Paulmn wrote,
Plus, just look at how all these okinawan and japanese weapon art are practice. I’m convince a kendo guy can hold against his own and win against a koryu kenjutsu guy in a sword duel.
Slightly OT, but there are some problems with this statement.
Yes, there are highly skilled practitioners of Kendo competing today that could, no doubt, score “points” very easily of koryu practitioners, but a “competition point” does not necessarliy equate into a good cut.
Remember to that modern sport Kendo allows for points to be scored ONLY on four rigidly prescribed targets, tskui(throat), kote(right wrist -although the left wrist can be scored on in jodan no kamae), do(body trunk) and men(both shomen and yokomen).
Koryu kenjutsu, on the other hand, has no such restrictions. Although, since most koryu systems developed under the Sengoku/Warring States period, their targets remained generally the weak points in the opponents armor like the throat, the back of the wrists, the armpits and behind the knees, but still anything was fair game.
Another point worth mentioning is that most practitioners of modern sport Kendo, unless they’re practicing Iaido as well, will never have an opportunity to train with anything other than a Kendo shinai (which bears very little resemblence to an actual sword btw), so they’re ability to make an actual cut can never be properly gauged. This phenomenon was duly noted by both Kunii and Nakamura Senseis during both gentlemens tenure at the Toyama Military Academy during WW2. Many of the officers they trained were all highly ranked Kendo practitioners, but very few of them, and this according to the rememberences of both gentlemen, could make even the most rudimentary cuts with an actual sword. Further, many of the Kendo men in those classes went on the say that up until the time of their courses in kenjutsu, they had never had any tameshigiri experience.
Still another point were mentioning in relation to the Kendo/Koryu discussion is the footwork particular to dojo Kendo to that of Koryu practitioners. In Kendo, the feet point directly forward at all times, and while this makes may be good for the polished wood floors of most Kendo dojos, it is not useful in the least on open fields.
Finally, Kendo does not allow or make any provisions for close in grappling like the Koryu systems do. Gassho/tsuba zeri is the term given to describe the situation when two swordsmen come in close and lock tsubas and vie for the advantage that way. In Kendo this situation is usually met with a reteating strike to the men, but in the Koryu system, this situation is best resolved with the use of grappling techniques designed to either take away the opponents sword or throw him to the ground, or a combination of the two.
So in summation, yes, a practitioner of modern sport Kendo would probably have the advantage against a practitioner of a Koryu style on a hardwood play following the rules of modern sport Kendo, but if those rules were not in effect and the “duel” was on open ground, I would not want to bet on the average Kendo man lasting too long.
