Women did not train in using the kaiken with sophisticated combat
techniques. If a woman was forced to fight, she was to grab the hilt with
both hands, plant the butt firmly against her stomach, and run forward to
stab the enemy with all her weight behind the blade. She was to become,
for a moment, a living spear. Thus, she was not supposed to boldly draw
her blade and challenge her enemy. Instead she had to find some way to
catch him unawares. If she were successful in this, she would most likely be
unstoppable. But men knew this, and so a woman could not realistically
expect to face a single foe or have the advantage of surprise. Furthermore,
if she were captured alive, even after killing several enemies, she would be
raped, displayed as a captive, or otherwise dishonored. In the rigid beliefs
of this period, this caused shame to attach to the family name. In these grim
times, the only escape from what was believed to be disgrace was death at
one’s own hands.
The Edo Period: An Enforced Peace
In the mid-seventeenth century, when Japan finally arrived at an enforced
peace under the authoritarian rule of the Tokugawa shogunate, the need for
skill at arms decreased. The turbulent energies of the warrior class were
bound up in an intricate code of conduct, based on laws governing behavior
appropriate to each level of society. The rough codes of warriors were or-
ganized into the doctrines (for there was not simply one) of bushidô (the way
of the warrior). Self-sacrifice, honor, and loyalty became fixed ideals, focus-
ing the warrior class on a new role as governing bureaucrats and police
agents of a society at enforced, totalitarian peace. The role of the warrior was
mythologized, and certain images were held up as ideals for all to emulate.
During the Edo period (1603–1867), all women, not only those of the
samurai class, became increasingly restricted. In this world, everyone had
to fill an immutable role in society, fixed at birth and held until death. The
rules and social conventions governing conduct between men and women,
formerly more egalitarian, became more rigid than at any other period of
Japanese history, and a woman’s relationship toward her husband was said
to mirror that of a samurai toward his lord. The bushi woman was ex-
pected to center her life on her home, serving her family in the person of
her husband first, his male sons second, and her mother-in-law third. Stud-
ies and strong physical activity were considered unseemly.
Work was almost completely gender divided, and men and women be-
came increasingly separate from one another. There was usually a room in
each house reserved for men that women were forbidden to enter, even to
clean or serve food. Husbands and wives did not customarily even sleep to-
gether. The husband would visit his wife to initiate any sexual activity and
afterwards would retire to his own room.
Women in the Martial Arts: Japan 695