Not really. the Maiai (sp) of the Yokomen / shomen attacks are set so that if the hand were to not be blocked it would easily pass the opponent, with the tip of the weapon in use cutting the opponent. as per normal kenjutsu practice. In aikido the hand itself is used, the maiai is set completely differently.Shomen and Yokomen may represent armed attack, but they are not armed attack, nor in any of the public presentations I have seen, are they executed in the way a skilled person actually uses weapons. I understand what you are saying, but it makes as much sense to me as practicing gun disarms against a pointed finger.
Also the attacking skill of an opponent in daito ryu is higher than that in aikido IMO. They attacker in daito Ryu strictly adheres to the attacking principles as they would be in Swordsmanship, not simple throwing hard a yokomen, being off balanced, out of control & easily lead.
We often train with Rubber tanto, Bokken and Shoto. After the aikinojutsu, as part of the Goshinyo-no-te, there are hanbo, tessen and tento usage ( as i understand it)
My teacher is a Menkyo in Ono Ha itto Ryu so he is very skilled with weaponry.
Again i think there is a misunderstanding here. Who has stated that weapons were not allowed?It may be that the Aizu han was different from other han and that weapons were absolutely forbidden, and thus, even the guards to the daimyo were unarmed and thus, practiced unarmed techniques against weapons as their primary responsibility, but I've read or heard nothing authoritative to support that thesis.
Short swords, shoto, tanto, tessen, hanbo, jutte etc would all have been allowed inside. Hence the need for defenses against them, and the use of some of them in defense.
You have stated that if an attack on some one of status were to take place the lightly hood of it being an official style of attack would be low. Thus we can conclude that attacks would have been done in a surprise manner.
This would have required immediate action from the bodyguards, either with a weapon to hand, or with unarmed methods, OR as is the case in many many kata, a combination of both. An initial unarmed method followed by the use of a tanto or similar. Idori - Ipondori has a stab to the armpit in its original form. Many schools have changed this to a strike, but it was a stab originally. a stab to this location is common to other Koryu arts.
I believe this is definitely true of aikido, but i do not believe that this is true of daito ryu. We are often told to attack skillfully as we would with a sword, we all practice ono ha itto ryu so we have some skill with a weapon, some of us practice other koryu also in addition."....a different expectation of what the uke will do."
Okabayashi Shogen sensei.and the white-haired gentleman (the name is escaping me right now - who recommends a same arm-same leg way of walking that has been discussed elsewhere)
Watching something on videotape and drawing the conclusions you have from it does not really sound like your usual deep research. I feel that you are interpreting the kata from an aikido perspective, as an Aikidoka. This is understandable, grouping similarities is easy to do. But does not really prove anything other than an aikidoka's understanding Daito ryu.
Agreed - your credentials are not in question here my friend.But having studied nearly thirty years a system pre-jujutsu, that focused specifically on killing with short weapons, and having observed most of the remaining other systems with close-combat with weapons, I am familiar with the parameters of combat in older Japanese society as it pertained to small weapons.
But have you ever seen Koryu Ju Jutsu schools 'Simulating' weaponry attacks? Short weapon attacks CAN be simulated in terms of ju jutsu. The principles remain whether you have a tanto in your hand or not. Hence the omission of weapons from demonstrations.
Also as i understand it Kondo sensei did not study deeply the weaponry arts. As he is one of the main disseminators of the art maybe it is on his line that you are drawing your main conclusions.
Other lines have a greater representation of the older movements of daito ryu in relation to weaponry, because of a more extensive knowledge of weaponry systems.
The formulation of set Kata happened via Sokaku and Tokimune. It is possible that many kata were shuffled around the order of the system.If the literally hundreds of techniques/kata I have seen over the years are are the survival methods taught to protect, unarmed, against armed assasination in the palace, I hope they had good cleaning supplies for the tatami after the blood settled.
I suspect you have only seen Shoden Waza, as
Aiki-no-jutsu ----------------------------- 53 Techniques.
Hiden okgui------------------------------- 38 Techniques.
Goshinyo-no-te--------------------------- 84 Techniques.
Are not often shown. These make up more waza than the shodens 118 and are the more direct teachings of defense. especially Goshinyo-no-te. Surely it would be more appropriate to judge after viewing the majority of kata rather than just Shoden waza.
Part of the reason for shuffeling the kata around was to enable novices to learn the basic principles prior to gaining knowledge in the advance methods. This would not have been the case in its origional format (high ranking bushi would have already been skilled JuJutsu ka)- basics would already be there, so many of the Shoden would have only been taught in one form, not with variation.
Indeed. But we are not talking about battlefield JuJutsu here. We are talking about a closed door system taught to high ranking bushi, which contained traditional etiquette and ceremony alongside martial methods.I'm observing it from a koryu bujutsu perspective, and all I asserted it that it's training method is quite different from all older schools that came from a period when one had only a brief period to train (like basic training, so to speak) before one actually had to fight.
The requirement for basic skills training would not have been there.
Most / all high ranking bushi (many in a body guard capacity) would already be extremely proficient in JuJutsu, Kenjutsu etc etc. So why teach BASIC juJutsu methods to someone already highly skilled in JuJutsu.
Hence the difference you observe. Many of the other Koryu were designed to teahch from scratch if you will. Oshikiuchi was design to advance and already advanced warrior.
kind regards
Chris