Ninja (21 page)

Looking north over what used to be K
o
ga, from the hills dividing Iga and K
o
ka.

Created by famed Japanese artist Utagawa Hiroshige in 1861, this work, entitled
Iga kaitosan,
depicts Mount Kaito in Iga Province, and is taken from the series
Shokoku meisho hyakkei: 100 famous views of Japan.

I
N
S
EARCH OF
N
INJA
F
ORTS

One little-known feature of the ninja heartland is the simple earthwork forts built by samurai and farmer landholders into which they would flee for a few days until danger passed. There were dozens, perhaps hundreds of them—no one knows, because so many of them have eroded back into the earth. A few sites are now known to archaeologists, but most are tree-covered.

From afar, this double fort (Murasame-Jizen), five kilometers south of K
o
ka, seems to be no more than a copse on a hillock.

Toshinobu Watanabe enacts a defense, standing on a worn and overgrown wall.

A detailed plan shows how the two forts were built—but no one yet knows how the different areas were used.

One fort, Hijayama, was the site of one of the final battles in which the ninjas were defeated by Oda Nobunaga. It's hard to find. A monk pointed the way
(above left),
but the site itself is covered by a temple
(above),
which is approached by steps
(bottom)
.

O
F
A
RMS AND
A
RMOR

Besides swords, the ninja armory consisted mainly of farming tools. But ninjas were not merely farmers. Many were samurai, and adapted samurai fighting traditions. Since ninjas operated in secrecy, they could not wear exotic samurai armor. If they had armor at all, it was chain mail, which could be worn beneath clothing. Many suits of ninja armor exist in museums, and some are still held privately.

A piece of privately held ninja armor, displayed in the ninja museum in Takayama.

(Ninja armor at the ninja museum in Takayama © Miguel A. Muñoz Pellicer/Alamy.)

Dark chain-mail armor, ideal for nighttime operations. These pieces are owned by Ueda Masaru, who inherited them from his grandmother. In addition to collecting, Ueda runs a restaurant by the Forty-Eight Waterfalls, an ancient training ground for both Shugend
o
students and ninjas.

The fearsome
tekko-kagi
(hand-armor hook) was supposedly attached to the hand as an extreme form of knuckle-duster.

The sickle-and-chain
(kusarigama)
derived from a farming tool. You disable or ensnare your opponent with the weighted chain, then kill him with the blade (or in the case of this one in the Iga Ueno ninja museum, with the double blade).

Caltrops, scattered to wound the feet of pursuers, were usually made of iron—but they might also be natural: those at the back are water-chestnut seeds, which are iron-hard when dried.