Demura, Fumio. 1971. Shitô Ryû Karate. Los Angeles: Ohara.
Egami, Shigeru. 1980. The Heart of Karate-dô.New York: Kodansha.
McCarthy, Patrick. 1996. Bubishi: The Bible of Karate.Rutland, VT: Tuttle.
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Karate.Burbank, CA: Ohara.Kata
See Form/Xing/Kata/Pattern Practice
Kendô
Kendô, the Japanese martial art of fencing, is a form of physical culture
that developed from combat swordsmanship techniques of Japanese war-
riors. When these techniques lost practical value, they were still practiced
for educational, health, spiritual, and sporting purposes and ultimately de-
veloped into modern kendô. There is a plethora of terms for swordsman-
ship: tachihaki, tachihiuchi, heihô (hyôhô),kenjutsu,and gekken among
them. But since the mid-1920s, kendô has been used almost exclusively.
There is also another modern martial art derived from traditional swords-
manship, iaidô,a noncombative form that involves both physical and men-
tal discipline.
Premodern History
Japan’s earliest chronicles, from the eighth century A.D., contain many ref-
erences to use of the sword and other bladed weapons. Indeed, the sword
was one of the three sacred treasures that the sun goddess Amaterasu gave
to the grandson whom she sent down to rule over the Japanese islands. The
techniques of forging swords came from the continent via the Korean
peninsula, and the earliest swords of bronze date from the fourth century
A.D. These early swords were double-edged broad swords like those com-
mon in China, and they were less useful as weapons than as symbols of au-
thority for the powerful. Soon technology improved, and swords became
effective weapons. It was not until the rise of the warrior class in the tenth
century, however, that the peculiar curved sword commonly associated
with the samurai—the tachi—came into wide usage. For most of the pre-
modern era, Japanese warriors practiced comprehensive martial tech-
niques, requiring familiarity with several weapons. Even then, the sword
was an auxiliary weapon for most samurai, whose reputations were gener-
ally established through feats of prowess with the bow and arrow.
Kendô 249