Samurai Armies 1550–1615

Osprey Men at Arms #86

by Stephen Turnbull, Richard Hook (Illustrator)

In 1543 three Portuguese merchants entered a turbulent Japan, bringing with them the first firearms the Japanese had ever seen: simple matchlock muskets called arquebuses. They proved a decisive addition to the Japanese armoury, as for centuries the samurai had fought only with bow, sword and spear. In 1575, during the Battle of Nagashino, one of the greatest original thinkers in the history of samurai, Oda Nobunaga, arranged his arquebusiers in ranks three deep behind a palisade and proceeded, quite literally, to blow his opponent's cavalry to pieces, marking the beginning of a new era in Japanese military history.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Military History, Japan, Military Fiction, Japanese Literature, Japanese History

48 pages, Paperback

First published March 22, 1979

About the author

Stephen Richard Turnbull is British a historian specializing in eastern military history, especially the samurai of Japan. His books are mainly on Japanese and Mongolian subjects. He attended Cambridge University where he gained his first degree. He currently holds an MA in Theology, MA in Military History and a PhD from the University of Leeds where he is currently a lecturer in Far Eastern Religions. He has also written a number of books on other medieval topics. He is semi-retired but still holds the post of Visiting Professor of Japanese Studies at Akita International University in Japan.

Reviews

[Manolo González · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book if you are in a rush to know all the basic stuff about the samurai and their battlefield during sengoku jidai.

[Rindis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Osprey's Men-At-Arms book Samurai Armies is a pretty good introduction to the warring states period of Japan. The series is more focused on men and equipment, and that is what you get here, though the three-page summary of the period is not bad.

It is a bit primitive in a couple ways, so it must be remembered that this is a 1979 book. Steven Turnbull turned into a fairly popular author on Japan in the '80s, and is still writing today, but this was his first book. Also, Osprey was still just moving away from the stiff figure illustrations that had dominated military uniform books in the '70s and earlier, and while the people in the color plates are shown in a variety of activities, backgrounds that might give more context of the world of these people are almost entirely absent still.

As is often the case with Osprey, the book suffers a bit from being too short; it has a good introduction to the use complicated formations in Japanese warfare, but no practical examples of how it worked out in practice, it gives a whirlwind tour of the evolution of armor styles, but you have to read very carefully to catch everything being said. On the other hand, there's a nice three-page reproduction of a Japanese print showing how to put on armor, and another page with a print showing various ways of lacing the helmet (the reproduction isn't so good on this one).

In all, it still stands up as a good beginning book on the subject, which is remarkable given how much more has been written on the subject since.

[John Somers · Rating 3 out of 5]

13/20.

[Sabastian Burlison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great

Love military history books and I've wanted to learn more about Japanese Medieval Military History. It was amazing and informative.