions of martial valor. In this way, the samurai went from provincial military retainers to feudal warlords to a stratified caste of warrior bureaucrats.The Tokugawa would reign for many more years, with the clans who had supported Tokugawa remaining in their favor, while their opponents, although not fully destroyed, remained greatly diminished over the centuries.WarfareA samurai pursuing fleeing Mongol infantry during the battle of Bunei during the first Mongol invasion in 1274. Source: Wikimedia CommonsThough they had many roles in society, the samurai are naturally most famous for their warrior prowess. The original samurai based their style of warfare on the Emishi, who fought as mounted archers in defense of their northern homes. The well-trained and skilled samurai nobles and retainers in time proved more cost-effective and militarily successful against the Emishi than the old imperial army of militia infantry conscripts.This was still true at the time of the Kamakura Shogunate. High-ranking samurai fought as mounted archers with the lower ranks supporting on foot, similar in some ways to a knight of Europe being supported by his armed attendants.In the ideal battle, the mounted archers would demonstrate their skill and courage by charging through the enemy arrows to return fire and issue challenges of single combat. These duels would break out across the lines and eventually turn from ranged to melee combat, with riders using the tachi or smaller knives depending on circumstances.The footmen would also engage in archery duels or take part in the melee armed with the naginata to take down a horse and rider and gain glory and rewards. While this was the romantic ideal of combat, the Kamakura samurai also conducted raids, urban fighting, and ambushes when required.The Mongol Invasion, Silk Tapestry, by Kawashima Jimbei II, 1904. Source: The Japanese Consulate NYThis type of small-scale, individualized fighting suited the structure of the samurai during the Kamakura Period, when there were relatively few major conflicts to be fought. During the Mongol invasions, Japanese sources noted the samurais bemusement at the Mongol use of Korean and Chinese conscripted infantry, rather than having elite warriors display their martial skill and challenge the defenders.Perhaps the Mongol generals, observing behind the front lines and descended from the great horse archers of Genghis Khan, saw some kinship with the samurais style of warfare. No doubt the samurai considered the Mongol generals cowardly and unsporting for not fighting on the front line.The Sengoku Jidai dramatically changed samurai warfare. The civil turmoil made the stylized traditional combat of the samurai impractical. Meanwhile, Ikki confederations deployed massed numbers of monks, peasants, and independent lesser samurai to defend their independent domains. These armies of massed levies, known as Ashigaru, were swiftly adopted by enterprising Daimyo.Oda Nobunaga was a keen proponent of the Ashigaru, which was a large part of his success. While samurai still served as the elite fighters and commanders of Sengoku armies, they replaced their horse archery warrior duels in favor of fighting in larger, more cohesive formations as heavy cavalry or infantry.WeaponsA scene from a sixfold screen depicting Oda and Tokugawa samurai and ashigaru armed with tanegashima muskets firing on the Takeda cavalry during the battle of Nagashino in 1575, Edo Period. Source: Google Arts & CultureAt this time, armor moved away from the more ornate original designs to more flexible and easier-to-produce designs. Later armor even used European-style iron plates inspired by Portuguese traders. Practicality also impacted weaponry.The naginata was superseded by the longer yari spear, which required less training and worked both as a lance or pike. The mighty tachi was still a fearsome weapon on horseback, but most samurai and Ashigaru adopted the smaller but less cumbersome katana as their sword of choice.While bows were still widely used, the new realities of warfare made melee combat more common, leading to the sword becoming the samurais most commonly associated weapon. However, a new ranged weapon, also a key part of Nobunagas success, soon made an even greater impact on samurai warfare.By the mid-1500s, Japan began mass-producing matchlock muskets, known as tanegashima after the island where they were first introduced by the Portuguese. They proved their battlefield worth quickly, with Takeda Shingen famously ordering his generals to decrease the number of spears per unit and have your most capable men carry guns. His son and heir, Takeda Katsuyori, tragically failed to heed this advice when his elite cavalry was wiped out by Nobunagas gunmen at the battle of Nagashino in 1575.The Japanese innovations in musketry proved devastatingly effective in Hideyoshis invasion of Korea. However, the somewhat land-focused samurai had made few innovations in naval warfare or cannons. Eventually, the Korean admiral Yi Sun-sin quite literally scuppered the invasion by destroying the Japanese navy with his more advanced navy and cannon, forcing the samurai to abandon the invasion.Katana, Edo Period. Source: The British MuseumHowever, the rise of the Tokugawa Shogunate drastically reduced the scale or frequency of conflicts. Hideyoshi and the Tokugawa Shoguns forbade the conscription of more ashigaru. Furthermore, to prevent a return to the chaos of the Sengoku Period, weapons became strictly controlled, and non-samurai were banned from carrying swords. In the new social order, the carrying of swords at the waist, known as daisho, was a status symbol exclusive to the samurai.Similar to the earlier Kamakura Period, violence, when it did occur, was small-scale between samurai entourages, but any major conflict was kept in check by the new regime. In practice, the samurai continued to train for war as they had fought in previous years, but they rarely used their skills outside of the occasional clash between bickering samurai. Bows and guns were used mostly for sport, and armor was kept mostly for parades or formal events.Society and SamuraiA contemporary portrait of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, a former ashigaru promoted to the samurai by his master Oda Nobunaga. Source: Osaka City Museum of Fine ArtsJust like the evolution of the samurais political status and methods of warfare, the samurai as a social order evolved greatly from the Kamakura to the Edo Period.From their inception as provincial warriors, there was always a distinct idea of a samurai warrior, but who and how one became a samurai was not set in stone. During the Genpei War, the legendary general Minamoto Yoshitsune, according to the literary epic Heike Monogatari, summarily made a huntsmans son a samurai for guiding him and his men down a rocky ravine before the Battle of Ichi-No-Tani. The promotion came complete with a top-knot haircut and a new name to denote his new status. This demonstrates how initially, samurai were a distinct class, but one that commoners or non-samurai could obtain.This was still true during the Sengoku Jidai. Hideyoshi was originally an ashigaru from a peasant background who was Nobunagas sandal bearer. However, his promise and brilliance saw him be promoted by his master into a samurai.On a broader scale, the period also saw clans of lesser samurai rise to distinction, sometimes at the expense of more venerable families. The Mori clan, for example, rose from humble origins as a family of Jizamurai to become one of the most powerful Daimyo in Japan. At this time, the women of samurai families were also trained with arms, largely for self-defense purposes, though there are many examples of women who served as samurai. These Onna-bugeisha, as they were known, were often popularly remembered for their extreme loyalty and capability in the service of their lords.The female warrior samurai Hangaku Gozen, by Yoshitoshi, 1839-1892. Source: Wikimedia CommonsOnce again, however, the Edo Period changed things. The Tokugawa Shoguns implemented an extremely rigid social structure throughout Japan, and gone were the days when a commoner could be promoted into the samurai. Even the samurai themselves were placed into a tiered hierarchy and forbidden from owning land independently. The samurai class was now explicitly designated as the retainers and servants of their lords. However, despite this codified bondage, the samurai were very much at the top of the Japanese social structure and enjoyed many legal rights and privileges. Female samurai were discouraged as the new samurai society pushed women to focus on domestic duties.The period also led to a rise in the number of ronin, masterless samurai, who were too proud, or legally barred, from renouncing their samurai heritage and becoming commoners. Instead, they became wandering vagrants selling their martial skills to the highest bidder. Effectively, the samurais position in society remained unchanged as Japanese society itself was almost frozen into place. The samurai were now locked into being almost a feudal civil service for provincial lords and the Shogun. However, their position came with rights, status, and legal privileges that set them above and apart from the rest of Japanese society.Samurai CultureA painting of the Sengoku era samurai general Akashi Gidayu composing his death poem as part of the ritual of seppuku, 19th century. Source: Tokyo Metro LibraryOf course, what it meant to be a samurai was also a cultural as well as a social question. In many ways, the core principles of samurai cultural identity remained fascinatingly consistent. The core concept of samurai culture was bushido, a code of principles that samurai were expected to follow on and off the battlefield. However, the term only arose during the 17th century, when various authors identified and codified the core principles that samurai supposedly embodied. Yet the principles of bushido itself predated the Edo Period, both in terms of a warrior code that the samurai followed, and in terms of the principles Bushido contains.During the Kamakura Period, there were several named codes, often referring to the practices of a warrior at arms, that the samurai were expected to abide by. These were often unwritten, and the details could change through the years and from province to province. However, their core tenets all seemed to stress that samurai should conduct themselves with honor, morality, and valor. These same principles would later be codified and written down into the concept of Bushido.Another notable and enduring aspect of samurai culture was their somewhat stoic attitude to death. While a samurai would not necessarily seek out death, dying in the service of a lord was seen as honorable, and death before capture was one of the most consistent philosophies of the samurai.War Helmet with Third Day Moon, by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, 1886, via Ukiyo-e.orgThis was, of course, seen in one of their most notorious practices: seppuku, a form of ritualistic suicide performed by dishonored or defeated samurai through self-disembowelment. Once again, Seppuku was recorded even before the Kamakura Period, but over the years, the practice evolved into a ritual which included the writing of a poem before the act. Both Minamoto Yoshitsune, at the beginning of the Kamakura Period, and Oda Nobunaga, at the end of the Sengoku Period, ended their lives via seppuku.By taking ones own life, a disgraced samurai restored their honor and denied their enemy the glory of making the kill. While other warrior cultures sought to capture their enemies for ransom and glory, samurai instead sought the same rewards by the taking of their enemies heads. This practice appears as old as the samurai themselves, but over time became a post-combat ritual, with the heads cleaned and carefully presented to a victorious general who would reward the respective head-takers.As the rituals of head taking and seppuku show, individual honor and the honor of ones lineage were core tenets of the samurais cultural identity. Additionally, samurai of all periods were also expected to be intellectually refined and culturally sophisticated, able to lead or take part in important social ceremonies and to be well-versed in literature, hence the tradition of composing poems before committing seppuku. Essentially, the cultural evolution of the samurai is remarkable in its consistency. While many other aspects of samurai life changed over the years, the principles and ideals they practiced and upheld, or at least claimed to, remained the same.End of the SamuraiA painting of the battle of Shiroyama, the final stand of the Satsuma rebellion, and often considered the final battle of the samurai, 1877. Source: Wikimedia CommonsReturning to the two samurai from our beginning, we can now see how the samurai evolved, but, in many ways, stayed the same. The samurai carved out a new political reality for themselves, but in all that time, the Emperor remained Japans true figurehead. They adapted to new ways of warfare and weapons, but their principles of honor and virtue remained almost unchanged.Ironically enough, the end of the samurai contained many parallels to their rise and rule. In 1854, after more than two and a half centuries, Japan was forced to reopen its borders to outsiders by the US Navy, and initially, the samurai adapted as they always had, taking on modern styles of warfare, uniforms, and weapons. Meanwhile, in the 1868 Boshin War, anti-Tokugawa samurai overthrew the Shogun (who had, after all, failed his job description of defeating the foreigners) and restored the Emperor to full power.Yet the new regime moved away from the old, rigid social system, which meant abolishing the samurai as a distinct social body. The new government even refounded the old imperial army of militia conscripts, just like the one the samurai had replaced in the 8th century, though now with guns and cannons. Most samurai bowed to the winds of change and took up new places in the imperial administration, but others would not let their way of life die without a fight. The story of the samurai ended in 1877 when Saigo Takamori, once a loyal general for the emperor, began an uprising of samurai in his home province of Satsuma.Drawing of Saig Takamori, printed in Kinsei Meishi Shashin vol. 1, 1934-35, via the National Diet LibraryThe rebelling samurai were determined to demonstrate their military superiority even in the new ways of war, but they failed to build momentum. Eventually, with their ammunition depleted, the last samurai (save for the many thousands in the imperial army and government) were trapped by the imperial army at the battle of Shiroyama. There, a wounded Takamori would follow Yoshitsune and Nobunaga in committing seppuku, while his followers either joined him or charged the imperial lines with swords in hand. In this last act of defiance, the samurai period ended, as their philosophy had always demanded, with death rather than the disgrace of defeat.The Jetavana temple bell ringsThe passing of all things.