Karl
F. Friday.
Samurai, Warfare and the State in Early Medieval Japan.
London: Routledge, Dec
2003.
256pp.
Publisher's
recommended price
Hardback ISBN 0415329620, £60.00
Paperback ISBN 0415329639, £19.99
Warfare
in early
medieval Japan was deeply linked to the social structure. Examining the
causes and conduct of military operations informs and enhances our
understanding
of the tenth to fourteenth centuries - the formative age of the
samurai.
Karl
Friday, and
internationally recognised authority on Japanese warriors, provides the
first comprehensive study of the topic to be published in English. This
work incorporates nearly twenty years of on-going research, draws on
both
new readings of primary sources and the most recent secondary
scholarship.
It overturns many of the stereotypes that have dominated views of the
period.
Friday
analyses
Heian-, Kamakura- and Nambokucho-period warfare from five thematic
angles.
He examines the principles that justified armed conflict, the
mechanisms
used to raise and deploy armed forces, the weapons available to early
medieval
warriors, the means by which they obtained them, and the techniques and
customs of battle.
A
thorough, accessible
and informative review, this study highlights the complex casual
relationships
among the structures and sources of early medieval political power,
technology,
and the conduct of war.
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