Ninja. Blago Kirof

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      Ninja

      By Blago Kirof

      Illustrated by Blago Kirof

      First Edition

      Copyright © 2013 by Blago Kirof

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      Ninja

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      Foreword

      "... They come like Wind, they go like Lightning". (Sun Tzu, "The Art of War")

      They called them Invisibles.

      In medieval Japan there were a few dozen families of Iga and Koga provinces specializing in Ninjutsu. Most of them belonged to the category of "goshi" - inferior level of the samurai class with its own hereditary estates. In Koga goshi clans were 53. In Iga dominated three Ninja clans - Hattori, Momoti and Fudzhibayashi.

      The Iga and Koga clans have come to describe families living in the province of Iga (modern Mie Prefecture) and the adjacent region of Koka (later written as Koga), named after a village in what is now Shiga Prefecture. From these regions, villages devoted to the training of ninja first appeared. The remoteness and inaccessibility of the surrounding mountains may have had a role in the ninja's secretive development. Historical documents regarding the ninja's origins in these mountainous regions are considered generally correct.

      A distinction is to be made between the ninja from these areas, and commoners or samurai hired as spies or mercenaries. Unlike their counterparts, the Iga and Koga clans produced professional ninja, specifically trained for their roles.These professional ninja were actively hired by daimyos between 1485 and 1581, until Oda Nobunaga invaded Iga province and wiped out the organized clans. Survivors were forced to flee, some to the mountains of Kii, but others arrived before Tokugawa Ieyasu, where they were well treated. Some former Iga clan members, including Hattori Hanzo, would later serve as Tokugawa's bodyguards.

      Following the Battle of Okehazama in 1560, Tokugawa employed a group of eighty Koga ninja, led by Tomo Sukesada. They were tasked to raid an outpost of the Imagawa clan. The account of this assault is given in the Mikawa Go Fudoki, where it was written that Koga ninja infiltrated the castle, set fire to its towers, and killed the castellan along with 200 of the garrison. The Koga ninja are said to have played a role in the later Battle of Sekigahara (1600), where several hundred Koga assisted soldiers under Torii Mototada in the defence of Fushimi Castle. After Tokugawa's victory at Sekigahara, the Iga acted as guards for the inner compounds of Edo Castle, while the Koga acted as a police force and assisted in guarding the outer gate. In 1614, the initial "winter campaign" at the Siege of Osaka saw the ninja in use once again. Miura Yoemon, a ninja in Tokugawa's service, recruited shinobi from the Iga region, and sent 10 ninja into Osaka Castle in an effort to foster antagonism between enemy commanders. During the later "summer campaign", these hired ninja fought alongside regular troops at the Battle of Tennoji.

      A final but detailed record of ninja employed in open warfare occurred during the Shimabara Rebellion (1637–1638). The Kōga ninja were recruited by shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu against Christian rebels led by Amakusa Shirō, who made a final stand at Hara Castle, in Hizen Province. A diary kept by a member of the Matsudaira clan, the Amakusa Gunki, relates: "Men from Kōga in Omi Province who concealed their appearance would steal up to the castle every night and go inside as they pleased.

      With the fall of Hara Castle, the Shimabara Rebellion came to an end, and Christianity in Japan was forced underground. These written accounts are the last mention of ninja in war.

      Superhuman or supernatural powers were often associated with the ninja. Some legends include flight, invisibility, shapeshifting, the ability to "split" into multiple bodies, the summoning of animals, and control over the five classical elements. These fabulous notions have stemmed from popular imagination regarding the ninja's mysterious status, as well as romantic ideas found in later Japanese art of the Edo period.

      Many famous people in Japanese history have been associated or identified as ninja, but their status as ninja are difficult to prove and may be the product of later imagination. Rumors surrounding famous warriors, such as Kusunoki Masashige or Minamoto no Yoshitsune sometimes describe them as ninja, but there is little evidence for these claims.

      They were not only cold-blooded assassins and spiesas as well as trying to present them some authors.

      Not accidental their art was preserved more than 1,300 years. The key to this art is their device: "Patience above all else".