{"id":29060,"date":"2025-06-05T07:00:12","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T07:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=29060"},"modified":"2025-06-05T07:26:41","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T07:26:41","slug":"a-how-to-for-the-self-sacrificing-samurai-now-translated-into-english","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=29060","title":{"rendered":"A How-To for the Self-Sacrificing Samurai, Now Translated into English"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A gory set of manuals, one dating to the 17th century, advised Japanese warriors in the secret ways of seppuku.<\/p>\n

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In 1970, the celebrated novelist Yukio Mishima committed seppuku, a gruesome form of ritual suicide that originated with Japan\u2019s ancient samurai warrior class. After a failed coup d\u2019\u00e9tat at a military compound in Tokyo, the 45-year-old writer knelt and drew a knife across his belly, cutting laterally from left to right and then upward and downward in a fatal L. Once he had disemboweled himself, Mishima lowered his neck, signaling a trusted second, or kaishaku, who was a member of his private militia, to swiftly behead him with a single stroke of a sword.<\/p>\n

But the hands of Mishima\u2019s second trembled so intensely that he botched three attempts, and another follower had to deliver the coup de gr\u00e2ce. Shamed, the kaishaku knelt and stabbed himself in the abdomen, too. Instant decapitation awaits the second who makes a hash of his duties, which is how the most notorious seppuku of modern times ended with two severed heads on the compound\u2019s floor.<\/p>\n

\u201cKaishaku: The Role of the Second<\/a>\u201d is the title of a new compendium of four rare instructional manuals that have been translated into English for the first time. The earliest, titled \u201cThe Inner Secrets of Seppuku,\u201d dates to the 17th century and was originally a work of kirigami, a half sheet of white mulberry paper folded into a book.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe manuals contain secret teachings that traditionally were only passed along by word of mouth,\u201d said Eric Shahan, who translated the texts. An American-born English teacher based in Japan, Mr. Shahan has a passion for translating ancient martial art books. He came across the two oldest guides, \u201cInner Secrets\u201d and \u201cSecrets Traditions of Seppuku,\u201d a manual written in 1840, in their original handwritten forms last year in libraries in Japan.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The other two guides detailed kaishaku techniques during the Edo period, from 1603 to 1868. Mr. Shahan came across them in obscure, mid-20th century handbooks on sword-fighting styles.<\/p>\n

The compendium answers such questions as what a kaishaku should wear to a beheading (it depends on the social status of the condemned), whether sake should be offered (too much and things can get unruly), and how to properly perform the lop (leave just enough flesh attached for the head to fall naturally forward into the executed man\u2019s arms).<\/p>\n

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A gory set of manuals, one dating to the 17th century, advised Japanese warriors in the secret ways of seppuku.In 1970, the celebrated novelist Yukio Mishima committed seppuku, a gruesome form of ritual suicide that originated with Japan\u2019s ancient samurai warrior class. After a failed coup d\u2019\u00e9tat at a military compound in Tokyo, the 45-year-old writer knelt and drew a knife across his belly, cutting laterally from left to right and then upward and downward in a fatal L. Once he had disemboweled himself, Mishima lowered his neck, signaling a trusted second, or kaishaku, who was a member of his private militia, to swiftly behead him with a single stroke of a sword.But the hands of Mishima\u2019s second trembled so intensely that he botched three attempts, and another follower had to deliver the coup de gr\u00e2ce. Shamed, the kaishaku knelt and stabbed himself in the abdomen, too. Instant decapitation awaits the second who makes a hash of his duties, which is how the most notorious seppuku of modern times ended with two severed heads on the compound\u2019s floor.\u201cKaishaku: The Role of the Second\u201d is the title of a new compendium of four rare instructional manuals that have been translated into English for the first time. The earliest, titled \u201cThe Inner Secrets of Seppuku,\u201d dates to the 17th century and was originally a work of kirigami, a half sheet of white mulberry paper folded into a book.\u201cThe manuals contain secret teachings that traditionally were only passed along by word of mouth,\u201d said Eric Shahan, who translated the texts. An American-born English teacher based in Japan, Mr. Shahan has a passion for translating ancient martial art books. He came across the two oldest guides, \u201cInner Secrets\u201d and \u201cSecrets Traditions of Seppuku,\u201d a manual written in 1840, in their original handwritten forms last year in libraries in Japan.The other two guides detailed kaishaku techniques during the Edo period, from 1603 to 1868. Mr. Shahan came across them in obscure, mid-20th century handbooks on sword-fighting styles.The compendium answers such questions as what a kaishaku should wear to a beheading (it depends on the social status of the condemned), whether sake should be offered (too much and things can get unruly), and how to properly perform the lop (leave just enough flesh attached for the head to fall naturally forward into the executed man\u2019s arms).We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29062,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29060","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29060"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29060\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29063,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29060\/revisions\/29063"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/29062"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}