How did a warrior class born to serve end up ruling Japan for seven centuries? When the Mongols twice tried to invade — and were twice destroyed by typhoons — what did that do to the samurai myth? And, when the Meiji government banned the wearing of swords in public in 1876, was that the end of the samurai — or just the beginning of something stranger?
Peter and Afua trace the samurai from their seizure of power under the first shogun, through the Zen culture, the arrival of European firearms, and the Warring States chaos, to their abolition, their afterlife in the Second World War, and why the world can't stop romanticising them.
0:00 Minamoto Yoritomo becomes the first shogun in 1192 — and strips all real power from the
imperial court
6:00 Zen Buddhism arrives and fits the samurai like a glove: discipline, impermanence, acceptance
of death
9:00 The Mongol invasions of 1274 and 1281 — and the typhoons that became divine winds
14:00 The Ashikaga shogunate: weak political control, extraordinary cultural flourishing
18:00 The Warring States period — Japan descends into anarchy, and the samurai finally have their
moment
20:00 Europeans arrive with matchlock guns — and personal martial prowess stops being enough
23:00 Christianity enters Japan and starts pulling apart the existing order
28:00 Commodore Perry's steam warships in 1853 — and the crisis that ends the samurai age
31:00 The Meiji Restoration abolishes the samurai: stipends cut, swords banned, a class erased
35:00 Bushido, kamikaze, and Seven Samurai — how a real warrior class became a global myth
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Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas:
Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com
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