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A Fine Group of Five Armours Befitting the Daimyo of Edo period Japan and their High-Ranking Retainers Victor Harris, Emeritus Keeper of the Japanese Section of the British Museum Most existing Japanese armour outside shrine, temple. museum, and great clan collections, dates from the Edo period (1604 - 1868). Few pieces of O-yoroi (the 'great harness') made for mounted samurai of the Heian and Kamakura periods survive, although there are a number of Muromachi period armours designed for use on foot. After the battle of Sekigahara (1600), and the Osaka castle campaigns (1614 and 1615) and the Shimabara Rebellion of 1637-1638, armour was not to be used again in combat until the disturbance of the Bakumatsu leading up to the Meiji Imperial Restoration of 1867. During those two and a half centuries armour became mainly an object for display, and a luxurious symbol of the power of the samurai class. During the last of the civil wars of the 16th century three main kinds of armour were in use defined by the construction of the do, or cuirass. The domaru (Lot nos. 285, 286, 288) fitted around the body and closed at the right side; the haramaki (Lot no. 289) fitted over the shoulders from the front and with the joint down the back; and the nimai-do was in two sections front and back joined with a vertical hinge down the left side. Of these the earlier domaru and the haramaki were composed of rows of kozane, individual lacquered iron and leather scales laced together in horizontal rows. The haramaki was provided with a separate piece, the seita (back plate) to cover the joint, which has been sometimes unkindly called the okubyo-ita [the coward's plate] on the grounds that one's back should never be turned towards the enemy. The nimai-do (Lot no 292), which actually was sometimes composed of a greater number of pieces forming two main parts, seems to have derived from European armour, which had distinct front and rear pieces. After the appearance of the matchlock gun on the battlefield in Japan in the middle fifteenth century, the breastplate of the nimai-do in particular was strengthened, and sometimes made of more bullet-proof solid iron plate. The nimaido became popular in the 16th century in place of the former O-yoroi, domaru, and haramaki for its advantages in the infantry combat prevalent at the time. Armour with a nimai-do and smaller components covering most of the body was preferred even by the most traditional of the daimyo (samurai provincial lords). These armours were less complex to make and hence cheaper than the old style composed of hundreds of individual laced scales, and the helmets were also of simpler construction, sometimes being of just a few plates. Such armour was known as 'Tosei Gusoku', or 'Equipment of the Times', indicating that it had become fashionable. But although simple in construction the tosei gusoku were sometimes decorated in eccentric styles, with exotically shaped helmets. Even after the onset of peace in the Edo period many daimyo continued to wear the utilitarian tosei gusoku on ceremonial occasions because of its association with the memory of the wars of a generation or two ago. But for some the older and rather grander yoroi with a large expansive shikoro [neck guard], sode [shoulder guards], and a tradition helmet of many plates with large kuwagata [stylized horns] were regarded as more fitting for the high-ranking samurai. Such are the domaru and haramaki of this collection. The construction of these more luxurious armours is predominantly of kebiki odoshi honkozane [close laced individual scales], in which small scales of iron or leather are laced together in rows, the scales lacquered, and several rows laced together to form the several components of the armour. Following the death of Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1616 his armour, a black-lacquered tosei gusoku with the helmet made in the form of the cloth cap of the popular deity Daikoku-Ten was enshrined in the Kunozan Toshogu shrine, where the spirits of Ieyasu, and Oda Nobunaga are venerated. That armour was reproduced by Ieyasu's successor, and from then on for each generation of the Tokugawa house until the end of the Edo period. The custom thereby arose that each daimyo upon his succession would have an armour made copying that of his father, or the previous generation. This custom had already been well established in Shinto shrines, and even to this day the Grand Shrine at Ise, dedicated to the Sun Deity, is rebuilt, and its treasures made anew, every twenty years in a practice which dates from at least as far back as the Nara period. It is largely due to this activity that the traditional crafts have been kept alive throughout the centuries in Japan. Indeed, Japanese armour itself has been the nurse of several traditions, for its manufacture entails a close cooperation between iron workers, soft metal sculptors and gilders, leather workers, lacquerers, silk dyers and embroiderers, makers of kumihimo, or silk braid, all under the direction of the armourer. Four of the magnificent group of armours in this collection are in the style of the Muromachi period domaru and one is of the hara-maki form, used by daimyo and their higher ranking retainers. It was always desirable that such noble armour should have the best helmet possible, and ideally the helmet bowl would be from a salvaged Kamakura period piece. The helmet bowl of the domaru (Lot no. 288) is marked with the character jo, or read kami, signifying that it was made by an armourer of Nara before the Muromachi period, for example. However such early helmets were not always readily available, and the Edo period armourers made shift with later pieces, or made helmets in the archaic style. Other armours incorporated copies of Heian or Kamakura period works, like the so-called Yoshitsune-gote (lot no. 285) based on the National Treasure original pair of sleeves housed in the Kasuga Grand Shrine, Nara. Although they are said to have belonged to the Heian period hero Minamoto-no-Yoshitsune the sleeves in fact date from the Kamakura period, but are none the less a most beautiful example of the armourer's art. The fashion for early style armours was firmly established when the eighth shogun Ieyoshi (1684 - 1750) promoted a revival of ancient weaponry, including swords and armour, to revitalize what he believed to be a decline in martial spirit of the nation. Armour similar to the classic pieces of this collection is illustrated in the Shuko Jissho [Ten Types of Antiquities] compiled by the daimyo Matsudaira Sadanobu around 1800. Since an armour of this quality made during the Edo period would cost probably the equivalent of a house today, they were carefully preserved and only brought out on ceremonial occasions. The armours in the collection have been little worn, and are accordingly in near pristine condition. They bear the mon of the daimyo whose house owned them, usually of gilt copper, placed prominently on the helmet, but sometimes richly scattered over the whole armour as exemplified by Lot no. 288 with solid gold mitsutomoe [triple comma shape] mon on most components. During the Edo period there were around 260 or so daimyo each occupying a domain with a castle and manor, and keeping a secondary manor in the capital city, Edo (present day Tokyo). The Tokugawas made it mandatory for each daimyo to spend either six months or a year (depending on his hereditary allegiance at Sekigahara) in his Edo mansion, and to leave his wife and heir there when he returned each year to his home domain. This system, called then sankin kotai was instituted to prevent the possibility of insurrection, and to keep the provincial samurai busy. The requirement was for the daimyo to travel with a large retinue, ranging from a few hundred to more than one or two thousand for a richer daimyo like the Maeda of Kaga province. Armour might be worn at certain stages of the journey, but it was essentially symbolic, since there was no possibility of a daimyo procession ever attacking Edo. It was customary for an armour to be produced as an ancestral relic for display on certain days of the year, such as the tango no sekku every 5th May, which has become known as 'Boy's Day'. When not in use armour would be packed away in its box, thus preserving it from the attacks of insects and keeping its natural folds intact. In that respect the similarity with silk kimono, which are folded away when not in use, and hung in their natural folds when displayed in a museum or gallery, is evident, perhaps an indication of the Japanese respect for objects in allowing them their own place and existence. The last time that traditional Japanese armour was worn in anger was in the abortive Seinan no Eki, or the 'Satsuma Rebellion' of samurai against the Meiji government in 1877. The last samurai fell to rifle fire, and armour became a symbol of the days in which peace had once been maintained by display of arms. Japanese armour remains today what it had become during the Edo period - a symbol of ancient military virtue and an object of luxurious beauty.

YOSHITSUNE-GOTE DO-MARU ARMOUR

EDO PERIOD (17TH-18TH CENTURY)

Details

YOSHITSUNE-GOTE DO-MARU ARMOUR
EDO PERIOD (17TH-18TH CENTURY)
A fine archaistic style armour, the helmet a hemi-spherical 24 plate oboshi kabuto-bachi [ridged-plate helmet with rounded protruding rivets] in Kamakura period style (13th-14th century), and with a broad kasa-jikoro [early expansive style neck guard] with gilt mon of standing butterfly, gilt kuwagata [stylized horn helmet crests] and with the maedate [forecrest] of a 'shigami' beast, russet iron menpo [face mask] with a yodare-kake [bi] nodowa [gorget-throat protector] of thickly-lacquered red-laced hon-kozane [individual lacquered iron scales], red, orange and white laced odoshi-do [cuirass] with hon-kozane [individual scales], a rare pair of waki-biki [under-arm pieces] (see illustration) of leather-covered shittsukezane, o-sode [large shoulder guards] in ancient style, 'Yoshitsune-gote' [sleeves in the style of the National Treasure kote in the collection of Kasuga Shrine], multi-tasset kusazuri [skirt], red, white, and orange variegated lacing haidate [thigh protector], iron tsutsu-suneate [lower leg guards], fur shoes with gilt metalwork on major components pierced and carved with peonies among foliage matching that of the 'Yoshitsune-gote', whereas that on the original National Treasure Kasuga shrine piece has chrysanthemums, and with the gilt triple leaf hollyhock of the ruling Tokugawa shogun clan also on major components

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