Tamerlane

hope this isn't too OT since he was, technically, a Mongol (though not within the same timeframe as the STW expansion).
So what's the deal with this guy? I was reading a book History of Genocide and his name came up as quite the bastard in regards to wiping out whole cities and such. Here's an excerpt:
"...a monster who razed Isfrara'in to the ground in AD 1381; built 2000 prisoners into a living mound and then bricked them over at Sabzawar in 1383; piled 5000 heads into minarets at Zirih the same year; massacred 100000 prisoners at Delhi in 1398; buried alive 4000 Christian soldiers at Sivas aftr their capitualtion in 1400..."
And my little list has undergone extensive ommission just to keep things short. Anything like this ever happen in Japan? I've heard of retainers being beheaded, buit anything on such a wide scale?

This never happened in Japan but the Japanese did inflict this on other people. Japan raped China during the second World War and took the lives of 600,000 in the city of Nan King. The Japanese soldiers said that they cut so many people down with machetes that their arms were tired by the end of the day. You may have heard of the Rape of Nan King. 60,000 women of all ages were raped by Japanese soldiers.

I know that Date Masamune once ordered the wholesale slaughter of the inhabitants of a castle he took, including all the civilians present (around 800 people in all). This was Otemori Castle, held by the Ouchi family of Mutsu (not to be confused with the Chugoku Ouchi), whose lord Ouchi Sadatsuna had recently betrayed Masamune for the Ashina. Hearing of the slaughter, the Ouchi family is supposed to have abandoned their Obama Castle and fled to the Ashina domain in Aizu. Masamune's actions may have been out of frustration. Three months earlier, an attempt to punish the Ouchi (and their Ashina allies) had ended in failure at Hibara (where the Ashina retainer Inawashiro Morikuni forced Masamune to retreat).

Tamerlame (or Timur the Lame) is an interesting conquerer. In addition to his many military endeavors, he had a great passion for chess and is supposed to have created a number of variants of the game in his free time. He was, as you say, Soly, quite ruthless - and is perhaps best known for at least once building a pyramid of skulls of his defeated enemies. He was poised to invade China when he died.

Tamerlane

race:mongrel oops typo error its monggol
sex: prefers rape of helpless http://www.ballericons.com/icon/13248.gif

occupation: http://www.ballericons.com/icon/659.gif

Never happened in Japan? How about the Shimabara Revolt, which btw, is in the same time frame as STW? 30,000 ~ 40,000 starving farmers fought against an army of 100,000 trained samurai. After a final showdown at a castle, ~11,000 farmers were beheaded, and ~6,000 burnt alive. Only a handful of the farmers survived the occasion.

Thanks, agios - I can't believe that slipped my mind. That was a very tragic event...

isnt that also called the Christian rebellion? i think it was mimicked in the movie Ninja Resurection where Jubei went inside the castle and killed its defenders almost singlehandedly, i know its fantasy but i think thats where they got the idea for the story.

oh and one more thing if someone can enlighten me, it wasnt an all peasant army was it, i seem to remember some samurai family backing up that rebellion, just cant remember who it was, anyone?

Yeap, Daimon, I saw that anime as well (just the 1st episode). Ninja Resurrection is obviously fantasy (I mean, what was up with that guy with the ripple rocket launcher?), but it is indeed based on this event. And you are right, it wasn't all farmers, but the huge bulk of them were (for a while, the farmers actually did well against the samurai, firing guns from castles). Their leader, Shiro of Amakusa ("Child of God") was a real person. And Jubei was indeed suppossedly employed by the Tokugawa around the time, and yes this was the crushing blow to Christianity in Japan (all this ties in actually very well with STW game dynamics). Since then Amakusa has been made into a weird cultic figure within Japanese pop culture. Another notable appearance of his, is in the popular Samurai Showdown/Spirits game series.

that was fast agios, thanks, is this amakusa person of samurai lineage? i read a book by shaisaku endo(forgot the tittle) about the christian persecution during this period, anyways thought that movie was based on that rebellion, thanks for confirming my suspicions, yeah if they have sword saints like jubei, who needs armies http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

It is my understanding that Amakuza Shiro was descended from samurai lineage. His father was one Masuda Yoshitsugu, who was a retainer of Konichi Yukinaga of Higo. I don't have the exact details in front of me, but if I recall, at some point his father gave up the samurai life to become a farmer. I'm not exactly sure of when this happened, but Shiro is also known as Masuda Tokisada, so it was most probably late in Shiro's teenage years at least.

There were a number of ronin involved in the 'peasant' revolt, some with causes, some just because they were disillusioned and saw a chance to strike out at the authority.

[This message has been edited by Ii Naomasa (edited 04-27-2001).]

truly such a sad side of history, its time when the good guys were beaten by the bad guys(im ny point of view at leat), but to die for what one believes in makes those peasants die like theis samurai brethren who bleeded with them....gyokusai! thanks naomasa-dono