The world of the samurai, the legendary elite warrior cult of old Japan, has long been associated solely with military history and has remained a mystery to the general reader. In this paperback edition, Stephen Turnbull, the world's leading authority on the samurai, goes beyond the battlefield to paint a picture of the samurai as they really were. This book explores the samurai within the context of an all-encompassing warrior culture that was expressed through art and poetry as much as through violence. Using themed chapters, Turnbull illuminates the samurai through their historical development and their relationship to the world around them - relationships that are shown to persist in Japan even today.

The dazzling spectacle presented by the armies of medieval Japan owed much to the highly developed family and personal heraldry of samurai society. From simple personal banners, this evolved over centuries of warfare into a complex system of flags worn or carried into battle, together with the striking 'great standards' of leading warlords. While not regulated in the Western sense, Japanese heraldry developed as a series of widely followed practices, while remaining flexible enough to embrace constant innovation. Scores of examples, in monochrome and full colour, illustrate this fascinating explanation of the subject by a respected expert on all aspects of samurai culture.

The most familiar characteristics of the traditional Japanese castle are the huge sloping stone walls and the graceful yet militarily sophisticated structures built on top of them. This title covers the entire period of Japanese castle development from the first introduction of stone walls and tower keeps in the mid-16th century, through the period of the great sieges of Japanese history - Nagashino (1575), Kitanosho (1583), Odawara (1590), Fushimi (1600), Osaka (1615) and Hara (1638), the last of the battles that brought an end to a period of intense internal strife known as the Sengoku Jidai (Age of Warring Battles).

From his seat in Xanadu, the great Mongol Emperor of China, Kubla Khan, had long plotted an invasion of Japan. However, it was only with the acquisition of Korea, that the Khan gained the maritime resources necessary for such a major amphibious operation. Written by eastern warfare expert Stephen Turnbull, this book tells the dramatic story of the two Mongol invasions of Japan that pitted the masters of the steppes against the noble Samurai. Using detailed maps, illustrations, and newly commissioned artwork, Turnbull charts the history of these great campaigns, which included numerous bloody raids on the Japanese islands, and ended with the famous kami kaze, the divine wind, that destroyed the Mongol fleet and would live in the Japanese consciousness and shape their military thinking for centuries to come.

Following on from the two volumes on siege weapons of the Far East, this title adds to the corpus of knowledge about fighting ships of the Far East. Using detailed descriptions, accurate cutaway plates and reliable historical examples, it covers the history of Chinese ship design and naval warfare from the beginning of the Han dynasty to the first few years of the Ming dynasty, when a Ming naval force countered Sichuanese rebels. Also covered is the epic battle of Lake Poyanfg in 1363, won by the man who was to become the first Ming emperor.

The prevalence of particular fortress types in medieval China, Mongolia, Japan and Korea demanded the evolution of different modes of siege warfare in each country. The wealthy walled towns of China, the mountain fortresses of Korea and the military outposts of Japan each presented different challenges to besieging forces, and this book reveals the diversity of tactics that were developed to meet these challenges. Most of the Far Eastern weaponry of this period originated in China, but was adapted to fit the demands of siegecraft across the region and the individual strengths and weaknesses of each piece of machinery are studied here.

In 1543 three Portuguese merchants entered a turbulent Japan, bringing with them the first firearms the Japanese had ever seen: simple matchlock muskets called arquebuses. They proved a decisive addition to the Japanese armoury, as for centuries the samurai had fought only with bow, sword and spear. In 1575, during the Battle of Nagashino, one of the greatest original thinkers in the history of samurai, Oda Nobunaga, arranged his arquebusiers in ranks three deep behind a palisade and proceeded, quite literally, to blow his opponent's cavalry to pieces, marking the beginning of a new era in Japanese military history.

This second volume about Japan's samurai commanders covers the generals of the later years of the Age of the Warring States, a period when only the most able leaders survived. This was a time when the prowess of a commander was measured as much by his strategic and organizational abilities as by his individual fighting skills and he was expected to give as great a show of strength in the council chamber as on the battlefield. This book discusses the lives, battles and wider roles of talented commanders such as Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi - great men who stood out prominently due to their elaborate suits of armour and helmets, their stunning personal heraldry and their great armies.

The samurai were the military elite of medieval and early modern Japan, and the men who led them were hailed as the very greatest, most heroic and most honourable of all samurai warriors. This first of two books examines the lives, equipment, battles and wider roles of the samurai commanders between 940 and 1576, the period from the emergence of the samurai to the triumph of Oda Nobunaga, who set Japan on the road to reunification. The styles of armour and weaponry of the samurai changed considerably during this time and this book visually recreates some of the most famous samurai commanders.

The history of the Mongol armies is a catalogue of superlatives. No armies in history have ever won so many battles or conquered so much territory. No army has ever provoked such justifiable terror and loathing in its victims, or slaughtered so many of its vanquished. What other army in history has marched on Russia in the winter and survived, let alone won victories? The stories of these and many other amazing feats of this 'barbarian' people are here brought vividly to life by Stephen Turnbull, from the birth of Genghis Khan in the wind-swept steppes of Mongolia, through the conquest of China and beyond.

From when the Empress Jingo-kogo led an invasion of Korea while pregnant with the future Emperor Ojin, tales of female Japanese warriors have emerged from Japan's rich history. Using material that has never been translated into English before, this book presents the story of Japan's female warriors for the first time, revealing the role of the women of the samurai class in all their many manifestations, investigating their weapons, equipment, roles, training and belief systems. Crucially, as well as describing the women who were warriors in their own right, like Hauri Tsuruhime and the women of Aizu, this book also looks at occasions when women became the power behind the throne, ruling and warring through the men around them.

Over the centuries, naval relations between Japan and Korea appear to have alternated between peaceful trade and outright hostility. However, this impression can be misleading, as much of what passed for mercantile activity was in fact conducted by Japanese pirate fleets, who pillaged the coasts of Korea and China in a long-lasting tradition that culminated in the greatest pirate raid of all: Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea in 1592. This was the conflict that involved Ming China and almost dragged in Siam. It also led to Korea developing East Asia's most famous warship: the legendary turtle ship, which is described for the first time in full technical detail in this book.

From the 11th century AD, East Asian armies made increasing use of exploding missiles and siege cannon to reduce the fortifications of their enemies. Some of these weapons were very similar to those used in Europe for example, the heavy siege cannon used in the siege of P'yongyang during the Japanese invasion in the late 16th century. Others, like the Korean hwach'a carts mounting over a hundred rockets that were used to bombard the Japanese at Haengiu in 1593, were very different from their European contemporaries. This book details the design and use of the wide range of weaponry available during this period.

An illustrated study of the fighting men of the Hussite Wars in 15th-century Bohemia, a significant transition point in medieval history.
In 1415, the judicial murder of the religious reformer Jan Hus sparked a major uprising in Bohemia. His death led within a few years to the 'Hussite' revolution against the monarchy, the German aristocracy and the Church establishment. In this book, Stephen Turnbull examines how the largely peasant Hussite armies successfully defied a series of international 'crusades' for two decades. He details how the Hussites owed many of their victories to the charismatic general Jan Zizka, and his novel tactical methods based on the use of 'war wagons'.
Fully illustrated with archive photography and specially commissioned colour artwork, this book investigates a remarkable episode in medieval warfare, which is remembered not only as the Czech national epic, but as an important forerunner to the wars of the Reformation the following century.

During the 16th century, Japan underwent a military revolution, characterized by the deployment of large armies, the introduction of firearms and an eventual shift towards fighting on foot. This study encapsulates these great changes through an exploration of the experience on the ground at three key battles, Uedahara (1548), Mikata ga Hara (1573) and Nagashino (1575), in which two very different types of warrior were pitted against each other. On one side were samurai, the elite aristocratic knights whose status was proclaimed by the possession and use of a horse. On the other side were the foot soldiers known as ashigaru, lower-class warriors who were initially attendants to the samurai but who joined the armies in increasing numbers, attracted by loot and glory. These two types of warrior battled for dominance across the period, changing and adapting their tactics as time went on.
In this title, the development of the conflicts between samurai and ashigaru is explored across three key battles, where highly trained elite mounted samurai of the Takeda clan faced ashigaru at very different stages in their development. The profound and irreversible changes that took place as the conflicts progressed are analysed in detail, culminating in the eventual incorporation of the ashigaru as the lowest ranks of the samurai class in within the standing army of Tokugawa Japan.

Osprey's examination of the campaign at Nagashino in 1575. When Portuguese traders took advantage of the constant violence in Japan to sell the Japanese their first firearms, one of the quickest to take advantage of this new technology was the powerful daimyo Oda Nobunaga. In 1575 the impetuous Takeda Katsuyori laid siege to Nagashino castle, a possession of Nobunaga's ally, Tokugawa Ieyasu. An army was despatched to relieve the siege, and the two sides faced each other across the Shidarahara. The Takeda samurai were brave, loyal and renowned for their cavalry charges, but Nobunaga, counting on Katsuyori's impetuosity, had 3,000 musketeers waiting behind prepared defences for their assault. The outcome of this clash of tactics and technologies was to change the face of Japanese warfare forever.

?Stephen Turnbull, a renowned expert on the history of Japan, examines the samurai invasion of Korea, the first step in an ambitious Japanese plan to conquer China. Examining the various stages of the war, from the pitched battles of the early war years, to the great naval encounters, the dramatic sieges and the bitter trench warfare that characterized the end of the war, Turnbull provides a concise analysis of the conflict. Highly illustrated with contemporary photographs, full colour battlescene artwork, detailed maps and bird's-eye views, this is a concise history of a unique and exciting campaign, which not only involved huge numbers of men, differing terrain and tactics but was also the only time that the legendary samurai were pitched against a foreign nation.

In 1614, Osaka Castle was Japan's greatest fortification, measuring approximately 2 miles in length with double circuits of walls, 100 feet high. It was guarded by 100,000 samurai, loyal to their master: the head of the Toyotomi clan, Toyotomi Hideyori. The castle was seemingly impenetrable, however the ruling shogun of the age, Tokugawa Ieyasu, was determined to destroy this one last threat to his position as Japan's ultimate ruler. This book explores the complex background of this bitter struggle, as well as the battle experiences of the opposing forces, in a compelling exploration of the conflict that led to the eventual triumph of one dynasty over another.

By 1400 the long running conflict between the Order of Teutonic Knights and Poland and Lithuania was coming to a head, partly as a result of the Order’s meddling in the internal politics of its neighbours. In June 1410 King Wladislaw Jagiello of Poland invaded the Order’s territory with a powerful allied army including all the enemies of the Teutonic Knights – Poles, Lithuanians, Russians, Bohemians, Hungarians, Tartars and Cossacks. This book recounts how, when the armies clashed on the wooded, rolling hills near the small village of Tannenberg, the Teutonic Knights suffered a disastrous defeat from which their Order never recovered.