i was feeling itchy and i couldn't sleep so i decided it would be time to blog about this ninja thingy i've been wanting to for a long time.

nin·ja

• a member of a feudal Japanese society of mercenary agents, highly trained in martial arts and stealth (ninjutsu), who were hired for covert purposes ranging from espionage to sabotage and assassination.

A lot of sources say that ninjas were made to oppose ancient japanese samurai ways.

ninjutsu: 忍術

ninja: 忍者

Very little is known about the early days of the Ninja due to the strict code of secrecy they abided by.

This art is thought to have been based on a great Chinese military text called The Art of War written by a general named Sun Tzu.

sam·u·rai

• a member of the hereditary warrior class in feudal Japan.
• a retainer of a daimyo.

if you didn't know, samurais carried big heavy weapons and fought their enemy one-on-one honorably.

on the other hand, ninjas carried light-weight weapons, and often killed their enemy without them knowing right at the last second.

The Ninja began training at a very young age, almost as soon as they could walk.

Their training consisted of unarmed combat, escape and evasion, camouflage and weapon skills, but they were also taught how to push their body and minds over the limit of most normal humans.

First aid , herbalism, Psychology, espionage and some say telepathy and clairvoyance were all part of the Ninjas training which made them feared even by the mighty Samurai.

Unlike some forms of extended sensory skills relating to mental activity alone, martial artists train their sensing abilities directly to their bodies.

That is, if we use the metaphor of "signals," then the incoming signal of an immediate, surprise attack will by-pass the conscious mind and go directly to the body awareness systems - resulting in an instantaneous movement appropriate to avoid or to counter the attack.

The Japanese legend of Prince Yamato is often considered the first ninja story, although Yamato did not adopt the black costume or stealthy tactics so often associated with ninja.

Instead, he used deception, dressing as a woman to attract two barbarian chieftains.

When the chieftains had been lulled into a false sense of security, Yamato drew a hidden sword and killed them both. His use of a disguise is a hallmark of ninja tactics, so Yamato is sometimes called "The First Ninja."

Another important part of ninja folklore is the story of 13-year-old Kumawaka.

Kumawaka had traveled very far to visit his dying father, but a monk who was keeping the father as a prisoner would not allow the two to meet. Kumawaka's father died before he had a chance to see him, so the boy vowed revenge upon the monk.

At age 13, he wasn't strong enough to simply fight the monk and his family. Instead, he faked an illness so they would take him into their home. There, he would sneak around at night, finding out where everyone slept and when the guards patrolled.

One night, he snuck into the monk's room. The monk slept with a lamp burning, so the boy opened a window and allowed moths to enter the room. They flocked to the light of the lamp and completely covered it, leaving the room in darkness. Then, Kumawaka stole the monk's sword and murdered him in his bed.

Fleeing out a window, the boy was chased by guards until he reached a river. He cleverly climbed to the top of a bamboo plant near the river, leaned until the flexible bamboo stalk bent out across the water, and then jumped off and escaped the guards.

Although he was only 13, and didn't call himself a ninja, Kumawaka's use of deception, stealth, and cleverness inspired generations of Japanese warriors who did adopt the name ninja.

while many of us think that ninjas wore tight fitting sexy body suits with masks all the time,

that's not really true.

The real thing about ninja attacks was that people didn't know when and where it was coming from.

I watched on discovery channel, some ninjas were simply gardeners, maids, common household people that you did not suspect. And that is the art of deception.

Birthplace of the Ninja

The regions of Iga and Koga in Japan are considered by many to be the birthplace of the ninja as a major force in Japanese warfare.

The men who belonged to the clans that ruled the area hired themselves out as mercenaries, fighting for whichever daimyo, or lord, paid them the most.

The Iga and Koga ninja often worked for daimyo that they had been hired to attack just a few years earlier. This reputation as disloyal mercenaries became a trademark of the ninja, running in direct opposition to the bushido code of the utterly loyal samurai.

The Iga ninja had another reputation, however -- one that ensured their continued use in Japan's feudal wars.

They were known as experts at infiltrating castles. With their stealthy skills, they could obtain secret information, sabotage enemy supplies, or steal food and weapons.

These skills were passed on from father to son. For generations, warring daimyo knew that the best ninja in Japan could be hired in Iga and Koga.

Today, Iga-Ueno, a city in the Iga region, has capitalized on the popularity of ninja.

The Hakuhojo White Phoenix Castle serves as a ninja museum, with a display of ninja weapons and costumed actors performing ninja attacks.

The city holds a ninja festival every year on the first Sunday in April, with ninja parades and events in local parks. (one day jocelyn ko shiya will go!)

Paper Lanterns

The Iga ninja didn't always have to sneak into enemy castles. Sometimes they walked right in the front gates.

To get into one castle, a group of ninja stole a paper lantern bearing the badge of the enemy daimyo. They then made replicas of the lanterns, and marched straight into the castle bearing their fake lantern badges.

After setting the castle on fire, they quickly escaped.

The damage they dealt was two-fold: In addition to the fire, the daimyo thought traitors within the castle had caused the damage, spreading confusion and paranoia in the enemy ranks.

A Different Role

Although the ninja from Iga and Koga were espionage mercenaries, in other parts of Japan the ninja took on other roles.

Many daimyo had elite groups of ninja who served him as loyally as any samurai. They served as spies, scouts, or commando groups that would make guerilla attacks on enemy castles and encampments.

When an army retreated from the field of battle, ninja with firearms were left lying in hiding to attack the oncoming enemy soldiers.

Legend

Despite the precautions taken to protect themselves from ninja tactics, ninja still brought death to many daimyo.

One of the primary roles of the ninja, and the one for which they are most well known and feared, was that of assassin.

The daimyo of feudal Japan came to fear assassination at the hands of ninja so much that they spent a great deal of time at "secret springs," which were hidden resorts built around natural springs far from the daimyo's castle.

Within the castle, a daimyo would often go to extraordinary lengths to protect himself from ninja. In Kyoto, the Nijo castle sported "nightingale floors."

These carefully crafted wooden floors were counterbalanced so that anyone walking on them made a loud squeaking noise.

Some daimyo even kept guards in the same room with them at all times, even when they were asleep.

The Tokugawa family required everyone in their household to wear trousers with wide legs that dragged on the floor, making it impossible to walk quietly.

The art of walking quietly, (yes i call it an art because it's not easy -.-) involves good shoes, and skill!

Ninjas would move near the side of walls, because the floor there were usually more stable and less creaky than the floor in the middle.

And they would often put all their weight on one leg, using the other to test the grounds for sounds that might give them away, if the floor creaked slightly, they simply retracted their leg and moved to another spot.

This art of walking might have given rise to the idea that ninjas had supernatural abilities such as invinsibility and being able to walk through walls.

The ninja themselves often used tricks and disguises that made their powers seem supernatural, and they encouraged stories depicting themselves as superheroes.

Other forms of trickery were said to be used for escaping and combat. Ashiaro are wooden pads attached to the ninja's tabi (thick socks with a separate "toe" for bigger toe; used with sandals).

The ashiaro would be carved to look like an animal's paw, or a child's foot, allowing the ninja to leave tracks that most likely would not be noticed.

During the Tokugawa (or Edo) period, Japan's civil wars were halted by the strict controls of the Tokugawa shogun. Peacetime forced many people in Japanese society to find different roles, including the ninja. They were very useful to Tokugawa, acting as spies and bodyguards in the enforcement of the laws that allowed him to maintain control of the clans.

Ninja Gear

Ninja used a wide variety of weapons, as well as other specialized equipment to help them survive while alone on difficult missions.

A ninja's uniform is called a ninja-yoroi, or ninja armor. It consists of a black jacket, black trousers, light sandals, and a hooded cowl.

Ninja boots (jika-tabi), like much of the rest of Japanese footwear from the time, have a split-toe design that improves gripping and wall/rope climbing.
They are soft enough to be virtually silent.
Ninja also attached special spikes to the bottoms of the boots called ashiko.

Foot spikes and hand claws would be used in conjunction with each other for climbing trees or up wooden huts.

And a grappling hook for walls or to gain access into somewhere that the foot spikes and hand claw were ineffective.

Some ninja costumes included red accents along with the black, supposedly to hide any injuries the ninja might receive from his enemies.

There is some evidence that ninja wore all white costumes in snowy conditions, but the multi-colored ninja seen in some action movies did not exist. A few ninja wore lightweight armor beneath their shirts.

Much of a ninja's work was not done while wearing his ninja-yoroi, however. If a ninja needed to gather information or get close to an assassination victim in a crowded place, wearing a black hood was not a good way to stay inconspicuous.

The ninja were experts at hiding in plain sight, disguising themselves as priests, dancers, merchants, or farmers. They tried to look as plain and ordinary as possible.

A ninja usually wore a ninja-to or other short sword on his back. They also used shuko, weapons worn on the hand (similar to brass knuckles), or tiger claws, which were sharp blades on the palm of the hand which may have been just as effective for climbing as for hand-to-hand combat.

Ninja are famous for using shuriken, or ninja throwing stars. These were often small knives or daggers in addition to the well-known star shapes.
And were kept in an inside pouch of the Ninja's uniform in groups of seven, as this spiritually denoted power.

The stars were very inaccurate, and were usually used as a delaying weapon if a ninja were being chased.

Although they had little chance of striking, seeing a sharp metal blade come flying out of the darkness at his face would likely make even the toughest of pursuers hesitate.

A wide variety of other weapons were used by ninja, including short knives, roped weapons for entangling a foe or striking from a distance, and weapons mounted on long bamboo poles.

Some ninja may have used poison on their bladed weapons, though the murky historical records make it difficult to tell if this is true.

Other useful ninja gear included rope ladders with hooks on the ends for throwing up onto walls; small sharp tacks called caltrops that could be left on the ground for enemies to step on (particularly useful in Japan, where most people wore light straw sandals at most);

small, one-person boats that could be folded down to a portable size; smoke bombs; blow guns; short hollow tubes for breathing under water;

and special healing herbs in case the ninja was injured while on a mission.

Kuji-In is a set of hand signs that the ninja use to give themselves strength, both spiritualy and mentally.

There are 81 hand signs that are used for a majority of diffrent things from bringing strength to the mind and body of the ninja to help heal themselves and others, there is one hand sign called jin that increases the telepathic powers of the ninja and retsu that stuns the attacker with a shout.

These hand signs would take the ninja a life time to study and master.

Clairvoyance

Ninjas in ancient japan were also known to be able to glance into the future, or seeing something that is happening elsewhere.

The art of clairvoyance required the ninjas to retreat to a calm surrounding for training.

**i watched on discovery channel, clairvoyance were often taught to ninjas by chinese monks living in secluded, mountain top areas.

if you dumbdumb still can't picture what is a ninja

ninja = naruto

except less one-on-ones and less hooplas

samurai = bleach

except less weird stuff and more fighting.

Japanese people are so interesting huh.

sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clairvoyance
http://people.howstuffworks.com/ninja.htm
http://website.lineone.net/~draconian/ninjutsu.html
http://www.biomindsuperpowers.com/Pages/MartialArtsAndSuperpowers.html

Labels: discovery

i was feeling itchy and i couldn't sleep so i decided it would be time to blog about this ninja thingy i've been wanting to for a long time.

nin·ja

• a member of a feudal Japanese society of mercenary agents, highly trained in martial arts and stealth (ninjutsu), who were hired for covert purposes ranging from espionage to sabotage and assassination.

A lot of sources say that ninjas were made to oppose ancient japanese samurai ways.

ninjutsu: 忍術

ninja: 忍者

Very little is known about the early days of the Ninja due to the strict code of secrecy they abided by.

This art is thought to have been based on a great Chinese military text called The Art of War written by a general named Sun Tzu.

sam·u·rai

• a member of the hereditary warrior class in feudal Japan.
• a retainer of a daimyo.

if you didn't know, samurais carried big heavy weapons and fought their enemy one-on-one honorably.

on the other hand, ninjas carried light-weight weapons, and often killed their enemy without them knowing right at the last second.

The Ninja began training at a very young age, almost as soon as they could walk.

Their training consisted of unarmed combat, escape and evasion, camouflage and weapon skills, but they were also taught how to push their body and minds over the limit of most normal humans.

First aid , herbalism, Psychology, espionage and some say telepathy and clairvoyance were all part of the Ninjas training which made them feared even by the mighty Samurai.

Unlike some forms of extended sensory skills relating to mental activity alone, martial artists train their sensing abilities directly to their bodies.

That is, if we use the metaphor of "signals," then the incoming signal of an immediate, surprise attack will by-pass the conscious mind and go directly to the body awareness systems - resulting in an instantaneous movement appropriate to avoid or to counter the attack.

The Japanese legend of Prince Yamato is often considered the first ninja story, although Yamato did not adopt the black costume or stealthy tactics so often associated with ninja.

Instead, he used deception, dressing as a woman to attract two barbarian chieftains.

When the chieftains had been lulled into a false sense of security, Yamato drew a hidden sword and killed them both. His use of a disguise is a hallmark of ninja tactics, so Yamato is sometimes called "The First Ninja."

Another important part of ninja folklore is the story of 13-year-old Kumawaka.

Kumawaka had traveled very far to visit his dying father, but a monk who was keeping the father as a prisoner would not allow the two to meet. Kumawaka's father died before he had a chance to see him, so the boy vowed revenge upon the monk.

At age 13, he wasn't strong enough to simply fight the monk and his family. Instead, he faked an illness so they would take him into their home. There, he would sneak around at night, finding out where everyone slept and when the guards patrolled.

One night, he snuck into the monk's room. The monk slept with a lamp burning, so the boy opened a window and allowed moths to enter the room. They flocked to the light of the lamp and completely covered it, leaving the room in darkness. Then, Kumawaka stole the monk's sword and murdered him in his bed.

Fleeing out a window, the boy was chased by guards until he reached a river. He cleverly climbed to the top of a bamboo plant near the river, leaned until the flexible bamboo stalk bent out across the water, and then jumped off and escaped the guards.

Although he was only 13, and didn't call himself a ninja, Kumawaka's use of deception, stealth, and cleverness inspired generations of Japanese warriors who did adopt the name ninja.

while many of us think that ninjas wore tight fitting sexy body suits with masks all the time,

that's not really true.

The real thing about ninja attacks was that people didn't know when and where it was coming from.

I watched on discovery channel, some ninjas were simply gardeners, maids, common household people that you did not suspect. And that is the art of deception.

Birthplace of the Ninja

The regions of Iga and Koga in Japan are considered by many to be the birthplace of the ninja as a major force in Japanese warfare.

The men who belonged to the clans that ruled the area hired themselves out as mercenaries, fighting for whichever daimyo, or lord, paid them the most.

The Iga and Koga ninja often worked for daimyo that they had been hired to attack just a few years earlier. This reputation as disloyal mercenaries became a trademark of the ninja, running in direct opposition to the bushido code of the utterly loyal samurai.

The Iga ninja had another reputation, however -- one that ensured their continued use in Japan's feudal wars.

They were known as experts at infiltrating castles. With their stealthy skills, they could obtain secret information, sabotage enemy supplies, or steal food and weapons.

These skills were passed on from father to son. For generations, warring daimyo knew that the best ninja in Japan could be hired in Iga and Koga.

Today, Iga-Ueno, a city in the Iga region, has capitalized on the popularity of ninja.

The Hakuhojo White Phoenix Castle serves as a ninja museum, with a display of ninja weapons and costumed actors performing ninja attacks.

The city holds a ninja festival every year on the first Sunday in April, with ninja parades and events in local parks. (one day jocelyn ko shiya will go!)

Paper Lanterns

The Iga ninja didn't always have to sneak into enemy castles. Sometimes they walked right in the front gates.

To get into one castle, a group of ninja stole a paper lantern bearing the badge of the enemy daimyo. They then made replicas of the lanterns, and marched straight into the castle bearing their fake lantern badges.

After setting the castle on fire, they quickly escaped.

The damage they dealt was two-fold: In addition to the fire, the daimyo thought traitors within the castle had caused the damage, spreading confusion and paranoia in the enemy ranks.

A Different Role

Although the ninja from Iga and Koga were espionage mercenaries, in other parts of Japan the ninja took on other roles.

Many daimyo had elite groups of ninja who served him as loyally as any samurai. They served as spies, scouts, or commando groups that would make guerilla attacks on enemy castles and encampments.

When an army retreated from the field of battle, ninja with firearms were left lying in hiding to attack the oncoming enemy soldiers.

Legend

Despite the precautions taken to protect themselves from ninja tactics, ninja still brought death to many daimyo.

One of the primary roles of the ninja, and the one for which they are most well known and feared, was that of assassin.

The daimyo of feudal Japan came to fear assassination at the hands of ninja so much that they spent a great deal of time at "secret springs," which were hidden resorts built around natural springs far from the daimyo's castle.

Within the castle, a daimyo would often go to extraordinary lengths to protect himself from ninja. In Kyoto, the Nijo castle sported "nightingale floors."

These carefully crafted wooden floors were counterbalanced so that anyone walking on them made a loud squeaking noise.

Some daimyo even kept guards in the same room with them at all times, even when they were asleep.

The Tokugawa family required everyone in their household to wear trousers with wide legs that dragged on the floor, making it impossible to walk quietly.

The art of walking quietly, (yes i call it an art because it's not easy -.-) involves good shoes, and skill!

Ninjas would move near the side of walls, because the floor there were usually more stable and less creaky than the floor in the middle.

And they would often put all their weight on one leg, using the other to test the grounds for sounds that might give them away, if the floor creaked slightly, they simply retracted their leg and moved to another spot.

This art of walking might have given rise to the idea that ninjas had supernatural abilities such as invinsibility and being able to walk through walls.

The ninja themselves often used tricks and disguises that made their powers seem supernatural, and they encouraged stories depicting themselves as superheroes.

Other forms of trickery were said to be used for escaping and combat. Ashiaro are wooden pads attached to the ninja's tabi (thick socks with a separate "toe" for bigger toe; used with sandals).

The ashiaro would be carved to look like an animal's paw, or a child's foot, allowing the ninja to leave tracks that most likely would not be noticed.

During the Tokugawa (or Edo) period, Japan's civil wars were halted by the strict controls of the Tokugawa shogun. Peacetime forced many people in Japanese society to find different roles, including the ninja. They were very useful to Tokugawa, acting as spies and bodyguards in the enforcement of the laws that allowed him to maintain control of the clans.

Ninja Gear

Ninja used a wide variety of weapons, as well as other specialized equipment to help them survive while alone on difficult missions.

A ninja's uniform is called a ninja-yoroi, or ninja armor. It consists of a black jacket, black trousers, light sandals, and a hooded cowl.

Ninja boots (jika-tabi), like much of the rest of Japanese footwear from the time, have a split-toe design that improves gripping and wall/rope climbing.
They are soft enough to be virtually silent.
Ninja also attached special spikes to the bottoms of the boots called ashiko.

Foot spikes and hand claws would be used in conjunction with each other for climbing trees or up wooden huts.

And a grappling hook for walls or to gain access into somewhere that the foot spikes and hand claw were ineffective.

Some ninja costumes included red accents along with the black, supposedly to hide any injuries the ninja might receive from his enemies.

There is some evidence that ninja wore all white costumes in snowy conditions, but the multi-colored ninja seen in some action movies did not exist. A few ninja wore lightweight armor beneath their shirts.

Much of a ninja's work was not done while wearing his ninja-yoroi, however. If a ninja needed to gather information or get close to an assassination victim in a crowded place, wearing a black hood was not a good way to stay inconspicuous.

The ninja were experts at hiding in plain sight, disguising themselves as priests, dancers, merchants, or farmers. They tried to look as plain and ordinary as possible.

A ninja usually wore a ninja-to or other short sword on his back. They also used shuko, weapons worn on the hand (similar to brass knuckles), or tiger claws, which were sharp blades on the palm of the hand which may have been just as effective for climbing as for hand-to-hand combat.

Ninja are famous for using shuriken, or ninja throwing stars. These were often small knives or daggers in addition to the well-known star shapes.
And were kept in an inside pouch of the Ninja's uniform in groups of seven, as this spiritually denoted power.

The stars were very inaccurate, and were usually used as a delaying weapon if a ninja were being chased.

Although they had little chance of striking, seeing a sharp metal blade come flying out of the darkness at his face would likely make even the toughest of pursuers hesitate.

A wide variety of other weapons were used by ninja, including short knives, roped weapons for entangling a foe or striking from a distance, and weapons mounted on long bamboo poles.

Some ninja may have used poison on their bladed weapons, though the murky historical records make it difficult to tell if this is true.

Other useful ninja gear included rope ladders with hooks on the ends for throwing up onto walls; small sharp tacks called caltrops that could be left on the ground for enemies to step on (particularly useful in Japan, where most people wore light straw sandals at most);

small, one-person boats that could be folded down to a portable size; smoke bombs; blow guns; short hollow tubes for breathing under water;

and special healing herbs in case the ninja was injured while on a mission.

Kuji-In is a set of hand signs that the ninja use to give themselves strength, both spiritualy and mentally.

There are 81 hand signs that are used for a majority of diffrent things from bringing strength to the mind and body of the ninja to help heal themselves and others, there is one hand sign called jin that increases the telepathic powers of the ninja and retsu that stuns the attacker with a shout.

These hand signs would take the ninja a life time to study and master.

Clairvoyance

Ninjas in ancient japan were also known to be able to glance into the future, or seeing something that is happening elsewhere.

The art of clairvoyance required the ninjas to retreat to a calm surrounding for training.

**i watched on discovery channel, clairvoyance were often taught to ninjas by chinese monks living in secluded, mountain top areas.

if you dumbdumb still can't picture what is a ninja

ninja = naruto

except less one-on-ones and less hooplas

samurai = bleach

except less weird stuff and more fighting.

Japanese people are so interesting huh.

sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clairvoyance
http://people.howstuffworks.com/ninja.htm
http://website.lineone.net/~draconian/ninjutsu.html
http://www.biomindsuperpowers.com/Pages/MartialArtsAndSuperpowers.html

Labels: discovery