Samurai Armour - Description Construction KitWritten by Dave Thatcher

While reading through books and surfing online stores I’m continually confronted with descriptions of armour using japanese terms. At first this appears to be clever gobby de gook written by those in the know to impress, however after a little research and practice it all becomes apparently simple to understand, and write.

The following descriptions were gleamed from two well known online dealers located in Japan. They both describe a complete armour offered for sale in english as:

1. Tetsu sabiji rokuju ni suji kabuto tetsu sabiji mogami do gusoku

or.

2. Tetsu kuro urishi nuri momonari kabuto tetsu kuro urushi nuri ni mai do gusoku

Both examples describe the helmet first and the do second. For some reason the mengu and sangu are not mentioned, but the word gusoku is present to indicate a set. I used Google to translate the kanji and some cheating with The Samurai Armour Glossary to make sense of it.

Lets look again at description 1.

Helmet: Tetsu sabiji rokuju ni suji kabuto

Name Tetsu Sabiji Rokuju ni Suji Kabuto

Kanji 鉄 錆地 六十二 間筋 兜

Meaning Iron Rust / Ground 62 Type - Plate Helmet

So we have a russet iron 62 plate suji style helmet. Now to the description of the do.

Do: Tetsu sabiji mogami do gusoku

Name Tetsu Sabiji Mogami Do Gusoku

Kanji 鉄 錆地 最上 胴 具足

Meaning Iron Rust / Ground -Style- Body -Set-

As above we have something like. A russet iron mogami style body armour / matching set

Here are some of the common terms that I found cropping up:

Name Kanji Meaning

Tetsu 鉄 Iron

Sabiji 錆地 Russet? Rusty or earth, ground

Kuro 黒 Black colour

Urushi 漆 Japanese Lacquer

The Samurai Armour Forum

www.katchu.co.uk Written by Dave Thatcher 2013 - Free to distribute

Name Kanji Meaning

Nuri 塗 Applied or coating

Most armour is made from russet iron or leather, this can be lacquered or covered in leather, and in some cases the leather plates can be strapped to a iron bar, lacquered, covered in leather, and even lacquered again. Its endless, so it may be best to keep it simple and focus on the core material. It’s worth noting that lacquer can be simulated to look like russet iron (Sabiji nuri) or be leaf gilded (kinpaku) or have various ground effects that resemble anything from tree bark to rag-rolling.

If you want to describe an item try this basic key.

A - What is the item made from?B - Is it uncoated or coated?C - Has an effect been applied?D- What is the style of the item?

For example, if you had a black lacquered iron hineno zunari kabuto with a five lame shikoro which is also in the hineno style you could simply describe it as:

tetsu kuro urushi nuri hineno zunari kabuto

or you could go further and describe the helmet bowl and shikoro.

tetsu kuro urushi nuri hineno zunari bachi (Iron, black lacquered, hineo style, zunari bowl)tetsuo kuro urushi nuri ita mono go dan ( Iron, black lacquered, solid plate, five lames)

....and lets not forget the lacing style

Sugake odoshi hineno-jikoro (sugake style lacing, hineo style shikoro)

Here’s some more:

Tetsu Kuro Urushi Nuri Ju hachi Ken Suji Kabuto 鉄黒漆塗十八間筋兜(iron applied black lacquered 18 plate suji style helmet)

Sabiji Nuri Ressei Menpo 錆地塗烈勢面頬(russet lacquer coating ressei style face armour)

Tetsu Kuro Urushi nuri Okegawa ni-mai Dou 鉄黒漆塗桶側二枚胴(iron applied black lacquered Okegawa style, two section body armour)

Remember to work out the styles of helmets, masks and body armour and incorporate them into the descriptions.

Good luck with the reading and writing!

The Samurai Armour Forum

www.katchu.co.uk Written by Dave Thatcher 2013 - Free to distribute