Hi there,
I hope you are doing well.
I've just finished Part Two of our sharpest katana series, and one story stayed with me longer than the rest.
A samurai armoured sleeve — the kote — is iron plate and mail sewn onto cloth. A katana is not built to cut through that. Swordsmen trained for years to aim at the gaps instead: the throat, the armpit, the inside of the wrist. Cutting the plate itself was simply not expected.
A commander of the Asakura clan did it anyway. His clan kept that sword for generations as proof. Oda Nobunaga took it as a prize in 1573. In 1882 it was presented to the Meiji Emperor, and today it sits in the Tokyo National Museum, still called the Kotegiri — the gauntlet cutter.
Four more blades in this one, including a dagger that moored a ship to a rock in a storm, and a sword that cut a stone lantern in half to win an argument about price.
Kind Regards,
Kei, Matt & Team from the History of Katana
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