The Samurai

Paul McGann (0:00)

It's September the 22nd, 1877

Darkness has fallen over the coastal town of Kagoshima in the southwestern province of Satsuma, Japan. The night is cool, following a rain shower, in contrast to the stifling heat of the day. The breeze carries with it a faint scent of pine needles and, fainter yet, gunpowder. Across the bay, illuminated by a ribbon of moonlight stitched across the water, the smoldering volcano, Sakurajima, stands in ghostly silhouette against the inky black sky. A thick plume of smoke billows from its crater, serving as a constant reminder to the local people of the fragility of life as they know it. Tonight, they need no reminding. Six months earlier, a government official named Saigo Takamori recruited men from Satsuma and other southern provinces to launch a rebellion. Their enemy is the Emperor. He has been attempting to modernize Japan, but this has involved steadily dismantling the warrior class to which Saigo belongs. Saigo and his followers are Samurai, elite swordsmen of noble heritage, known to espouse a strict code of honor both on and off the battlefield. For a thousand years, they have been the dominant political force in Japanese society. But now, these rebels truly are the last of their kind. Today, in the volcano's shadow, the insurgents, wielding swords, did battle against 35,000 imperial troops armed with rifles. Tonight, outnumbered and outgunned, Saigo and his few remaining men have retreated to the slopes of a hill overlooking Kagoshima town. They take advantage of the pause between bombardments to repair their bamboo defences and tend to the wounded. But they know they are fighting a losing battle. While his advisers debate tactics, Saigo himself walks quietly to the edge of the camp and peers over the top of the rudimentary battlements. Below the enemy garrison stretches into the distance, an impenetrable wall of manpower and modern artillery. With just a few hundred samurai against the swarming imperial soldiers, resistance is beginning to look suicidal. Surrender surely is the only option. Saigo's grip tightens around the hilt of his blade. Before they know it, it will be morning. He has a decision to make.

In this episode, we will take a trip to the Land of the Rising Sun, to meet an elite group of legendary warriors, whose exploits helped forge the very soul of Japan. But who exactly were these mysterious men and women? And are they really deserving of the acclaim and even reverence that they have received since their demise? This is The Samurai.

Amid crackling gunfire and exploding shells, Saigo Takamori stands on that moonlit hillside, faced with a choice of inglorious surrender or inevitable death. As battle recommences, his troops are mown down by Gatling guns, as wave after wave of samurai soldiers, trained in the art of kendo or the way of the sword, are slaughtered by civilian conscripts, equipped with new-fangled weaponry. A terrible truth begins to dawn on Saigo. The samurai are not at war with the emperor's army, but with an enemy that is even more resolute and ruthless. They are at war with progress. But to understand how this mighty warrior class ended up here, teetering on the brink of oblivion, we first have to understand where they came from. And for that we need to travel back to Japan in the Middle Ages.

Due to the lack of official records from this time, it can sometimes be hard to separate truth from legend when dealing with the early history of the samurai. One thing we know for sure, however, is that their rise was not the result of a sudden revolution, but instead, in the words of historian Carl Friday, a matter of incremental evolution occurring in fits and starts. By the 9th century AD, Japan is ruled by an increasingly insular aristocracy. From their extravagant palace in modern-day Kyoto, the imperial family spends most of its time indoors, engaged in leisure activities and artistic pursuits, with much less attention afforded to the business of governing. Practical matters like tax collecting and empire expansion are left in the hands of the military. And over the years, the Japanese armed forces have been undergoing some pretty drastic changes. For example, in the mid-eighth century, the court abolishes the conscript system, ending the reliance on peasant soldiers. Instead, they introduce smaller, more mobile units of specially trained mercenaries. And over the next few centuries, these mercenaries will be engaged in an ongoing conflict along the northern border of the Japanese peninsula, with a group of indigenous people called the Emishi. The Emishi are a distinct ethnic group native to northern Japan, whereas the majority of the Japanese population, the aristocracy included, are descendants of the Yayoi people who migrated from Korea and China around 300 BC to 300 AD. Jonathan Clements is a historian and author of A Brief History of the Samurai.