Samurai

Loyal. Self-sacrificing. Brave. Why not Cool as well? Samurai Japan, Samurai Blue, the men's national baseball and football teams, respectively. Romanticized in countless manga, anime, songs and period dramas on NHK. During the Edo period, 2 million out of a population of 30 mil. Insufferably arrogant. Parasitic. That's probably what the rest of Edo thought, for social inferiors were required to support them financially and, adding insult to injury, to prostrate themselves (dogeza, it's called) and grovel in their presence (though this custom was relaxed somewhat in Edo itself). Inhumane, cruel, bloodthirsty. The term tsujigiri (辻斬) refers to practice of testing one's blade randomly on passing strangers (drive by be-headings, perhaps). Social inferiors,of course. And then, there's inuoumono (犬追物). Samurai on horseback, in a circle, armed with bow and arrow. A dog is released. The circling riders let fly, vying to outshine their fellow samurai in accuracy and grace. Charles Dunn, University of London Reader in things Japanese, has written an informative text about Edo called Everday Life in Traditional Japan Except he doesn't know or omits this detail of everyday samurai life. Not so Shirato Sanpei, the author of Kamuiden. Shirato devotes a significant section of his hit manga to the practice.