1:72 Samurai

The class that ruled Japan

The word samurai originally meant a servant, that is a man-at-arms in the retinue of a noble lord. During the twelfth century a protective company became a real military nobility, whose standing was confirmed by the rise of the shogunate. The decisive era came four hundred years later, when the country broke up into dozens of hostile domains and an age of warring states lasting almost a century set in.

The equipment and what sets it apart

The armor was made up of small lacquered plates tied with colored cords, which gave it flexibility and at the same time a conspicuous coloring by which allegiance to a clan was recognized. On the helmet sat a decorative front crest, and on the back a sashimono banner with the clan emblem was worn. Beside the famous sword, however, the main weapon of a horseman was the long asymmetrical bow, and in the field it was the yari spear in the hands of the ashigaru foot units that decided matters.

From Sekigahara to the time of peace

The battle of Sekigahara in 1600 unified the country under the Tokugawa clan and the warfare ended. Over the following two and a half centuries a fighting man became rather an official and a school of swordsmanship, until the reforms of the second half of the nineteenth century abolished the class altogether.

Clan marks at first glance

The colored lacing, the shape of the breastplate and above all the front crest of the helmet revealed whom a warrior served. That is exactly why sets of this type pay off painted in groups of five to ten pieces with the same shade of cords; the resulting scene then looks like the armies of two rival domains rather than a random knot of figures.

A note on working with them

The material is soft polyethylene, which bends under a knife rather than being cut. Flash is therefore removed with a sharp point or a file, and the surface is degreased before paint is applied, so that acrylic holds on the smooth plastic.