Yasuke: In Search of the African Samurai

by Thomas Lockley

  Ronin: The most famous story about masterless samurai is perhaps that of the forty-seven ronin, the subject of a recent movie starring Keanu Reeves, as well as numerous other books, plays and media ever since the event took place. Their lord, Asano Naganori, had been ordered to perform seppuku, his lands were confiscated and his retainers made masterless samurai, ronin, a fate nearly as bad as death in their eyes. The sentence was handed down because Asano had dared to draw his sword within the precincts of the shogun’s castle, a heinous offence. To defend his honor and legacy, forty-seven of his retainers, now ronin, carefully plotted revenge on Lord Kira Yoshinaka, the man who’d intentionally besmirched the honor of their master and caused his death. They pretended to live debauched lives so their intended target would lower his guard. This took fourteen months, but when the time was ripe, they gathered and attacked the culprit and his men. The attack, however, took place only after they’d sworn not to harm helpless members of the household and had informed the neighbors of their mission, to prevent their being thought of as simple robbers. The forty-seven ronin took Kira’s head and laid it on their old master’s tomb. They then presented themselves to the authorities for punishment. They were duly sentenced to cut their own bellies, and forty-six of them did on February 4, 1703. The forty-seventh man had been sent home to report the mission’s success. He died in 1747 and was later commemorated beside his comrades.

  Selected Bibliography

  Berry, Mary Elizabeth. The Culture of Civil War in Kyoto. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994.

  Brown, Delmer M. “The Impact of Firearms on Japanese Warfare, 1543–98.” The Far Eastern Quarterly, no. 7, 3 (1948): 236–253.

  Cooper, Michael. They Came to Japan: An Anthology of European Reports on Japan, 1543–1640. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1965.

  Farris, William Wayne. Japan to 1600: A Social and Economic History. Honolulu: University of Hawaii, 2009.

  Jansen, Marius. The Making of Modern Japan. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2000.

  Kim, Young Gwan and Hahn, Sook Ja. “Homosexuality in ancient and modern Korea.” Culture, Health & Sexuality, no. 8, 1 (2006): 59–65.

  Kure, Mitsuo. Samurai Arms, Armor, Costume. Edison, NJ: Chartwell Books, 2007.

  Morillo, Stephen. “Guns and Government: A Comparative Study of Europe and Japan.” Journal of World History, no. 6, 1 (1995): 75–106.

  Ōta, Gyūichi (J. S. A. Elisonas & J. P. Lamers, Trs. and Eds.). The Chronicle of Lord Nobunaga. Leiden, NL: Brill, 2011.

  Screech, Timon. “The Black in Japanese Art: From the beginnings to 1850.” In The Image of the Black in African and Asian Art, edited by David Bindman and Suzanne Preston Blier, 325–340. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2017.

  Shapinsky, Peter. Lords of the Sea: Pirates, Violence, and Commerce in Late Medieval Japan. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2014.

  Society of Jesus. Cartas que os padres e irmãos da Companhia de Jesus escreverão dos reynos de Japão e China II (Letters written by the fathers and brothers of the Society of Jesus from the kingdoms of Japan and China—Volume II). Evora, Portugal: Manoel de Lyra, 1598.

  Tsang, Carol Richmond. War and Faith: Ikko Ikki in Late Muromachi Japan. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.

  Turnbull, Stephen. The Samurai: A Military History. London: Routledge, 1977.

  Turnbull, Stephen. The Samurai Sourcebook. London: Cassell, 2000.

  Turnbull, Stephen. Samurai Women 1184–1877. Oxford: Osprey, 2010.

  Turnbull, Stephen. Ninja: Unmasking the Myth. Barnsley: Frontline Books, 2017.

  Chapter 14

  Ranmaru: The relationship between Nobunaga and Ranmaru counts as one of the greatest love stories in Japanese history, and their relationship remains revered and sacrosanct to this day. Ranmaru’s huge odachi sword remains as a viewable artifact in the modern-day Honnō-ji Temple.

  Sex with Nobunaga: Even if such a thing was public knowledge, no Jesuit would have written of it and our key Japanese sources, Ōta Gyūichi and Matsudaira Ietada, did not mention any personal details about Nobunaga’s relationship with Yasuke other than the fact of Yasuke’s first audience and warrior service with Nobunaga. [Special thanks to Cliff Pereira for his expert advice on the section about sexual practices in Africa and to Professor Timon Screech for his expert personal opinion on the depths of the Yasuke/Nobunaga relationship.]

  Sex in Japan: Japan, at this time, did not take a particularly restrictive view to any sexual relationships, although different types of partnership, marriage, concubinage, casual, paid or unpaid sex, and kept mistresses or boys were often highly codified and sometimes had strict laws pertaining to them, particularly among the upper classes. Men who could afford it kept numerous concubines—Nobunaga’s favorite, Kitsuno, was the mother of his first two sons—but polygamy in any formalized sense was not practiced. Multiple sexual partners for both sexes was common, as was divorce and remarriage. Traditionally, children were often held in common in the countryside, being brought up by the community rather than in exclusive nuclear families. This declined in the early modern age due in large part to the increased rule of law and hence the need to formalize inheritance and property rights. Among the lower classes, there was a lot more leeway and many families never had their relations formalized in any civil or religious fashion. Senior wives of the upper class, often the result of political marriages, were normally expected to employ courtesans and sex workers, temporarily or permanently, to entertain their husbands; and the senior wife often adopted the offspring of such liaisons, especially if no official heir was forthcoming, or a new one was needed. In Nobunaga’s case, his senior wife, Nōhime, was unable to conceive, so she adopted his children by other women and is believed to have been cared for by his second son, Nobukatsu, after her husband’s death. In Hideyoshi’s case the opposite is rumored. His concubine, Lady Yodo, a formidable woman and daughter of Nobunaga’s sister Oichi, is supposed to have conceived her son Hideyori with someone else as Hideyoshi could not do it. Not surprisingly, the Jesuits took a dim view of Japanese sexuality, especially homosexual relationships. The non-Jesuit Europeans and Africans though, thought they were in wonderland, and seemed often to be happy enough to follow the saying “when in Rome...”

  Valignano leaves: Valignano eventually left from Nagasaki on board the Portuguese ship of Captain Ignacio de Lima on February 20, 1582. Accompanying him were the four young Japanese ambassadors to Rome, kinsmen of the Christian lords, Ōtomo Sōrin, Arima Harunobu and Ōmura Sumitada.

  The gifted screens depicting Azuchi: After reaching Rome (which Valignano never did), the Pope duly expressed his wonder at Nobunaga’s gift, and no doubt others did afterward. Europeans have always had a fascination for Asian art, and Japanese art in particular, partly set off by these early wonders which were carefully chosen to astonish. The fate of the screens thereafter is unknown. It’s thought that, in the absence of expertise to preserve these magnificent works of art, they rotted away over time.

  Selected Bibliography

  Chatterjee, Indrani, and Eaton, Richard. Slavery and South Asian History. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006.

  Cieslik, Hubert. Soldo Organtino: The Architect of the Japanese Mission. Tokyo: Sophia University, 2005.

  Evans-Pritchard, E. “Some Notes on Zande Sex Habits.” American Anthropologist, New Series, No. 75, 1 (1973): 171–175.

  Ihara, Saikaku, Powy Mather, E. (Trans.). Comrade Loves of the Samurai. Tokyo: Tuttle, 1972.

  Jameson, E. W. The Hawking of Japan: The history and development of Japanese Falconry. Davis, CA: 1962.

  Keay, John. India: a History, From the Earliest Civilisations to the Book of the Twenty-first Century. London: Harper Press, 2010.

  Kure, Mitsuo. Samurai Arms, Armor, Costume. Edison, NJ: Chartwell Books, 2007.

  Madut-Kuendit, Lewis Anei. The Dinka History the Ancients o
f Sudan. Perth, Australia: Africa World Books, 2015.

  Murakami, Naojiro. “The Jesuit Seminary of Azuchi.” Monumenta Nipponica No. 6, 1/2 (1943): 370–374.

  Ōta, Gyūichi (J. S. A. Elisonas & J. P. Lamers, Trs. and Eds.). The Chronicle of Lord Nobunaga. Leiden, NL: Brill, 2011.

  Russell-Wood, A. J. R. The Portuguese Empire, 1415–1808. A World on the Move. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992.

  Sarkar, Jagadish Narayan. The Art of War in Medieval India. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, 1984.

  Souza, George. The Survival of Empire: Portuguese Trade and Society in China and the South China Sea 1630–1754. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.

  Chapters 15 & 16

  Hideyoshi’s rise: Not much is known for certain about Hideyoshi’s youth apart from the fact that he came from a very humble background, and his father was an ashigaru (common foot soldier) named Yaemon. Before 1570, his story is mostly legend, but he appears in documents from this time as one of Nobunaga’s officers. In 1573, Nobunaga made him a lord, and his star never stopped rising.

  Tottori castle ghost story: In the mid-1980s, seven high school students were joking around and having a late-night coffee at a café in the shadow of Tottori Castle. The conversation turned to the story of ghostly samurai on the castle mountain. Eventually, they dared each other, kimodameshi, or test of courage in the face of the supernatural, to enter the mountain castle grounds and brave the samurai ghosts within. Tottori Castle is on several levels; the modern entrance is at road level and steep stone stairs take one up the lower mountainside defenses. The braver students surged ahead to the second-highest level, maybe two hundred-plus feet above the moat. To go higher really would have been foolhardy in the dark; it is not only ghosts that are a threat, there are bears, and other dangerous animals living wild there too. It was 2:00 a.m., the witching hour. The streetlights below glowed, but the mountainside was pitch black and ominous. The young people, fueled by their own stories and imagination, looked around them, hoping the ghosts were nothing but stories. One student, Minoru, who was especially sensitive to supernatural entities, felt more fearful than the others. He’d seen ghosts before and climbed the slope more slowly, knowing this was not a joke. Suddenly, a huge samurai burst out of the ether, six feet tall. He was armored, wore his swords sheathed and his eyes were bloodred. There was no time to take in more details. The samurai grabbed for the students, trying to pull one away. Minoru saw it all, but the prospective victim was utterly oblivious to the ghostly presence. Minoru immediately turned and ran. In panic at the sudden flight, his friends followed him down the steep and dangerous stairs and nearly brained themselves tripping on the stone, but managed to reach the main gate and the streetlights that beckoned safety beyond. The ghost did not follow them. Panting from the run and fear, Minoru’s friend asked “Why did you run?” and Minoru, his heart racing, told him of the armored warrior who’d tried to take him. Decades later, Minoru still visits Tottori Castle every April to view the cherry blossoms, but he has never returned to that one spot where years ago his twentieth-century friend was attacked by a samurai from Yasuke’s day.

  Ishikawa Goemon’s death: In 1594, Ishikawa Goemon attempted to assassinate Hideyoshi, but his luck had run out. He was sentenced to death by boiling. His infant son was also sentenced to die with him, but the ninja managed to save the boy by holding him above the boiling cauldron. Hideyoshi is supposed to have generously spared the boy’s life to honor the father’s brave action. The type of metal bath that he died in is now known as a “Goemon bath” in his honor.

  The execution by boiling of the ninja Ishikawa Goemon. This type of bath is called after him even today.

  The name “ninja”: It’s likely the word ninja was hardly ever used in Yasuke’s time. In fact, it probably only entered common usage in Japanese in the post-WWII period when the concept was popularized overseas. This is supposedly because the word ninja is easier to render into English that many of the other terms used to refer to special operative troops in ancient Japan. Yasuke would have known them by names like shinobi, Iga no mono (a person from Iga), rappa (thief/ruffian), kusa (grass, because they hid in the grass), or nokizaru (roof-monkey, as they moved around on roofs rather than using the road).

  Yasuke’s spiritual life: Yasuke’s spiritual life remains only in historic speculation. None of those who saw fit to record his life mentioned anything related to his faith. As seems most likely—due to his path through India, his skin color, and extreme height—he was born of the Dinka (Jaang) people in what is now South Sudan and brought up believing in a supreme creator god, Nhialic. A divine force present in all of creation, Nhialic controls the destiny of every human, plant and animal in the Dinka world. If Yasuke still held any of the spirituality he’d been born with, he would have been thanking Nhialic for his blessings. The spiritual leader of a Dinka community was the Spear Master, who was both political chief and holy man. Spear Masters mediated between the gods and their communities, and were the spiritual representatives on earth of Nhialic himself. Each village, as Yasuke would have seen it, had its own “Pope.” The Spear Master’s religious invocations ensured the giving and preservation of life, the general wellbeing of his people, and success against their enemies, elements and wild animals. He could also purportedly smite his enemies. Prayers were often supplemented by the sacrifice of cattle, a holy animal in the Dinka world: the source of all wealth, most nourishment and the giver of life. A cow’s sacrifice was no small matter, but an action filled with significance and gravity. Enslaved during childhood, Yasuke hadn’t had the chance to complete any of the ceremonies which accompanied manhood—including scarification of the face and the removal of six teeth from the lower jaw. Other Africans in Asia had been described so, but not Yasuke.

  Yasuke had most likely fallen into the hands of Muslim slavers, and it is virtually certain he’d been converted to Islam. The conversion of kaffir, “infidel,” slaves took place either willingly or forcibly, and typically happened during the slave’s journey to the marketplace. Conversion to Islam is, at least on the surface, a straightforward act; all a person has to do is pronounce Shahada, the testimony of faith, in Arabic: “There is no true god but God (Allah), and Mohammed is his messenger.” When Yasuke recited these words, he’d have been a Muslim. Whether the vast majority of newly enslaved non-Muslims who recited these words—enchained, torn from their homes, in a language they did not understand, for reasons they probably did not comprehend—actually understood what they were signing up for is unlikely. Most, in fact, were simply—as with the Jesuits and Japanese—following their new master’s instructions. Had Yasuke remained a Muslim slave in a Muslim world (or in service to a Muslim master in India), however, this had various advantages. He would have had social status as a member of the faithful that was unavailable to non-Muslims, a route to emancipation and the legal protection that any children he fathered would have automatic freedom—as it was illegal for Muslims to enslave anybody born a Muslim. A French Jesuit reporting on Yasuke’s exploits some fifty years after Nobunaga’s death wrote that Yasuke was a Moor. A possible reference to Islam, although more likely to have meant only that he was a “black man” as such parlance was common at the time to describe every African, Arab or Indian. Prior to Valignano’s employment, Yasuke no doubt took on his third belief system. Valignano wouldn’t have engaged the services of a man like Yasuke who did not, outwardly at least, profess the Catholic faith. Yasuke was therefore, technically required to be able to recite the Paternoster, Ave Maria, the Commandments and the Articles of Faith, as well as having been baptized—the minimum official qualifications necessary to deem a “heathen” as Catholic. In practice, many enslaved Africans were baptized with little knowledge of what was happening to them, due to lack of priests available. At various points in time, the Portuguese Crown even allowed slaving ship captains to perform mass baptisms. In Yasuke’s time, this ofte
n took place in Africa before they boarded the ships for the destination where they were to be put to work. Fortunately for the enslaved—or so the Christian slavers told themselves—this meant that if they died from murder, despair, starvation or disease, in the terrible conditions on the slave ships, their souls had at least been saved. In Yasuke’s case, he’d arrived in India via the Muslim world rather than through a Portuguese settlement in Africa. Therefore, he may well have been baptized after arriving in Goa, Cochin or any of the other Portuguese-controlled enclaves along the subcontinental coastline. Legally speaking, in the Portuguese world, slave children of ten or under were not given a choice about baptism; those older than ten, however, could in theory refuse. As Yasuke was employed by Valignano around the age of twenty, and perhaps not yet Catholic, he technically could have refused baptism. However, Valignano was a strict and rather demanding character, and would have insisted that any conversion be properly observed, rather than perfunctory. Living with Valignano and among the Jesuits, Yasuke had been exposed to strong and zealous professions of Catholicism on a daily basis, thereby becoming familiar with even niche areas of doctrine and practice. Yasuke outwardly showed many signs of Catholicism and attended mass and prayers, either voluntarily or as part of his duties, on a daily basis. He may well, perhaps, have truly believed.