Katanas

While preparing to write I tend to do a lot of research, perhaps too much. One of the things I am currently studying is combat. Since I'm writing a fantasy novel set in a time without guns, I'm studying really anything that came before guns.

One thing that I've noticed is a rolling commentary on the katana. The katana is a Japanese blade that has become extremely popular. People who love the katana say it was the best sword ever. People who like other swords usually say the katana is overrated because of popular culture. I've just got a few observations:

Katanas are not just swords. To many people the katana represents the values and belief system of the Samurai. It's not just the sword, but the entire Samurai culture that is involved with this sword. It's similar to the way those of European descent view King Arthur and the knights of the round table. There is a sense of romanticism and adventure surrounding the Katana.

Military change throughout the ages represents a huge back and forth between opponents. If I sent my army at you with a stick, you might get bigger sticks for your army. If I put on a lot of heavy clothes and to pad my warriors bodies and some wood on their heads to protect them, you might come at me with a sharpened weapon to cut through that padding, or a club with spikes that could poke through. If you just found this great stuff called metal that you could shape, you might use as much as you could find. But you might, instead, change your fighting style so that you could pinpoint the weaknesses in my armor without finding a new weapon. Chances are that you'd probably do whatever you could to come out on top.

The point here is that weapons, armor, fighting styles, and even military philosophies change throughout the years in concert with enemies, resources, and technology. Swords throughout the world have gone through various changes throughout the millennium. Materials dictated how long and how thin swords could be made (a 4 foot copper sword would not stand up to continual beating, but a 2 foot copper sword made thick enough might do the job). Sometimes it was a matter of knowing how to forge the metal. Sometimes it was about finding the metal (Iron, as it turns out, is not found naturally in bars or sheets at a local sword making store). Katanas were made in Japan. Japan is an island with limited resources. Katanas have a thick back side made of lower quality metal with a blade forged from a very high quality metal. This design allowed the weapon smiths to create a strong blade with less cost. It is an ingenious design that comes partly from the real world limitations.

One fallback katanas have is that they don't bend. Katanas are created like a long, thin, axe blade. Thick at the back and sharp at the edge. They can stab, but Europeans started making swords that could take a lot of strain and still come back to their original shape. One reason flexible swords are useful is that they can slide along tough armor and slide into weaker joints. The knight was like a tank. He let the armor take blow after blow until he was in position and then he attacked. We don't see many knights fighting with rapiers, because thin and flexible rapier blades made it easier for unarmored opponents to take down a knight.

But there is one piece of evidence that may support the katana's effective design especially in more modern combat. The swords used in more modern wars are single edged, curved blades like the katana. Part of that is that sabers are very useful for cavalry who want to ride through and slice down their enemy. A curved sword is much better if you want to keep going, while a straight sword tend to hang up a bit. Also, plate armor became less and less useful when guns came around (thick enough plate to stop a bullet may well just be too heavy).

I don't know if there is any connection between the saber and the katana. The truth is that every weapon is useful in certain situations, but just looking at the trends, it seems that over time we gravitated toward a similar style. That doesn't mean that the katana is the best sword ever, but the convergent design seems like a good indicator that there is something to be said about katanas.