So You Want to Be a Samurai Trivia Quiz

Answer: Warriors

Samurai were first and foremost warriors. They also tended to be literate. They studied military strategy as well as music, poetry and other subjects. Royalty in Japan were Emperors or daimyos (lords). Peasants, as a rule, were illiterate and therefore not samurai material. It is true there were some priests who were samurai but they were warriors first.
Even in Japan, even in those days, a peasant could never be more than a peasant.

Answer: Daimyo

The ruler of Japan was the Emperor. This title stayed within the ruling family. A shogun was the military commander. If the Emperor was weak in power, the shogun became, in essence, the ruler of Japan. A daimyo was a feudal lord who controlled his own area.

The daimyos supported the shogun and the Emperor. Samurai worked directly for a daimyo. Samurai itself means "one who serves." The samurai held service to their daimyo in high regard and were expected to follow the daimyo should he choose to rebel against the shogun or Emperor.

There were instances, however, of samurai remaining true to the Emperor and refusing to follow rebel daimyos. One shogun tried to use pirates to fight his battles. He called them sam-ARR-ais.

Answer: Bushido

The Bushido dictated every aspect of a samurai's life: personal, family and military. The code promoted seven virtues. These were rectitude (gi), courage (yu), benevolence (jin), respect (rei), honesty (makoto), honor (meiyo), and loyalty (chugi). Honor was probably regarded as the highest virtue. It was the Bushido code that dictated a samurai could regain lost honor by committing ritual suicide (seppuku).
Elements of Bushido can be found today in judo, karate, jujitsu and other martial arts.
The Vikings also had a "Way of the Warrior". They called theirs the Norse code.

Answer: Katana

The main samurai weapon was the katana--a long curved sword. It was curved in order to make it easier to slice through an opponent. The katana is unique to samurai and skilled sword-makers were revered. They were also permitted to carry a second sword, the shorter wakizashi. Being warriors, samurai were also generally skilled in use of the bow, pole arms, and, starting in the late 16th century, the arquebus from Portugal.
What is a samurai's favorite Tennessee Williams play? Katana Hot Tin Roof.

Answer: Helmet, breastplate, shoulder, shin and arm guards

Samurai armor evolved over time. A typical full suit of armor included helmet, body armor, shoulder, shin, arm and hand guards. The helmet (kabuto) consisted of metal plates fastened together. A samurai would typically decorate his helmet with emblems of his rank and clan.

It was tied on. The helmet usually had a hole in the top--experts are unclear as to whether it was for ventilation or to allow the samurai's pony tail to stick out. The main body armor (o-yoroi) also consisted of metal plates fastened together.

These were then lacquered to prevent corrosion. The o-yoroi protected the torso, shoulders, waist and hips. Many o-yorois were covered in colorful bead patterns. Shin guards (suneate) and arm protectors (kote) were also worn. At one point some samurai experimented with putting candles on their helmets for fighting at night, but it only made them light-headed.

Answer: Samurai were more literate than most Japanese at the time

Samurai definitely had to have a military education. Their main purpose, after all, was to fight. To make them better soldiers, samurai had to be literate. They had to be able to study Sun Tzu's "Art of War." They also studied religion, medicine (to heal battle wounds), astronomy, art, poetry, calligraphy (to write down their thoughts), and etiquette (a samurai was expected to act with honor; a breach of etiquette could make the samurai lose face and that was something a samurai never wanted to do.)
One samurai, Hashiba Hideyoshi, undertook a province-by-province rice survey of Japan in the 1580's. When he finished every rice field in Japan was listed. This was of immense value to the daimyos who controlled the provinces. They now knew how much revenue they could expect each year.
This may not be true but I think I read somewhere that he next did a survey of corn fields. It was a corn-census.

Answer: A warrior like himself

Combat in feudal Japan was like against like. Peasants fought peasants. The samurai challenged and fought each other and enemy commanders in single combat. That was the way battles were fought within Japan. In 1274 the Mongols arrived. Their style of fighting was completely different.

They fought in masses, attacking everyone they found. The Japanese were not used to this type of fighting and the Mongols soon made their way south to the island of Kyushu. Here the Japanese were able to mount a spirited defense that slowed the Mongols.

The enemy was unprepared for this--they expected quick victory--and was soon low on provisions. Fortuitously a storm prevented the Mongol reinforcement and supply ships from landing and the Mongol hordes were turned back. Here's a joke for you. Two samurai are having lunch in a sushi restaurant. One decides he needs some horseradish for his meal so he turns to the other and says "Wasabi?" The other samurai looks at him and says "Not much. Wasabi with you?"

Answer: True

Shortly after 1600 a navigator from England named William Adams became the advisor to the shogun on Western and naval matters. Japan was just beginning to have dealings with the West so anyone with Western knowledge was valued. He became so close to the shogun that he was made a samurai. His name was changed to Miura Anjin ("Miura" was the name of the ship in which he arrived, "Anjin" means pilot) and he was forbidden to leave Japan.
There was a samurai from the West even earlier than Adams. In the late 1500's an unnamed slave from Africa was made a samurai by Oda Nabunaga, a powerful daimyo who at one point controlled 1/3 of Japan, and was given the name Yasuke.
When I worked at the Japanese fertilizer factory my nickname was Anjin. My job was to pile it here and pile it there.

Answer: Kendo

Kendo literally means "way of the sword." It has its roots in kenjutsu (the art of the sword), which is what the samurai studied, practiced and used. In kenjutsu, the object was to kill one's opponent with powerful strikes. Any part of the body was fair game. Kendo, on the other hand, is based on striking only the head, throat, lower arms, or lower sides of your opponent.
I only tried kendo once. I was really confused about what my opponent was doing with his sword. Then it hit me.

Answer: False

The JGSDF special forces unit is the Central Readiness Force. Sadly, the samurai class was abolished in 1868. By that time Japan had reached a state of peace and samurai warriors were no longer needed. At the same time the public wearing of swords, which was one of a samurai's unique rights, was outlawed as well.
After they could no longer be samurai, many of them, because of their dexterity with swords, found work neutering flies and other small critters--or so I heard.