Lots of schools....
Originally Posted by
ScottUK
Guys & girls,
Two questions:
1) Does anyone know of any figures about how many koryu existed pre-WWII and how many survived the war? I know it could be construed as a very sensitive subject, but I am genuinely curious about this.
2) Was the omote manji or ura manji ever used as kamon? If so, does it survive today or was it outlawed with the American occupation on 1945 due to its use by the Nazi party (swastika)?
Apologies in advance if anyone disagrees with me asking such things.
1) There is a figure used widely to count the number of koryu jujutsu schools at the end of the Edo era; Tomiki cited it, Kano cited it, and I am too lazy to look it up. Something like 179 jujutsu schools, and many more kenjutsu schools, etc. I've seen reference to the original source of the document, which was a compendium of ryuha; I've seen similar scrolls, but never bought them because they're simply lists of school names. I don't know how many the Butokukai acknowledged, which would have been pretty authoritative, as it was recognized by the Ministry of Education.
2) AFAIK, no. First, the Occupation was not 'American', it was the Allied powers, but the Occupation authorities would've quickly understood it was a traditional symbol without political meaning, and presumably briefed their troops as such. Much brighter than some of today's European governments, but then again I didn't live under Nazi rule or occupation. And, it's all over the place even today; e.g., it's the common map designation for a Buddhist temple, and you can spot it inside temples. Only within the last year or so did the Shorinji Kempo bunch give it up as their symbol in Japan, a group practices in one of the facilities I use, and it was always funny to watch the reactions of Western visitors when they saw the 'swastika'.
Lance Gatling ガトリング
Tokyo 東京
Long as we're making up titles, call me 'The Duke of Earl'