Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by slferg
African Samurai: The True Story of Yasuke, a Legendary Black Warrior in Feudal Japan by Geoffrey Girard, Thomas Lockley
5.0
The author researched this book for 8 years. He went to Japan as a teacher and while there heard stories of a black samurai. The samurai had become something of a legend. So he began to research. He found information in diaries and such that had been locked away in old family archives and a movement had begun in Japan to publish these in an effort to make more history known. He also found information in old Jesuit letters.
Yasuke came to Japan as bodyguard to a Jesuit Visitor, the head of the missionary effort, answerable to the Pope. He became known to the people and attracted the attention of Nobunaga, head of the Oda clan, who was trying to unite Japan into one country. Yasuke was over 6 feet tall and very strong and very good with weapons. When the Visitor left Japan, he left Yasuke to the employ of Nobunaga, who made him a Samurai and gave him a house of his own in his castle grounds and servants. So Yasuke became a member of the Samuarai bodyguard and warriors close to Nobunaga.
Some of the story is of necessity speculation, but Lockley gives his reasons for his conclusions in the background notes if not in the story itself.
Very interesting and makes me want to know more of the Samurai and the conditions and customs in Japan.
Yasuke came to Japan as bodyguard to a Jesuit Visitor, the head of the missionary effort, answerable to the Pope. He became known to the people and attracted the attention of Nobunaga, head of the Oda clan, who was trying to unite Japan into one country. Yasuke was over 6 feet tall and very strong and very good with weapons. When the Visitor left Japan, he left Yasuke to the employ of Nobunaga, who made him a Samurai and gave him a house of his own in his castle grounds and servants. So Yasuke became a member of the Samuarai bodyguard and warriors close to Nobunaga.
Some of the story is of necessity speculation, but Lockley gives his reasons for his conclusions in the background notes if not in the story itself.
Very interesting and makes me want to know more of the Samurai and the conditions and customs in Japan.