Japanese Samurai VS. European Knights

[Nelson]

Yes Catiline you're right. I should have said rigid close formations a la pike blocks were precluded by mixing horse and foot. Egyptian chariot units seem to have had indigenous light troops attached at Kadesh. Hybrid units like you mentioned would be good to see in a game some day. Rome has got to be next.

[vapd]

well I havnt read thru every reply but deffinitly think there is a bit of euro bashing going on here and a lot of belief based on the fact that we all see a lot of movies involving wonderful swift kensai type swordsmen and hack hack medival knights.

European swords were quite good really and the training was exellent. Its not all fat kings chucking chicken bones over there shoulders. In those days the nobels often led from the front, you think there not gonna train like xxxxxx's to make sure they dont get killed?? You think that your average man at arm's (professional soldier) wants to die?? You think somones gonna employ him if he cant fight well??

I'm not saying that Japenese Samurai wernt trained well but surly mans greatest instinct is to survive and give us Europeans some credit for that. NOONE is going to not develop serious training techniques/arms/armour if there life depends upon it!!

Now, on about the 6th post on this site is a link to an intereesting SA, go check it out.

[Leet Eriksson]

Let me say some few words IT ALL DEPENDS ON TERRAIN so no one will win its either the knights getting smeared in japan or samurai creamed in europe.

[Sir Kuma of The Org]

Ah Faisal, i can finally say that i agree with one of your statements

The whole situation, season, number and quality of troops, who is defending and who is attacking, wich side is rested and well fed, the terrain, all of these can make yesterday's looser , today's winner and vice-versa

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Yes the camel sprites do look good, hope they sound good also...

[St Stephen]

In our history it is always good to play with a thought "what if". This is certainly one of those "what if " question.However to try to anticipate the outcome of such a encounter we must categorized the problem.There are couple of categories I can think of such as(we are taking two equally fit ,trained and discipline master swordsman of the Middle Ages 15 century):

-Single combat,unmounted,without armor
-Single combat,unmounted,in full battle armor
-Single combat,mounted with full battle armor( I don't list mounted without armor because usually they used full battle armor on horseback on both side)
-Group battle in full armor on horseback.

Before I start guessing I must state that unfortunately we can ONLY imagine the mind set of a warrior in the Middle Ages where life and honor dependent on a steel blade.We can hardly imagine today how was it feel like living by the physical power and technical knowledge of a sword.We are also talking about two completely different approach to the same situation which is the survivability on and off the battlefield.Sadly there are very few and limited sources left to us about the training and fighting style of the Medieval Knight so we are ONLY guessing about them.Luckily the combat style and training of the Medieval Japanese warrior class still with us today even if it is not the actual and exact way therefore we don't have to guess about them.

The Western approach to the survival on the battlefield was to build up a superior defensive armor therefor the fighting style of a knight was reflected on that.The Eastern(Japanese) approach was to stay very mobile and build on the superior training and technical knowledge of the weapons use by the samurai.

This is why in single combat, unmounted the Japanese Samurai would come out the winner of the two,I can even add to this He had a far superior sword in his hand.However in any mounted confrontation between this two type of warrior the European Knight would come out victorious because His superior armor and specialized mounted fighting style would be too much for the smaller and least protected mounted Samurai.

[vapd]

Darn, what do I have to say!! There is nothing superior about oriental training compared to Euro training. Mobility isnt the bee all. Euro armour wasnt that restrictive and no man who


oh forget it. I call it a draw.

[Whitey]

wasn't there a thread with a link here somewhere that said the knight easily had the edge one on one on foot, sword and shield vs katana?

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"Situation excellente. J'attaque!"

[Leet Eriksson]

everyone has his prespective,the japanese will tell you the samurai easily busted the knight and the europeans will say the knight will easily kill the samurai and so on its a long war and no one will prevail unless they actually bring 2 poeple trained in the arts of sword fighting and fight it out until one of them is killed.AT that time you can boast who is superior but for know CASE CLOSED(keep this thread from becoming complicated)

[BSM_Skkzarg]

Again, the original question was 1 on 1, "fully decked out" warriors facing each other in the open, on flat terrain. With this being the case, and the predominance of the Yari usage by samurai, it is likely the samurai in question would have a spear available to him, while the knight would have longsword and shield.

The way the question was posed, terrain would not be a major factor. Nor would # of men, as its a 1v1 battle.

Now - lets address this - would a yari have been useful against dismounted knight? This is one area I can not speak in - as I have never messed with a Yari. For those who have, and have some knowledge of the pierce resistance of European armor, what say you all?

Qapla!

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BSM_Skkzarg
"ARG when I'm Happy, ARG when I'm Sad, ARG when I'm good or bad. ARG!"
"ARG to port! ARG to starboard! Arg from stem to stern! ARG!"

[Irving]

BSM,
have you ever 'messed' with a gatana, tachi, wakizashi etc?

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Chaos is born from order.
Cowardice is born from bravery.
Weakness is born from strength.
-Sun Tzu

[Whitey]

Faisal - you are probably right...but we will see - I'll go search....


[This message has been edited by Whitey (edited 03-07-2002).]

[Whitey]

http://www.thehaca.com/essays/knightvs.htm

ok - this is what I found - I think its been posted here before, but it is the closest we can get to a conclusion...

[Cheetah]

Very interesting essay Whitey, but the original question was both about individual and group battles:

Quote I always wondered what combat would have been like between the medieval knights of Europe and Japanese Samurai, both single combat and large battles. [/QUOTE]

And about large battles I still maintain my prediction.

[Leet Eriksson]

i say none will win unless somehow seomeone actually saw it.what happens if there was a japanese forumer here?he would say the samurai is this and that etc etc etc so aside from whose gonna win this European Vs. Japanese is totally fiction no one can prove it by using plain logic or thinking

[Cheetah]

It is not pure logic. It is about combining our historical knowledge of the given periods in a meaningful way.

[Whitey]

hell - if we can't come up with at least a theory then what use is history at all?

leave us our theories faisal...its all we have

[Leet Eriksson]

even if you keep combining historical knowledge for hundreds of years it will never be 100% correct it must be seen to be proven.

[Whitey]

hmm...I don't think we are looking for proof, just the 'weight of historical evidence'

If we search history and attempt to find facts, truth, proof, or laws, then we will be dissapointed - it is more subtle than that IMHO...

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"Situation excellente. J'attaque!"

[Leet Eriksson]

then anyone could say the knight can easily defeat the samurai and vice versa.actually judging from what i have read i think the Samurai could defeat the knight on one on one combat since samurai were more agile than the lumbering knight but when going on a big battle(5000vs5000)the knight could probably win since the japs did'nt fight in any particular order.

[Irving]

you obviously speak of PRE sengoku jidai years.

an average european army vs an average Japanese army wouldn't be fair at all because the Japanese would outnumber the europeans so badly it wouldn't be funny.


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Chaos is born from order.
Cowardice is born from bravery.
Weakness is born from strength.
-Sun Tzu

[Cheetah]

The french outnumbered the english army at Agincourt roughly by 4 to 1. Indeed, it was not a funny battle at all!!!

BTW, the assumption is that they have equal numbers.

[james]

dont fink so

[Cheetah]

What do you don't think so?

[Whitey]

he just don't fink...

[Leet Eriksson]

HEy who said it was funny i said that if 2 armies clashed the japs would lose becuase of their figthing formations if they ever had one...ANYWAY talking about a pre sengoku jidai era the samurai would lose becuase the katana was not yet refined to be the ultimate sword history ever known but i can still say a knight could still be defeated by a saracen anytime HAHA or vice versa

[Irving]

it isn't only formations that comes into play when forming an opinion about who would win.

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Chaos is born from order.
Cowardice is born from bravery.
Weakness is born from strength.
-Sun Tzu

[Cheetah]

Quote Originally posted by Irving:

it isn't only formations that comes into play when forming an opinion about who would win.[/QUOTE]

I agree, but my understanding of the problem is that we assume that they fight a fair battle, i.e. they have equal numbers, both army well fed, well rested, etc. Generalship is a major factor as well, but again the meaningful thing is to assume equal skills on the part of both general. Armour and weaponry can be important too, but the situation seems to be balanced or at least closely balanced. Most of us would agree that the europeans had the better armour but the japanese had the better offensive weapons (tough, obviously this depends on the given period, so you might disagree). Overall, I think that the difference is not so great that it could be decesive in itself. I think that the only major difference, and this could be decesive, is that the japanese were not trained to fight as a unit. Oda Nobugana was the first to train his ashigaru to fight as a unit. However, to stop a european style cavalry charge the infantry have to fight as a unit, or the battlefield have to be prepared (stakes, dicthes, etc), or you have to be extremely lucky (heavy rain, snow-storm, hurricane, etc . Since we assume good weather and no preparation of the battlefield (or at least this was my original question, i.e. whether we assume the japanese to be prepared) the only chance the japanese have is to act as a unit. But we know that they were not trained to do so. Thus, they lose.

[Irving]

not so! Toyotomi Hideyoshi favoured the use of massed groups of spearmen. This is a group. I, disagree with the fact that the Europeans had better armour. The o-yoroi was excellent all around armour. I had good stopping power for arrow (many ukiyo-e scrolls picture samurai with many many arrows sticking out of their armour)

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Chaos is born from order.
Cowardice is born from bravery.
Weakness is born from strength.
-Sun Tzu

[BSM_Skkzarg]

Samurai - while not usually outfitted exactly alike, MOST used Yari as their primary weapon.

Now - samurai were NOT stupid - tactically they were not all genius caliber, but you expect us to believe that a bunch of samurai, looking out across a plain - seeing an equal number of horseman, are just gonna hang out and wait for the horsemen to charge and then attempt to initiate 1 on 1 combat??? C'mon - common sense shows they would gather together, set their spears and send a lot of horses to the glue factory when the knights charged. The idea that a Euro cav charge into samurai would decimate the japanese army is just ludicrous even at face value.

With the predominance of the Yari in the Japanese army, cav action becomes a lot more risky. And while there has been the statement that Euro knights in armor were quite mobile, its still kind of hard to fight after you fall from your horse. Many knoghts would be pinned under their dying mount, or injured/killed in the fall. The number of knights surviving the charge would be much diminished - and if it was a fight to the "last man standing", they would then be heavily outnumbered by the enemy.

I agree that a sam with a katana would be at a disadvantage against a euro knight on horseback. But, historically - the katana was not the main weapon of the majority of the samurai - the yari was...
spear vs cav = 9/10 of the time - spear wins.

now - 1 vs 1 on foot - how useful would a yari be? I posed the question previously - and got no response. So I ask it again.

Could a Yari be reasonably effective against a man-at-arms (dismounted knight)?

Q!
Skkz

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BSM_Skkzarg
"ARG when I'm Happy, ARG when I'm Sad, ARG when I'm good or bad. ARG!"
"ARG to port! ARG to starboard! Arg from stem to stern! ARG!"

[the Count of Flanders]

Quote Originally posted by BSM_Skkzarg:
Samurai - while not usually outfitted exactly alike, MOST used Yari as their primary weapon.

Now - samurai were NOT stupid - tactically they were not all genius caliber, but you expect us to believe that a bunch of samurai, looking out across a plain - seeing an equal number of horseman, are just gonna hang out and wait for the horsemen to charge and then attempt to initiate 1 on 1 combat??? C'mon - common sense shows they would gather together, set their spears and send a lot of horses to the glue factory when the knights charged. The idea that a Euro cav charge into samurai would decimate the japanese army is just ludicrous even at face value.

[/QUOTE]

In Europe they also tried to stop knights charges with pikes, it wasn't very effective. The earliest pikemen still got hacked to pieces. So it's not just a matter of "all aiming your yari towards the enemy". Most important thing of all is manouevering while keeping formation intact. The Swiss were the first to be able to do this, and on flat territory they still had a good chance of being slaughtered. They also used exceptionally thick pikes so they wouldn't break so easily under the force of the charge. And I've read somewhere their spears had varying length (back rows had longer pikes), effectively fighting like a greek phalanx. I am very sure the samurai can't do this, sure the first row of knights will fall to the yaris but rest will cut through them like a hot knife through butter. The samurai's best bet is fighting like the turks: mounted with bows and trying to avoid the charge while wearing them down. But they wouldn't know this in advance so...