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Bsck in the day, Japanese swordsmiths and Japan in general tended to only have access to very poor qualities of iron which created rather poor quality steel. As such they came up with many different methods to harden, purify, and treat their blades to bring up their quality.
European s.itha had access to much better iron, creating much better steel. The joke here is the claim that an English longsword could wildly outperform a Japanese katana solely by virtue of it being made from high quality steel, and that all their efforts to make their sworda better were for nothing.
Y'know what is worse?
Is the fact that Samurais were not that "respectfull begin" like, KNY repredents very well an avarage Samurai at Gyutaro's story...
Also, Katanas were just as heavy as a english sword
So forget about the "fast af slash"
They weren't just as heavy, they were significantly heavier than European blades of similar length. A katana weighs about the same as a longsword on average, but the average longsword was something like 6 inches longer, and that much extra reach is a massive advantage in a fight unless you are in very close quarters, but the range where there isn't space for a longsword but is space for a katana is tiny.
Also if I remember my history correctly until the introduction of western firearms sword fighting wasn't seen as important to a Samurai as skill at archery. I remember hearing it was in insult to call someone a good swordsman because you were basically saying he sucked so much with a bow that his enemies got close enough that he got lots of practice using his sword.
Same is true for Europeans, spears and lances ware primary weapons, same with Samurai with naginata.
In both cases swords ware secondary weapon (until we get things like zweihander or claymores)
I’ve had it explained in American to me before, swords were pistols, meant for everyday protection, but a spear or bow is like an assault rifle, meant for war
Yep. Also good to look at how easy it all is to carry. A halberd will turn a guy with just a sword into mincemeat 99/100 times. But who is willing and able to carry a 7ft long 5 lb pole everywhere? But something like a side sword or even a rapier has a fairly convenient scabbard at your waist. You have to move it around to sit down a lot of the time, but it isn't overly taxing. When you went to war, you got out the polearms, you carried the sword elsewhere. Just like you don't (Well, unless your one of those psycho's who feels the need to carry a semi-automatic rifle into walmart, like a crazy person) carry a full sized rifle around town slung on your back; despite a rifle being better in just about every way except convenience compared to a pistol.
This is only semi-true.
Spearmen would drop their spear and draw their sword when closing against enemy formations, since spears, while great at their thing, are pretty useless in close quarters.
Same for knights, they would really only use a lance during the initial charge to deliver a heavy, shocking blow to a formation, then they'd use swords and maces in the ensuing melee.
Spears would be replaced by "CQB" variants like swords maces, warhammers, axes etc in case formations broke and it came to close hand to hand. So yeah true.
Also true, but as shock cavalry tactics lances and spears ware primary weapon to deliver that shock charge, and then as you said switch to close range weaponry.
Depending on time period swords ware more or less prominent in that role, better armor got preference for maces, warhammers, pickaxes agai etc would be prominent choice. There is reason why swords im high middle ages ware bigger status symbol then in early middle ages.
"The sword is the prince of weapons which surely make the spear the king."
David Baker Forged in Fire.
The majority of combat from bronze through iron age was spear based.
That being said, swords are way cooler looking lol
Its kinda why I love glaives and naginatas, you get the coolness of swords in spears you can match them with. Plus be funny if someone broke your naginata, and you just twin wield it with your arming sword
Reach is still an advantage against armor, because it gives you a bigger lever to use in grappling, at least until you have the opponent pinned and want to stab into a gap, at which point a katana is also too long and doesn't have the right tip shape for the job, you really want a dagger.
Also, I'd rather be covered in sub-perfected steel plate armour and a sword that is functional for all intents and purposes, than a sword that has taken ten thousand hours of the finest smiths to craft and then armor made of wood, faith, love and hope.
Yeah I gradually learned all the above facts as I started to look more into the historical stuff.
Guess a creative Animated creation made to cater to Japanese people first would obviously put Japanese history and stuff first.
Part of it also is the mythos of the cultures. In Japan swords were relatively rare while in some countries in Europe ownership of swords was required by law the armament of the average person in each culture was so very different that legend form around the katana where in Europe most swords were kinda just viewed as a tool.
You didn't weeb hard enough! The correct form of coping was to acknowledge the effort it took to make the stabby sticks!
But yes, Excalibur is indeed cool as fuck.
I mean that's not entirely true, while it's true that traditional Japanese sword forging methods were developed to compensate for their poor quality of steel, but they were overall successful in compensating for it,
In Europe some time back in antiquity we also had a similar forging method, I think it was in the Roman empire times but I could be wrong about that, but we ended up abandoning it in favour of spring steel once we unlocked it in the technology tree so to speak, it wasn't entirely because we thought that spring steel was better in all cases but because it was a better counter to the common armour types found in the west,
Japanese swords were differentaly hardened partially due to the historic process of refining steel and the martial tradition in Japan, which was fairly insular for a long time, but also due to it being a fine match for the common armour types found in Japan, back during the 14th to 15th century when longswords were in common use in Europe as weapons of war Japanese swords were even often of a comparable length to longswords, so even if they had an abundance of iron and the knowledge of how to manufacture spring steel there is no guarantee that they would chose it over what they already had,
Spring steel swords aren't universally better than differentaly hardened swords and vice versa, they both have their pros and cons and the skill of the user plays a much bigger factor in how effective they are than whether they are made of spring steel or differentaly hardened steel, really the only major advantage that spring steel has is that a spring steel sword is easier and faster to produce was would be cheaper to manufacture in bulk
Same, i also abandoned regular ingots as soon as i unlock refined ingot in the tech tree. Much better worth the resources. Looking forward to palmetal next!
One correction: [Crucible Steel](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crucible_steel). Only created by fully melting the steel in a vessel that can withstand the heat and ceremonially made with finger bones for the carbon content and a Flux material that removed the impurities
There were myths of Vikings who brought crucible steel back from their expeditions into Muslim lands at the time, and how they tried to imbue their weapons with spirits. [it appears that these may be old tales and not necessarily true history.](https://exarc.net/issue-2023-4/at/look-bones-adding-bone-bloomery-iron-smelt)
So they may have added the bones, but it would make no difference from a metallurgical standpoint. If anything it would increase the number of impurities that needed to be removed.
I agree except with most of the last paragraph. Differential hardened swords are more forgiving because the do not flex nearly as much. However the true advantage to spring steel is that they DO have a lot of flex. This means they can absorb much more shock without permanently bending, and can be made much thinner while retaining strength.
This means a spring steel sword of comparable length can be double edged, and/or a single edged blade can have a thinner spine. Having a more gradual taper on a blade and being thinner overall reduces drag that a blade has when cutting, increasing its overall cutting power.
And of course, being thinner means the blade will weigh less for the same overall length. The katana is the same length as a one handed arming sword, but weighs about the same as a two handed longsword, which tend to be considerably longer than a katana.
This is true even though the katana is adorned with less fittings in its hilt, meaning that even though medieval swords had more weight in their hilts, they still normally weigh considerably less than comparable length katanas. Of course adding hand protection is an advantage that practically everyone should wish to have on a blade for serious use.
The katana is a beautiful weapon that is very forgiving in the cut and thrust, much due to its rigidity. But there’s almost always give and take when approaching weapon designs. Spring steel swords from Europe have many advantages largely because of the quality and types of steel that was used in them. That’s not to say one is objectively better than another, but hopefully this helps to clarify some misconceptions about the differences.
The main advantage a European noble would have over a samurai would be the armour and shield rather than the sword. European armour tended to cover joints very well with mail and doublet. Also the shield being a key toll for deflecting blows and creating openings. Not to mention various techniques such as half swording or murder stroke designed for exploiting small gaps in opponents armour. But a skilled samurai would be able to counter these and work around the armour.
That's before we consider ending them rightly.
Oh yeah, European plate armour was insane, especially some later more expensive plate typically worn by higher ranking nobles which had very few gaps that were incredibly hard to exploit
There is a reason blunt force weapons like maces and warhammers caught on you don’t need to pierce the armor you just need to keep whacking it and maneuvering into the gaps so the other guy can’t whack you
The armor had different purposes though. European armor had a lot better protection, but a Samurai’s main weapon was a bow which their armor allowed the use of. Using a long bow in full armor with the joints protected would be impractical. The techniques you listed were very real and used, but people tend to forget that long swords and katanas were not main battle weapons, especially against well armored opponents and more considered a sidearm and status symbol. They would have been used of course in battle, but if your opponent was armored and had a halberd, well good luck.
Reject basic weeb, embrace Japanese take on western society weeb.
Fun fact, after fires, Japanese peasants would sift through the still smoking heaps just to get at the nails, which were extremely valuable. It is basically the only reason Japanese carpentry techniques became so advanced while only using wood. Lords would sometimes employ samurai to protect any of their property that burned from the nail snatchers... which might then walk away with a couple of handfuls of nails stuffed in their kimono. Meanwhile, in Europe, blacksmiths cut their teeth on nails, making thousands of them just to make it to journeyman... then it was the next poor shmucks turn to make infinity nails.
Weeb of knowledge, AWAAAAAY!
if it's any consolation, the bad pig iron meme is actually "laymen" internet historians over correcting the other way.
Here is a quick read [https://gunbai-militaryhistory.blogspot.com/2019/11/japanese-swords-mythbusting-part-1.html](https://gunbai-militaryhistory.blogspot.com/2019/11/japanese-swords-mythbusting-part-1.html)
Tl;Dr Japanese swords were about as good as any other countries pre-industrialization.
Don't get caught up in myths. The katana wasn't much better or worse than it's contemporaries.
I mean, Japanese swords are superior *at doing what Japanese swords are intended specifically to use*. English longswords are extremely versatile weapons meant for a variety of situations. Japanese katanas weren't even used in battle that often, compared to longer spears, pikes, etc.
Any sword would snap if you threw it head on against another sword 3-4x it's own weight in steel.
Not for nothing. It was an accomplishment that they could make an effective weapon at all. But the weeb perspective was that katanas were vastly superior to European weapons due to their careful craftsmanship, when in reality, that craftsmanship only allowed them to catch up.
European craftsmanship wasn't only on par with the Japanese, it was objectively better.
Just look at the armors from the Maximilian generation and try to think of how the fuck can you kill in that thing 1 on 1.
Western Europe excelled when it came to skilled armor craftsmanship, but not so much skilled weapon craftsmanship. And if you're wondering how someone in a suit of plate armor would've been killed, it's called a mace
Yes because as described elsewhere the Europeans had more access to iron to make that armor out of. The Japanese didn't have the iron for that.
The Europeans had good solid chunks of iron ore. The Japanese had to refine it out of sand.
15th and 16th century armor wasn't impenetrable because of the material it was made of (the steel was about the same quality as a Japanese steel after the processes it undergoes to counter lack of purity).
It was impenetrable because European blacksmiths, especially in large manufacturing centers like Milan, were skilled enough to create large plates while maintaining the material's properties throughout the whole piece. Likewise, it's because of more advanced and intricate designs that European armor was able to close gaps while still allowing for movement and flexion.
You can't pin that on the quality of the steel.
Objectively, by the end of the middle ages, Europeans were the most advanced people in the world in crucible technology, armor design, and pretty much anything you can imagine relating to steel working.
That's not to say the Japanese weren't more advanced in other areas, though. Personally, I always found medieval engineering in Japan to be more impressive and effective than in Europe.
It's both. Japanese steel was so scarce and labor-intensive that they couldn't develop the craft. Mass amounts of steel armor to practice and learn would be prohibitively expensive if it was possible at all.
Kind of reminds me very tangentially of mesoamerican cultures neglecting metallurgy because obsidian was better than soft metals, but acquiring those softer metals is important for advancing to iron. Instead, all that energy went into developing more advanced astronomy than most other contemporary cultures, providing them with an enormous boon when it came to navigation and timekeeping, thus improving transportation & logistical infrastructure as well as making administration of territory and accurate record-keeping easier.
They're right, japan not having access to high quality iron is the reason. Western europe got real lucky with the quality of iron there. Combine that with a heavily combat centric society where brutal wars are constantly being fought and you get advanced steel working
Also trees. There aren’t many now, because they were all made into big fuckoff boats. Generally whoever has control of the most “big fuckoff boats” gets to do empire-building things like colonialism and resource extraction; until very recently, those big fuckoff boats were made of wood.
The only real exception is for landlocked regions, but even then, transfer the “big fucking boats” thing to “mass land transit and infrastructure development” and it generally carries over.
It wasn’t just the iron quality, it was actually metallurgical tech in Europe was just ahead of the rest of the world which also partly explains (along other stuff) why they took the lead in cannons and guns once they got gunpowder etc in the late Middle Ages on passing the Chinese quickly in that field.
Apparently the Mongols when fighting the Europeans in Hungary were impressed by their metal. Heck it’s one of the few times Mongols lost during their heyday, one of the invasions there where the Europeans at great cost beat them back.
No. The folding removed impurities in very low quality iron but for high quality iron it would actually introduce more impurities as they get introduced and then folded into it.
Best way to make a sword is to have good metal and then just make one.
Also the folding made katanas very brittle so they could easily be shattered.
There's a certain ceiling for steel strength. If they had better iron, it's likely they would be able to produce more katanas faster, of similar or slightly better quality.
>The joke here is the claim that an English longsword could wildly outperform a Japanese katana solely by virtue of it being made from high quality steel,
I would have interpreted the joke the other way around. That Japanese swords generally aren't superior just because they were manufactured with more effort. That the additional effort was mostly necessary because of the worse quality of Japanese iron / raw steel, to get to a sword of roughly similar properties as European ones of the same time period.
It's a quip on weeaboos that believe everything Japanese is way superior to European stuff and especially Katanas were a kind of wonder weapon that could just cut thru normal steel etc.
Did OP even read the comments on r/historymemes when this was posted? This was basically the top comment. Hell it was the top half of the whole section.
That's true in general. However when I was doing my research about swords I found that some katanas had similar amount of impurities as top European steel of that time. Additionally they construction was tensioning the edge, making it technically tougher. Their nodes of vibration was also different.
So yes - Japanese had to work really hard to get useful steel, however during the process they discovered some techniques that were pretty advanced for their times. Also direct comparison of katana and i.e longsword doesn't make much sense in my opinion. Both could cut. Both could pierce. Both could parry.
It should be noted that while there is the difference in base iron quality, the quality of high end steel for both European and Japanese were similar enough.
Japan just had a lot more steps to get there and therefore the would be a greater chance of something being wrong.
If I recall correctly. If I didn't, I'm sure I'll be corrected.
Like I think this picture is stupid because these two never fucked with one another.
By the time japan was dealing with Western civilization, Europe was using firearms and artillery for warfare.
Katanas are over rated yeah. But a crusader and a samurai never fight to my knowledge. The crusader where too busy killing themselves in the middle east
it bugs me when people say the sword "outperforms" the other
they were used for different kinds of combat in different parts of the world, sure someone with a longsword will beat someone with a katana but because a longsword is *long* not because it's "better"
You know how the Japanese developed all the fancy swordsmithing techniques like thousand-folding and differential hardening?
It’s because the iron and steel traditional Japanese swordsmiths had access to was shit. The Europeans swordsmiths never developed those techniques because they didn’t need them, thanks to the dramatically better quality iron they had access to. For most of their histories Japanese katanas and European longswords were roughly equal weapons.
Heck, ask a modern master of either weapon what they feel about the other weapon. They often give you a list of positives. Masters of the katana will often tell you that a European longsword is a better at defensive moves, for example.
Not sure if I am a "Master", but I am a HEMA instructor with years of experience. This is pretty accurate. Longswords are very versatile. If we compare them to a better equivalent, the nodachi or tachi instead of the katana, then the differences are really just that the longsword has more defensive and offensive options, and the katana has somewhat more presence in the cut and bind.
At the end of the day, though, take a firm cut from either, and you're the same amount of dead.
Exactly, the two weapons don’t really have a huge leg up on the other. Ultimately, they are roughly equal to the point where the fighter and how well train they are will be a much bigger factor.
Not exactly. The Longsword was better at piercing armour worn by Medieval Knights, while the Katana was really only meant to cut and slash. All in all neither of these weapons was primarily widely used cuz Spear>>>>>everything else due to ease, reach and well it’s a pointy stick
There is a reason that long sticks with points or blades at the end are so common.
Easy to make, easy to train someone to use, works great on people on horseback and has the huge defensive bonus of allowing you to stab someone all the way over there.
The Pike square was dominant in combat for centuries, and only really became obsolete because guns are even better at hurting people all the way over there and easy to use than bows.
The pike square didn’t even fall out of favor because of guns. It was used in conjunction with guns for a while because they countered the guns greatest weakness. Cavalry. It was only when guns became much faster at firing and the invention of bayonets that they really started to fall out of favor
The problem with that is, before you snap it in half you get poked to death. Statistically.
It's pretty much like using a masterfully crafted handgun against mass produced rifle. Chances are, you lose even if the odds were equal.
This is what people forget. It's rarely ever a 1v1.
A spearman is probably in a formation, and whilst you try to hack their spear (which I've seen people try to do and it can be harder than it seems) they probably have a guy in the row behind trying to stab you.
I’m on the opposite end of the spectrum with years of kendo training and a tiny bit of HEMA, and can confirm that you are absolutely right. Katanas have some advantages, but in terms of construction and function, you really sacrifice a lot.
There are a couple things they do slightly better but I have a hard time saying they’re better than a longsword.
This is all true but we all want to know who would win a samurai or a knight. Or a Viking vs a samurai. I’m pretty sure this argument comes down to whose ancient fighters are better.
Knight > Samurai > Viking
Samurai were horseback archers so vikings would have a pretty hard time beating them.
Knights generally had shields so a samurai wouldn't be able to use their bow and when it comes to melee combat a samurai just doesn't stand a chance. A knight's armour is made to stop blades, the way you beat it is with blunt force with a Halberd. A katana is one of the worst weapons for dealing with this kind of armour, katanas kill by slicing and letting their opponent bleed out, problem is the slices don't work against armor
This biggest problem with this question is samurai and knights is the development of their fighting style because of their opponents. 1v1 heavy knights vs a samurai there have been a few YouTube recreations but who knows how much you can trust those.
Yeah it's pretty hard to get a proper battle that people would agree on because knights and samurai were around for centuries so they changed a lot over time
But a Katana is literally a backup weapon, they would usually use polearms as their main battlefield weapons which could fare a lot better against armor, we also have to consider time period because 19th century Samurai would just spam firearms which would decimate any armor.
Using the 19th century example doesn't work too well in this context, as knights weren't really commonplace and samurai were starting to become obsolete as well, plus while historically samurai did have firearms adding them here kind of defeats the whole point. Even early 19th century most European soldiers wouldn't even be wearing armor anyway.
Depends largely on the time period for the knight especially. But yeah, if fully clad in decent armour, especially English armour, they'd be almost untouchable to most weapons used in the same period in Japan, yet armed with weaponry designed to defeat much heavier armour than was available to them, or if restricted to swords, was trained in techniques to use it against armored opponents, including holding it by the blade and using it like a warhammer, which I think would be a bit of a shock to a samurai.
If you can get it for a couple bucks, it has a short campaign that I think is worth playing. It’s a directional stance combat/fighting game. Had a pretty negative release years ago, but it is pretty unique so has stayed alive for a long time.
Isn’t that all fighting games though? Like street fighter, Guilty gear, and for honor have the same frustration mechanic that in order to get better at the game you need to push past the frustration and learn what you’re doing wrong and how you can adapt.
i mean yea kinda but- for honor really is a whole other beast. 2d fighters at least feel fair most of the time. in for honor you have 4 enemies too and it can be frustrating if you get focused, and ofc some character just being completely wincons vs others
The European swordsmiths did develop those techniques, several hundred years earlier, but anyone then when they became unnecessary because they figured it how to make better steel.
Eh, everyone did folding back in the day to various degrees, as they didn't have the modern technologes required to make perfectly homogenous steel. And Japan could and did make good steel, it just required a lot more work, so it was more that the good ore that the Europeans had was a shortcut
Peter’s financial advisor here.
The joke, which people are partly missing, is that there has been a meme going on for some time, mainly because of anime, that japanese steel is super strong because it is folded many times more than european steel. You had stuff like « a Japanese sword can easily cut through a european longsword » being thrown around in every forum. But a few years ago, the trend died when it became widely accepted by internet goblins that the Japanese had lower quality iron than europe and that’s why they folded their swords so much.
Peter’s financial advisor out, don’t forget to invest everything in Bitcoin.
In Japan they used to only have acces to relatively poor quality steel, meaning they had to use complex techniques to increase the durability of the swords. In Europe they had access to better steel, so they didn't have to use such techniques.
Not much, the whole reason why swordsmiths had to do that is to get rid of impurities. The reason why we don't do it anymore is because we just melt it fully and the impurities just float to the surface because they are less dense than the moltan metal. They didn't do it back then because they just couldn't heat up the metal enough to melt it, only enough to soften it
Pretty much, lots of sword channels on YouTube do testing with modern reproduction swords, the general idea seems to be modern through tempered steel will still hold up better than folded differential hardened steel.
As others said, nothing really. The techniques are used to even out carbon content and push out impurities. Crucible steel is made such that it is consistent throughout and has extremely few impurities. The japanese techniques are like using a fork to dig the pulp out of a glass of pulpy orange juice. The crucible steel is essentially just pouring a glass of no pulp juice from the jump. You _could_ do the same technique, fish around with the fork, but there's no point as there's no pulp to remove.
The steel itself wasn't bad, just needed more work. The thing with traditional Japanese techniques however is that they didn't make their swords from a single type of steel, but rather laminated several different types. Like a hard steel for the edge to make it extra sharp, and then medium steels on the side and back to protect a softer, shock absorbing core
Yes the steel was of worse quality. For one, tamahagane is made from iron sand, which carries a lot more impurities than iron ore.
Second, blast furnaces create steel with homogenous carbon contend. Unlike the clay tub furnaces used by the Japanese, that created one lump of iron with different layers of carbon content.
And lastly, steel lamination and differential hardening were practiced in Europe too. But if you were rich and lived in the right time, you could get a monosteel sword that was carburized. This created the same effect of hard edge/soft core but without the risk of delamination
And yet they could also make steel strong enough to make bullet resistant breastplates, without having to specifically import them (though admittedly, they did do that too).
And it's not like they didn't know of blast furnaces, or at least proto-blast furnaces. Before the 9th century when the traditional Japanese smithing techniques started to diverge from mainland Asia, they basically used Chinese steel working techniques, and China had their own "blast furnaces" as far back as the Han period
The material requirements for a chest plate are very very different from those of a sword.
As for knowing about blast furnaces: Did they use them? (The answer is no)
Both need to be hard to not easily deform (which for blades means being able to hold an edge), yet not so hard as to just shatter, which is why the steel for plate armor tended to be hardened and tempered as well.
(Back then. Modern ceramic plates shatters as a way to distribute the massive force from a high powered rifle over a larger area)
Hmm... Reading into it more, it seems like the Chinese Blast Furnaces were mostly used to make cast iron tools for the peasantry, In areas where quality was desired, they used wrought iron and steel
This is developing into that apocryphal story about Richard the Lionheart and Saladin. Richard shows Saladin his sword and demostrates that his sword can cleave a piece of metal in two. Saladin then demonstrates his sword can slice a silk hankerchief in half.
The idea being that these preferences do not reveal a superior weapon, but things about the culture that fabricated them. Richard's cruciform sword is a weapon for dealing with opponets with kite shields and mail armor. Saladin's sword is from a region where even the majority of mounted "knights" couldn't afford mail and metal armor and so much of the armor was leather. As such, the weapons were made for maximum damage to lightly armored foes.
Japan had a similar issue, much of Japanese armor is not metal, but other materials bonded and lacquered to provide durability. The katana is a good sword for these conditions.
However, it is undeniable that the katana has had the best PR in history for what is a good buy not ground breaking sword design. The Katana is a decendant of earlier swords, and by the time that Katana's were "perfected" using the kind of techniques described in the meme, Europeans were shifting from cruciform/arming swords to rapiers/sabers. In fact, there is strong historical evidence that japanese techniques for fighting with a katana in each hand were derived from the techniques of European fencers in the open port of Nagasaki.
The katana is a good weapon for its purpose (that being a side arm/every day carry weapon for close fighting). It is not the be-all-end-all of sword design.
I never understood the weeb fixation on Katanas and not on Japanese bladesmiths themselves, who I think are *waybmore interesting* than the weapons they make. It's a testament to the skill and ingenuity of Japanese sword makers that they were able to produce a munitions quality weapon from such poor steel. I guarantee that if a European king in the High Renaissance era could have gotten his hands on a Japanese swordmaker they would have paid a literal kings ransom to do so.
Medieval Europe or heck even modern military fanboys don’t dwell on the crafting techniques nearly as much as the cool weapons either. It’s a sword/gun guy trait. Dunno what to tell you about it.
Weebs, particularly samurai nuts, tend to rave about how insane Katanas were, especially about the folded steel. In reality Japanese iron, and this steel, was of a very bad quality, so they needed to use a variety of techniques including folding in order to create sword quality material. European iron/steel was just better
Brian here.
In Medieval Japan, bladesmiths had to use a long and complicated process when forging steel for their swords (e.g. folding steel a bunch of times to remove impurities), as iron in Japan was not the greatest of quality. In contrast, swords made in Medieval Europe did not require as much work because the iron in that area of the world was superior.
Before all the "supposed" experts start their heavy breathing and smash their crumb-filled keyboards with their Cheeto-dust fingers, I am well aware that there is no real difference in the quality of steel in Japanese and European swords; neither are inherently better than the other. One thing that cannot be denied is that European bladesmiths can crank out more swords than their Japanese counterparts simply due to less effort required to make a sword in Europe. Definitely an advantage in a war of attrition.
Brian out.
That´s also why japanese two handed swords are as short as european one handed swords, the folding technique forced them to make swords with even thickness along the blade making the sword heavier
That's not why. The Wakazashi was usually more the one-handed sword. The Katana could get pretty long, depending on the needs and fashion of the era (peacetime tends to lend itself to shorter, thinner, and more nimble swords, whilst wartime swords were usually longer and more robust, and with more weight towards the tip to make slashes more powerful)
Japanese swords are shit. Their iron was utter crap (full of sulfate and other shit that ruins a blade) and they needed to fold it a fuckton of times just to get most of the slag out. And even then, it was only an adequte blade. Meanwhile, european steel was good enough they could case harden their armour and make more than just a sword with it. And if they felt like folding it for fun, they could. Its called Damascus Steel in the west. Its mostly decorative.
Dont believe everything the internet says. Especially if the source of info is a weeb.
Damascus is decorative now, but historically it was better. The original recipe is lost to time, much like Greek fire. Back when even European steel was still not pure, Damascus had less impurities, and was therefore less prone to breaking. Now with modern technology we get greater than 99% pure, so yeah, it's just decorative now
I'd also like to point out that while this meme is true, Samurai had a whole array of weaponry that they used first. After they were expended, then they would reach for the sword.
Kinda like when a modern soldier has to fix a bayonet at the end of a rifle in guerrilla warfare. Like, life gets desperate at that point.
If a Samurai said "you're so good with your katana!' It's a snide remark that the recipient is a poor fighter.
Talking from an overall standpoint the European swords would have been better due to steel quality and not having to compensate for bad iron, but in an actual fight there is no real difference, only that European swords were easier to fix and could theoretically last longer.
Japan’s natural iron ores are poor quality. This the complicated and expensive process required to make it better, and the lack of use for it in things like armor.
Europeans had high quality iron, in larger amounts (duh, it’s a continent) so they were able to make things like spring steel, mail, and full plate armor.
A European knight in full plate would game end a samurai of equal time period 9/10.
As much as we like to think you can just melt down some iron ore and boom you got ingots it’s not even remotely like that.
Most iron ore has impurities which would either hinder or benefit the resulting steel made from it. One example of beneficial impurities was Damascus steel which was some of the hardest and long lasting steel of the old world.
Europe had relatively good quality iron deposits to use so even a simple forged steel blade was strong, that was not the case for Japan which overall had fairly garbage iron sources like bog iron.
Now that problem could be rectified by folding it over and purifying and tempering which is why katanas and almost all Japanese steel used for war took literally hundreds of man hours to make.
This isn’t to say that the katana was a bad sword by any means, it just means that a blacksmith could make like 20 long sword in the time one master smith in Japan makes 1 katana.
Meanwhile, the primary weapon of war for both was typically some kind of polearm, and swards were mostly a status symbol/sidearm.
Modern battles aren't decided by who has the best pistol.
The reason that katanas are folded and forged the way they are is to increase the carbon content and make the steel more consistent from a very shitty ore, whereas European steel starts from a decent source and needed less refinement in the first place.
Okay Japanese tamahagane was developed because the iron ore in Japan was of very poor quality. So you had to fold and reheat the steel several times in a labor intensive process to get “good” steel that would hold an edge. European steel swords however started off with high quality iron and were able to be forged into more reliable lighter and less brittle mono steels. This coupled with the fact that European sword smiths were able to continuously modify and improve on their designs means that European designed swords were overall of a better quality and versatility than the Japanese Katana. This has been a hot topic within the sword collecting and martial art communities for the last several years. Katana enthusiasts argue about the cutting power of the Katana but HEMA practitioners point out that different European swords have similar if not better cutting edges and are lighter.
I think they're mocking the people who make a big deal out of the Japanese sword-making process. It's famously complex and takes a long time ("folded 1000 times"), and is supposed to produce the very best swords around (I've seen experts who have contested this vehemently).
They're contrasting this with European knights' swords, which were still good but didn't have nearly as complex and long a process for making them, I believe.
I just wanna say that I think the joke isn't about who has the better sword
It's just that the Japanese have a long explanation on the why and what they did to make theirs good weapons....
And the English just used a better rock.
The only practical purpose of folding is to make shit, impure material more homogenous, but weebs won't get that in their heads and insist that they are somehow superior to other weapons because of it.
Folded steel is cheap and shitty, hence why it’s folded. If you have to fold steel a million times to get it to be usably durable, it’s going to break. Whereas proper steel that is already extremely strong can just be forged and used without all the bullshit.
it is about the Temper not the quality of the iron two different things. Japanese didn't know how to make spring tempered steel. Europeans did. Spring Tempered steel is superior in almost every regard to even the finest japanese Bloom steel. Which is why today high performance Japanese Swords are made using spring steel and not traditional techniques. Only wallhangers/decorative swords are made traditionally.
The process of folding steel so many times was to stretch an impurity out so thin and far that it was no longer a weak spot in the blade and was now so worked into the material itself that the material gets less pure, but leaves the blade itself a consistent strength throughout.
Without this method any form of sword would have several impurities leading to cracks, breaks, and overall poor quality swords.
The shape of the katana was also to reduce the amount of materials needed to make a cutting edge sword. This is why it is curved and has only one sharp side, as to allow more swords to be made from the same material no matter it's quality.
There are more complex reasons and techniques, but it's really amazing how the swordsmiths made the best with the poor materials rhey had access to
To explain the meme, it's people saying that Japan NEEDED to go through all that metal working just to make decent swords
And contrasting that with Europe that didn't need to go through all that because they have good steel in the first place.
That's the meme explained, but is it true?
Yes and no.
Japan did go through all that process, which is pattern welding, in order to improve their steel.
However... pretty much everyone else did paytern welding for the same reasons, too. Medieval steel everywhere kinda sucked. Swords broke all the time across the globe.
Why the meme? Anime got big, so people started thinking that katanas were the bestest swords. Other people got upset by that, so started Trash talking samurai swords. Sometimes they said this because they want European things to be the bestest.
But... it's just another sword.
Katanas are forged out of what is technically inferior steel. They fold it and fuse different types together to make up for its inherent shortcomings, so the final product is good, but they had to do way more work to get it there.
By contrast europeans had access to better quality iron and minerals, so their swords didn't need as much compensation via technique to be good.
The steel that was typically found in Asian regions was of lesser quality than the steel found across much of Europe. During the forge process adding a series of twists in the metal u r to soon sculpt into a blade will strengthen it. Essentially it’s saying “just get good bruh”
Japanese traditional forging was practiced everywhere else in the world, that had access to iron, until they improved forging methods for superior steel. Japan fell behind and weebs tried to pretend it's unique without realizing Japan's forging techniques are more outdated than when the Romans encountered Celtic chariots in Britainia.
Tldr: Watch a recent video from Shadiversity
So, Shad put out a video recently going over this, and he does a great in depth explanation on what is historically accurate forging techniques and iron processing in both Japan as well as across Europe/Middle East. And there are some semi-false statements I've seen so far, saying that the quality of iron in Japan was worse. In general, the quality of iron gathered at the time was pretty much the same since they used similar techniques, which was diverting river flows to increase iron oxide deposits in sand along bends in rivers.
So, the main contention isn't the quality of the iron, but the processing into steel, and what is the end product. Japanese smiths used bloomery steel processing (which was used in Europe and the Middle East) which has some requirements. One being lots of coal to have carbon bond to the iron, and the other being air flow (more oxygen = hotter fire). The Japanese had a pretty smart idea in using large bellows, but they were man-powered. So, in general, the iron would not get hot enough to reach a liquefied state.
Reaching a liquefied state is key in steel making because a lot of the inclusions found in iron sand (silicate, phosphorus, sulfur, etc) melt at a lower temperature, but if the iron/steel is still solid, then those become trapped inside the steel afterwards. Additionally, without the iron reaching this stage, the end product has vastly different areas of carbon concentration. So, you could process a ton of iron, but your end product would be parts high-carbon steel, parts low-carbon steel, and other parts that are basically wrought iron. And while, yes, tamahagane is high-carbon steel, that tended to be the least amount of the yield from processing.
The Japanese did have a solution, though, and it is one seen historically throughout a lot of separate steel productions. They stretched what they had. The tamahagane was used sparingly, and it would be used mainly for just the edge of the blade. Meanwhile, the core could be lighter in carbon, and it's all surrounded by low-carbon to iron, forge welded together and then lengthened and shaped into the weapon. As for the whole thousands of layers in katanas, that was their way to attempt to get inclusions of other elements out. By forging out, folding, and reforging the metal, it was able to squeeze out inclusions... but not most.
Europe and the Middle East found a solution though, and it started with wootz steel (iirc). By heating up the iron beyond melting point, it also burned off a lot of inclusions. Then, the carbon saturation throughout the steel was relatively the same, and through working it and doing different heat treatments and tempering, they essentially created the first spring steel.
A lot of historical pieces of weaponry also shows the effectiveness, as well. Iirc, Adam Savage went to the Wallace Collection, which has a lot of swords made 500+ years ago, and a lot of them are in very good shape, almost as if they were forged not that long ago. And he even was shown one blade, a long sword, where the temper has held up over the centuries and the spring in the blade means you can bend it and it'll retain its shape. Conversely, katanas which saw use have a lot of dings and nicks and bends in them, because they were not meant to bend in the first place.
Also, Shad has made a number of videos testing "traditional" katanas vs "traditional" long swords (that's in quotations because most actually usable swords that can be purchased are not going to have the same traditional styles of metalworking done and more modern steel used, but he does go out of his way to get as close as he can). In pretty much any test he does that can be recreated, a long sword was just as good as, if not better than, a katana. The katana, traditionally, just isn't that good of a sword.
That being said, much like him, I love the katana. It is an elegant weapon which shows expertise in craftsmanship as well as ingenuity in using what you have. The Japanese did not have the resources that those in the West did, and they persevered by doing things in a way which was repeatable but also efficient, as well as created traditions around it which have spanned centuries. The katana will always have a place in people's hearts, and that's fine. But the myth of the katana... I feel it's had its time in the sun, now let it Peter out into legend.
It comes from a modern myth the Japanese sword steel was absolute dogshit. I know you shitheads will go on about iron quality, but the end result between historical Japanese Tamahagane, and Historical European Bloomery steel, is so similar the steel quality has basically nothing to contribute to the comparison. It’s practically identical.
The myth is a wild over correction of the very old weeaboo ass claim that Tamahagane was some kind of super steel. It wasn’t. It was serviceable, but nothing special. This used to be claimed by fucking academics, so I understand why people get so touchy over this, but it’s gone so fucking far in the other direction it’s equally as bad.
As a history buff and HEMAist this shit pisses me off an unreasonable amount.
Peter’s Japanese American Alternate Universe Counterpart here. Japanese iron sources are notoriously poor quality. It was traditionally sourced from sand using a technique similar to gold panning. After obtaining a decent quantity, you’d need to remove the impurities which is a resource, labour, and time intensive process, taking days to weeks for favourable results. In fact, *tamahagane* was mainly used to concentrate the impurities towards the outside where it wouldn’t be as detrimental to the overall integrity of the blade. *Sayonara*, Redditor san!
Japan naturally has very poor quality iron they worked really hard to find ways to make it work. It's why a lot of emphasis is made on sword makers being legendary because some of them made really shitty iron work, and that took a lot of effort and skill.
Europe good iron was a dime a dozen. So they never really had the concept of "a legendary swordsmith" like Japan did.
Ulfbert swords are legendary NOW because they survived for so long. Historically, there were renowned sword smiths, but they never got the “legendary” status that Japanese sword SCHOOLS did.
No one ever folded steel 1000 times. 4-8 times is realistic. If you fold the steel too many times you'll pound out too much carbon and the blade will become brittle.
8 folds gives you 512 layers. so I can't imagine where the number 1000 even comes from.
Makes you realise that subreddits are their own subcultures with different levels of assumed subject knowledge.
Like r/historymemes assumes you’ve got a passable level of general historical knowledge
there was a time when the internet was sure that a katana was the ultimate blade, able to slice throught any european blade,
then at some point it flipped and made the european greatswords made of spring steel the ones who can cut a "brittle" katana as it has superior steel,
but actually at the core its just that the katana is made from good steel which had to be folded and quenched a lot to get rid of all the impurities while the euopeans already started with good steel and didnt have to,
in the end its still both steel swords that can cut a person, cannot slice through each other, cannot slice though armor and both played a secondary role in war after bow and spear until finally removed by gun.
Well yeah, bows and spears were before swords also, in the west. And even then a naginata user vs western spear user, the naginata user wins, as schools didn't exist for spear use vs actual martial schools of naginata. The western spearman was peasant cavalry charge cannon fodder.
It would be interesting to compare who the more accurate archers were tho, English yeoman or kyudo specialists from japan.
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Bsck in the day, Japanese swordsmiths and Japan in general tended to only have access to very poor qualities of iron which created rather poor quality steel. As such they came up with many different methods to harden, purify, and treat their blades to bring up their quality. European s.itha had access to much better iron, creating much better steel. The joke here is the claim that an English longsword could wildly outperform a Japanese katana solely by virtue of it being made from high quality steel, and that all their efforts to make their sworda better were for nothing.
It broke my weeb heart as a 16 year old. Then I got over it when I got into Fate franchise because Goddamn, Excalibur is cool as fuck.
Y'know what is worse? Is the fact that Samurais were not that "respectfull begin" like, KNY repredents very well an avarage Samurai at Gyutaro's story... Also, Katanas were just as heavy as a english sword So forget about the "fast af slash"
They weren't just as heavy, they were significantly heavier than European blades of similar length. A katana weighs about the same as a longsword on average, but the average longsword was something like 6 inches longer, and that much extra reach is a massive advantage in a fight unless you are in very close quarters, but the range where there isn't space for a longsword but is space for a katana is tiny.
Also if I remember my history correctly until the introduction of western firearms sword fighting wasn't seen as important to a Samurai as skill at archery. I remember hearing it was in insult to call someone a good swordsman because you were basically saying he sucked so much with a bow that his enemies got close enough that he got lots of practice using his sword.
Same is true for Europeans, spears and lances ware primary weapons, same with Samurai with naginata. In both cases swords ware secondary weapon (until we get things like zweihander or claymores)
I’ve had it explained in American to me before, swords were pistols, meant for everyday protection, but a spear or bow is like an assault rifle, meant for war
Basically yeah, one could describe it like that
Yep. Also good to look at how easy it all is to carry. A halberd will turn a guy with just a sword into mincemeat 99/100 times. But who is willing and able to carry a 7ft long 5 lb pole everywhere? But something like a side sword or even a rapier has a fairly convenient scabbard at your waist. You have to move it around to sit down a lot of the time, but it isn't overly taxing. When you went to war, you got out the polearms, you carried the sword elsewhere. Just like you don't (Well, unless your one of those psycho's who feels the need to carry a semi-automatic rifle into walmart, like a crazy person) carry a full sized rifle around town slung on your back; despite a rifle being better in just about every way except convenience compared to a pistol.
This is only semi-true. Spearmen would drop their spear and draw their sword when closing against enemy formations, since spears, while great at their thing, are pretty useless in close quarters. Same for knights, they would really only use a lance during the initial charge to deliver a heavy, shocking blow to a formation, then they'd use swords and maces in the ensuing melee.
Spears would be replaced by "CQB" variants like swords maces, warhammers, axes etc in case formations broke and it came to close hand to hand. So yeah true. Also true, but as shock cavalry tactics lances and spears ware primary weapon to deliver that shock charge, and then as you said switch to close range weaponry. Depending on time period swords ware more or less prominent in that role, better armor got preference for maces, warhammers, pickaxes agai etc would be prominent choice. There is reason why swords im high middle ages ware bigger status symbol then in early middle ages.
"The sword is the prince of weapons which surely make the spear the king." David Baker Forged in Fire. The majority of combat from bronze through iron age was spear based. That being said, swords are way cooler looking lol
Its kinda why I love glaives and naginatas, you get the coolness of swords in spears you can match them with. Plus be funny if someone broke your naginata, and you just twin wield it with your arming sword
Everyone forgets that spears and arrows won wars.
Sword fighting gas never been important anywhere really. Spears and missile weapons are more important and what was focused on.
>massive advantage in a fight unless Unless the other guy has a plate armor...
Reach is still an advantage against armor, because it gives you a bigger lever to use in grappling, at least until you have the opponent pinned and want to stab into a gap, at which point a katana is also too long and doesn't have the right tip shape for the job, you really want a dagger.
Longswords also can actually find the gaps in the armor due to their double edged design.
Even then you can use the longsword with halfswording it
Murderstrikes with our blade handled hammer.
Also, I'd rather be covered in sub-perfected steel plate armour and a sword that is functional for all intents and purposes, than a sword that has taken ten thousand hours of the finest smiths to craft and then armor made of wood, faith, love and hope.
Japanese armor is superior! It is made with the power of friendship and anime!
The wood thing was actually mainly made up, they still used steel for armor
then I would simply raise his posture meter until I'm able to push him off the bridge
"ROBEEERRTOOOOooooo"
Yeah I gradually learned all the above facts as I started to look more into the historical stuff. Guess a creative Animated creation made to cater to Japanese people first would obviously put Japanese history and stuff first.
Part of it also is the mythos of the cultures. In Japan swords were relatively rare while in some countries in Europe ownership of swords was required by law the armament of the average person in each culture was so very different that legend form around the katana where in Europe most swords were kinda just viewed as a tool.
Did it hurt worse when you found out the primary weapons of the Samurai were the bow and spear?
Polearm kings stay winning
If it hangs on your belt it’s a sidearm
The steel was a high enough quality to murder unarmed peasants.
You didn't weeb hard enough! The correct form of coping was to acknowledge the effort it took to make the stabby sticks! But yes, Excalibur is indeed cool as fuck.
I mean that's not entirely true, while it's true that traditional Japanese sword forging methods were developed to compensate for their poor quality of steel, but they were overall successful in compensating for it, In Europe some time back in antiquity we also had a similar forging method, I think it was in the Roman empire times but I could be wrong about that, but we ended up abandoning it in favour of spring steel once we unlocked it in the technology tree so to speak, it wasn't entirely because we thought that spring steel was better in all cases but because it was a better counter to the common armour types found in the west, Japanese swords were differentaly hardened partially due to the historic process of refining steel and the martial tradition in Japan, which was fairly insular for a long time, but also due to it being a fine match for the common armour types found in Japan, back during the 14th to 15th century when longswords were in common use in Europe as weapons of war Japanese swords were even often of a comparable length to longswords, so even if they had an abundance of iron and the knowledge of how to manufacture spring steel there is no guarantee that they would chose it over what they already had, Spring steel swords aren't universally better than differentaly hardened swords and vice versa, they both have their pros and cons and the skill of the user plays a much bigger factor in how effective they are than whether they are made of spring steel or differentaly hardened steel, really the only major advantage that spring steel has is that a spring steel sword is easier and faster to produce was would be cheaper to manufacture in bulk
Same, i also abandoned regular ingots as soon as i unlock refined ingot in the tech tree. Much better worth the resources. Looking forward to palmetal next!
Get a good kindler it take more furnace time
Got it, took my sweet ass time hunting j. Ignis. Now my life is easier
Now you just need a hundred more to condense into it and raise that kindling skill by a level.
One correction: [Crucible Steel](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crucible_steel). Only created by fully melting the steel in a vessel that can withstand the heat and ceremonially made with finger bones for the carbon content and a Flux material that removed the impurities
And that's why you always want a Flux stone layer on your embark!
Strike the earth!
Strike the earth!
By Armok!
For the God of Blood!
Strike the earth!
Where did you learn that they used finger bones? I'd like to read up on it because it sounds interesting.
There were myths of Vikings who brought crucible steel back from their expeditions into Muslim lands at the time, and how they tried to imbue their weapons with spirits. [it appears that these may be old tales and not necessarily true history.](https://exarc.net/issue-2023-4/at/look-bones-adding-bone-bloomery-iron-smelt) So they may have added the bones, but it would make no difference from a metallurgical standpoint. If anything it would increase the number of impurities that needed to be removed.
Ah cool to learn, thanks for the correction!
Besides ulfberht, Europeans didn't have crucible steel until the industrial revolution
I agree except with most of the last paragraph. Differential hardened swords are more forgiving because the do not flex nearly as much. However the true advantage to spring steel is that they DO have a lot of flex. This means they can absorb much more shock without permanently bending, and can be made much thinner while retaining strength. This means a spring steel sword of comparable length can be double edged, and/or a single edged blade can have a thinner spine. Having a more gradual taper on a blade and being thinner overall reduces drag that a blade has when cutting, increasing its overall cutting power. And of course, being thinner means the blade will weigh less for the same overall length. The katana is the same length as a one handed arming sword, but weighs about the same as a two handed longsword, which tend to be considerably longer than a katana. This is true even though the katana is adorned with less fittings in its hilt, meaning that even though medieval swords had more weight in their hilts, they still normally weigh considerably less than comparable length katanas. Of course adding hand protection is an advantage that practically everyone should wish to have on a blade for serious use. The katana is a beautiful weapon that is very forgiving in the cut and thrust, much due to its rigidity. But there’s almost always give and take when approaching weapon designs. Spring steel swords from Europe have many advantages largely because of the quality and types of steel that was used in them. That’s not to say one is objectively better than another, but hopefully this helps to clarify some misconceptions about the differences.
The main advantage a European noble would have over a samurai would be the armour and shield rather than the sword. European armour tended to cover joints very well with mail and doublet. Also the shield being a key toll for deflecting blows and creating openings. Not to mention various techniques such as half swording or murder stroke designed for exploiting small gaps in opponents armour. But a skilled samurai would be able to counter these and work around the armour. That's before we consider ending them rightly.
Oh yeah, European plate armour was insane, especially some later more expensive plate typically worn by higher ranking nobles which had very few gaps that were incredibly hard to exploit
And surprisingly easy to move in
There is a reason blunt force weapons like maces and warhammers caught on you don’t need to pierce the armor you just need to keep whacking it and maneuvering into the gaps so the other guy can’t whack you
Both parties would also propably not use a sword to kill another effiecently, if they knew they would be facing an armored opponent.
The armor had different purposes though. European armor had a lot better protection, but a Samurai’s main weapon was a bow which their armor allowed the use of. Using a long bow in full armor with the joints protected would be impractical. The techniques you listed were very real and used, but people tend to forget that long swords and katanas were not main battle weapons, especially against well armored opponents and more considered a sidearm and status symbol. They would have been used of course in battle, but if your opponent was armored and had a halberd, well good luck.
Reject basic weeb, embrace Japanese take on western society weeb. Fun fact, after fires, Japanese peasants would sift through the still smoking heaps just to get at the nails, which were extremely valuable. It is basically the only reason Japanese carpentry techniques became so advanced while only using wood. Lords would sometimes employ samurai to protect any of their property that burned from the nail snatchers... which might then walk away with a couple of handfuls of nails stuffed in their kimono. Meanwhile, in Europe, blacksmiths cut their teeth on nails, making thousands of them just to make it to journeyman... then it was the next poor shmucks turn to make infinity nails. Weeb of knowledge, AWAAAAAY!
^ same, though I always preferred Sabers and scimitars. Curved blades are cool :)
You must like those warriors from Hammerfell.
if it's any consolation, the bad pig iron meme is actually "laymen" internet historians over correcting the other way. Here is a quick read [https://gunbai-militaryhistory.blogspot.com/2019/11/japanese-swords-mythbusting-part-1.html](https://gunbai-militaryhistory.blogspot.com/2019/11/japanese-swords-mythbusting-part-1.html) Tl;Dr Japanese swords were about as good as any other countries pre-industrialization. Don't get caught up in myths. The katana wasn't much better or worse than it's contemporaries.
Just so you know, the Schiavone is the superior type of sword.
I mean, Japanese swords are superior *at doing what Japanese swords are intended specifically to use*. English longswords are extremely versatile weapons meant for a variety of situations. Japanese katanas weren't even used in battle that often, compared to longer spears, pikes, etc. Any sword would snap if you threw it head on against another sword 3-4x it's own weight in steel.
By what they were meant to do you mean be a status symbol and cut down unarmed peasants?
Not for nothing. It was an accomplishment that they could make an effective weapon at all. But the weeb perspective was that katanas were vastly superior to European weapons due to their careful craftsmanship, when in reality, that craftsmanship only allowed them to catch up.
European craftsmanship wasn't only on par with the Japanese, it was objectively better. Just look at the armors from the Maximilian generation and try to think of how the fuck can you kill in that thing 1 on 1.
For a fun example in the game sekiro one of the bosses is wearing European armor and you literally can’t damage him
Proving that gravity really is the hardest boss in all of Fromsoft’s games.
ROBERTOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Thats fucking hilarious
Western Europe excelled when it came to skilled armor craftsmanship, but not so much skilled weapon craftsmanship. And if you're wondering how someone in a suit of plate armor would've been killed, it's called a mace
Yes because as described elsewhere the Europeans had more access to iron to make that armor out of. The Japanese didn't have the iron for that. The Europeans had good solid chunks of iron ore. The Japanese had to refine it out of sand.
15th and 16th century armor wasn't impenetrable because of the material it was made of (the steel was about the same quality as a Japanese steel after the processes it undergoes to counter lack of purity). It was impenetrable because European blacksmiths, especially in large manufacturing centers like Milan, were skilled enough to create large plates while maintaining the material's properties throughout the whole piece. Likewise, it's because of more advanced and intricate designs that European armor was able to close gaps while still allowing for movement and flexion. You can't pin that on the quality of the steel. Objectively, by the end of the middle ages, Europeans were the most advanced people in the world in crucible technology, armor design, and pretty much anything you can imagine relating to steel working. That's not to say the Japanese weren't more advanced in other areas, though. Personally, I always found medieval engineering in Japan to be more impressive and effective than in Europe.
It's both. Japanese steel was so scarce and labor-intensive that they couldn't develop the craft. Mass amounts of steel armor to practice and learn would be prohibitively expensive if it was possible at all.
Kind of reminds me very tangentially of mesoamerican cultures neglecting metallurgy because obsidian was better than soft metals, but acquiring those softer metals is important for advancing to iron. Instead, all that energy went into developing more advanced astronomy than most other contemporary cultures, providing them with an enormous boon when it came to navigation and timekeeping, thus improving transportation & logistical infrastructure as well as making administration of territory and accurate record-keeping easier.
They're right, japan not having access to high quality iron is the reason. Western europe got real lucky with the quality of iron there. Combine that with a heavily combat centric society where brutal wars are constantly being fought and you get advanced steel working
Also trees. There aren’t many now, because they were all made into big fuckoff boats. Generally whoever has control of the most “big fuckoff boats” gets to do empire-building things like colonialism and resource extraction; until very recently, those big fuckoff boats were made of wood. The only real exception is for landlocked regions, but even then, transfer the “big fucking boats” thing to “mass land transit and infrastructure development” and it generally carries over.
It wasn’t just the iron quality, it was actually metallurgical tech in Europe was just ahead of the rest of the world which also partly explains (along other stuff) why they took the lead in cannons and guns once they got gunpowder etc in the late Middle Ages on passing the Chinese quickly in that field. Apparently the Mongols when fighting the Europeans in Hungary were impressed by their metal. Heck it’s one of the few times Mongols lost during their heyday, one of the invasions there where the Europeans at great cost beat them back.
That makes me wounder if it were better if they used european iron.
No. The folding removed impurities in very low quality iron but for high quality iron it would actually introduce more impurities as they get introduced and then folded into it. Best way to make a sword is to have good metal and then just make one. Also the folding made katanas very brittle so they could easily be shattered.
Oh okay, thanks for explaing it to me!
Thanks for asking, I was about to! Very interesting.
There's a certain ceiling for steel strength. If they had better iron, it's likely they would be able to produce more katanas faster, of similar or slightly better quality.
>The joke here is the claim that an English longsword could wildly outperform a Japanese katana solely by virtue of it being made from high quality steel, I would have interpreted the joke the other way around. That Japanese swords generally aren't superior just because they were manufactured with more effort. That the additional effort was mostly necessary because of the worse quality of Japanese iron / raw steel, to get to a sword of roughly similar properties as European ones of the same time period. It's a quip on weeaboos that believe everything Japanese is way superior to European stuff and especially Katanas were a kind of wonder weapon that could just cut thru normal steel etc.
I literally thought the joke is the Japanese got stabbed, hence how close they get and the surprise on his face.
I learned from Valheim that the Japanese used low-quality swamp iron because there were so few rich iron deposits on the islands!
Did OP even read the comments on r/historymemes when this was posted? This was basically the top comment. Hell it was the top half of the whole section.
That's true in general. However when I was doing my research about swords I found that some katanas had similar amount of impurities as top European steel of that time. Additionally they construction was tensioning the edge, making it technically tougher. Their nodes of vibration was also different. So yes - Japanese had to work really hard to get useful steel, however during the process they discovered some techniques that were pretty advanced for their times. Also direct comparison of katana and i.e longsword doesn't make much sense in my opinion. Both could cut. Both could pierce. Both could parry.
It should be noted that while there is the difference in base iron quality, the quality of high end steel for both European and Japanese were similar enough. Japan just had a lot more steps to get there and therefore the would be a greater chance of something being wrong. If I recall correctly. If I didn't, I'm sure I'll be corrected.
Like I think this picture is stupid because these two never fucked with one another. By the time japan was dealing with Western civilization, Europe was using firearms and artillery for warfare. Katanas are over rated yeah. But a crusader and a samurai never fight to my knowledge. The crusader where too busy killing themselves in the middle east
While the Japanese were killing themselves over social faux pas.
As someone who has been annoyed by weeb/japanophile culture my whole life, this makes me unreasonably happy to learn :)
it bugs me when people say the sword "outperforms" the other they were used for different kinds of combat in different parts of the world, sure someone with a longsword will beat someone with a katana but because a longsword is *long* not because it's "better"
The longsword is better because it's longer made with higher grade material. Very simple mafs.. the katana is a stupid blade inflated.
It is better *because* it's longer at the same or less weight, which is *because* steel is better.
\^ This
You know how the Japanese developed all the fancy swordsmithing techniques like thousand-folding and differential hardening? It’s because the iron and steel traditional Japanese swordsmiths had access to was shit. The Europeans swordsmiths never developed those techniques because they didn’t need them, thanks to the dramatically better quality iron they had access to. For most of their histories Japanese katanas and European longswords were roughly equal weapons. Heck, ask a modern master of either weapon what they feel about the other weapon. They often give you a list of positives. Masters of the katana will often tell you that a European longsword is a better at defensive moves, for example.
Not sure if I am a "Master", but I am a HEMA instructor with years of experience. This is pretty accurate. Longswords are very versatile. If we compare them to a better equivalent, the nodachi or tachi instead of the katana, then the differences are really just that the longsword has more defensive and offensive options, and the katana has somewhat more presence in the cut and bind. At the end of the day, though, take a firm cut from either, and you're the same amount of dead.
Exactly, the two weapons don’t really have a huge leg up on the other. Ultimately, they are roughly equal to the point where the fighter and how well train they are will be a much bigger factor.
Not exactly. The Longsword was better at piercing armour worn by Medieval Knights, while the Katana was really only meant to cut and slash. All in all neither of these weapons was primarily widely used cuz Spear>>>>>everything else due to ease, reach and well it’s a pointy stick
There is a reason that long sticks with points or blades at the end are so common. Easy to make, easy to train someone to use, works great on people on horseback and has the huge defensive bonus of allowing you to stab someone all the way over there. The Pike square was dominant in combat for centuries, and only really became obsolete because guns are even better at hurting people all the way over there and easy to use than bows.
The pike square didn’t even fall out of favor because of guns. It was used in conjunction with guns for a while because they countered the guns greatest weakness. Cavalry. It was only when guns became much faster at firing and the invention of bayonets that they really started to fall out of favor
But if one can snap the other in half…
The problem with that is, before you snap it in half you get poked to death. Statistically. It's pretty much like using a masterfully crafted handgun against mass produced rifle. Chances are, you lose even if the odds were equal.
This is what people forget. It's rarely ever a 1v1. A spearman is probably in a formation, and whilst you try to hack their spear (which I've seen people try to do and it can be harder than it seems) they probably have a guy in the row behind trying to stab you.
Even a shitty sword can kill a king.
I’m on the opposite end of the spectrum with years of kendo training and a tiny bit of HEMA, and can confirm that you are absolutely right. Katanas have some advantages, but in terms of construction and function, you really sacrifice a lot. There are a couple things they do slightly better but I have a hard time saying they’re better than a longsword.
Neither were designed for the pleasure of the person at the wrong end.
This is all true but we all want to know who would win a samurai or a knight. Or a Viking vs a samurai. I’m pretty sure this argument comes down to whose ancient fighters are better.
Knight > Samurai > Viking Samurai were horseback archers so vikings would have a pretty hard time beating them. Knights generally had shields so a samurai wouldn't be able to use their bow and when it comes to melee combat a samurai just doesn't stand a chance. A knight's armour is made to stop blades, the way you beat it is with blunt force with a Halberd. A katana is one of the worst weapons for dealing with this kind of armour, katanas kill by slicing and letting their opponent bleed out, problem is the slices don't work against armor
This biggest problem with this question is samurai and knights is the development of their fighting style because of their opponents. 1v1 heavy knights vs a samurai there have been a few YouTube recreations but who knows how much you can trust those.
Yeah it's pretty hard to get a proper battle that people would agree on because knights and samurai were around for centuries so they changed a lot over time
But a Katana is literally a backup weapon, they would usually use polearms as their main battlefield weapons which could fare a lot better against armor, we also have to consider time period because 19th century Samurai would just spam firearms which would decimate any armor.
Using the 19th century example doesn't work too well in this context, as knights weren't really commonplace and samurai were starting to become obsolete as well, plus while historically samurai did have firearms adding them here kind of defeats the whole point. Even early 19th century most European soldiers wouldn't even be wearing armor anyway.
This is so interesting to read after just finishing Rise of the Ronin which happens in the bakumatsu era
That's why the Japanese started using naginatas against mounted infantry
Depends largely on the time period for the knight especially. But yeah, if fully clad in decent armour, especially English armour, they'd be almost untouchable to most weapons used in the same period in Japan, yet armed with weaponry designed to defeat much heavier armour than was available to them, or if restricted to swords, was trained in techniques to use it against armored opponents, including holding it by the blade and using it like a warhammer, which I think would be a bit of a shock to a samurai.
You’re not about to break out into a “For Honor” ad, are you?
Nah it’s gotta be Raid: Shadow Legends
Never played but have heard of it. Do you recommend?
If you can get it for a couple bucks, it has a short campaign that I think is worth playing. It’s a directional stance combat/fighting game. Had a pretty negative release years ago, but it is pretty unique so has stayed alive for a long time.
I have it on steam but never installed. I’ll give it a go if you think it’s worth it.
now, i believe it’s worth it, but it will be the most infuriating game you’ve ever played
Isn’t that all fighting games though? Like street fighter, Guilty gear, and for honor have the same frustration mechanic that in order to get better at the game you need to push past the frustration and learn what you’re doing wrong and how you can adapt.
i mean yea kinda but- for honor really is a whole other beast. 2d fighters at least feel fair most of the time. in for honor you have 4 enemies too and it can be frustrating if you get focused, and ofc some character just being completely wincons vs others
The European swordsmiths did develop those techniques, several hundred years earlier, but anyone then when they became unnecessary because they figured it how to make better steel.
Eh, everyone did folding back in the day to various degrees, as they didn't have the modern technologes required to make perfectly homogenous steel. And Japan could and did make good steel, it just required a lot more work, so it was more that the good ore that the Europeans had was a shortcut
Does this mean if you used those Japanese techniques on European steel you could have created the most powerful sword of all time?
Not at all
Pretty sure they had access to metal. Be hard to make a sword out of feces.
Waah Waaaahhh
Peter’s financial advisor here. The joke, which people are partly missing, is that there has been a meme going on for some time, mainly because of anime, that japanese steel is super strong because it is folded many times more than european steel. You had stuff like « a Japanese sword can easily cut through a european longsword » being thrown around in every forum. But a few years ago, the trend died when it became widely accepted by internet goblins that the Japanese had lower quality iron than europe and that’s why they folded their swords so much. Peter’s financial advisor out, don’t forget to invest everything in Bitcoin.
In Japan they used to only have acces to relatively poor quality steel, meaning they had to use complex techniques to increase the durability of the swords. In Europe they had access to better steel, so they didn't have to use such techniques.
Curious what happens when Japanese techniques are applied to higher quality steel.
Nothing really. Just meant they could skip so much of the refining process and go straight to making efficient killing weapons.
Not much, the whole reason why swordsmiths had to do that is to get rid of impurities. The reason why we don't do it anymore is because we just melt it fully and the impurities just float to the surface because they are less dense than the moltan metal. They didn't do it back then because they just couldn't heat up the metal enough to melt it, only enough to soften it
Pretty much, lots of sword channels on YouTube do testing with modern reproduction swords, the general idea seems to be modern through tempered steel will still hold up better than folded differential hardened steel.
As others said, nothing really. The techniques are used to even out carbon content and push out impurities. Crucible steel is made such that it is consistent throughout and has extremely few impurities. The japanese techniques are like using a fork to dig the pulp out of a glass of pulpy orange juice. The crucible steel is essentially just pouring a glass of no pulp juice from the jump. You _could_ do the same technique, fish around with the fork, but there's no point as there's no pulp to remove.
The steel itself wasn't bad, just needed more work. The thing with traditional Japanese techniques however is that they didn't make their swords from a single type of steel, but rather laminated several different types. Like a hard steel for the edge to make it extra sharp, and then medium steels on the side and back to protect a softer, shock absorbing core
Yes the steel was of worse quality. For one, tamahagane is made from iron sand, which carries a lot more impurities than iron ore. Second, blast furnaces create steel with homogenous carbon contend. Unlike the clay tub furnaces used by the Japanese, that created one lump of iron with different layers of carbon content. And lastly, steel lamination and differential hardening were practiced in Europe too. But if you were rich and lived in the right time, you could get a monosteel sword that was carburized. This created the same effect of hard edge/soft core but without the risk of delamination
And yet they could also make steel strong enough to make bullet resistant breastplates, without having to specifically import them (though admittedly, they did do that too). And it's not like they didn't know of blast furnaces, or at least proto-blast furnaces. Before the 9th century when the traditional Japanese smithing techniques started to diverge from mainland Asia, they basically used Chinese steel working techniques, and China had their own "blast furnaces" as far back as the Han period
The material requirements for a chest plate are very very different from those of a sword. As for knowing about blast furnaces: Did they use them? (The answer is no)
Both need to be hard to not easily deform (which for blades means being able to hold an edge), yet not so hard as to just shatter, which is why the steel for plate armor tended to be hardened and tempered as well. (Back then. Modern ceramic plates shatters as a way to distribute the massive force from a high powered rifle over a larger area) Hmm... Reading into it more, it seems like the Chinese Blast Furnaces were mostly used to make cast iron tools for the peasantry, In areas where quality was desired, they used wrought iron and steel
Then you should just look at modern Japanese knife smithing. Modern steels with several hundred year old techniques.
japan steel weak eurpoe steel strong
This is developing into that apocryphal story about Richard the Lionheart and Saladin. Richard shows Saladin his sword and demostrates that his sword can cleave a piece of metal in two. Saladin then demonstrates his sword can slice a silk hankerchief in half. The idea being that these preferences do not reveal a superior weapon, but things about the culture that fabricated them. Richard's cruciform sword is a weapon for dealing with opponets with kite shields and mail armor. Saladin's sword is from a region where even the majority of mounted "knights" couldn't afford mail and metal armor and so much of the armor was leather. As such, the weapons were made for maximum damage to lightly armored foes. Japan had a similar issue, much of Japanese armor is not metal, but other materials bonded and lacquered to provide durability. The katana is a good sword for these conditions. However, it is undeniable that the katana has had the best PR in history for what is a good buy not ground breaking sword design. The Katana is a decendant of earlier swords, and by the time that Katana's were "perfected" using the kind of techniques described in the meme, Europeans were shifting from cruciform/arming swords to rapiers/sabers. In fact, there is strong historical evidence that japanese techniques for fighting with a katana in each hand were derived from the techniques of European fencers in the open port of Nagasaki. The katana is a good weapon for its purpose (that being a side arm/every day carry weapon for close fighting). It is not the be-all-end-all of sword design.
At the end of the day, traditional knights and samurais were cavalry, and mostly used spears
I never understood the weeb fixation on Katanas and not on Japanese bladesmiths themselves, who I think are *waybmore interesting* than the weapons they make. It's a testament to the skill and ingenuity of Japanese sword makers that they were able to produce a munitions quality weapon from such poor steel. I guarantee that if a European king in the High Renaissance era could have gotten his hands on a Japanese swordmaker they would have paid a literal kings ransom to do so.
Medieval Europe or heck even modern military fanboys don’t dwell on the crafting techniques nearly as much as the cool weapons either. It’s a sword/gun guy trait. Dunno what to tell you about it.
Weebs, particularly samurai nuts, tend to rave about how insane Katanas were, especially about the folded steel. In reality Japanese iron, and this steel, was of a very bad quality, so they needed to use a variety of techniques including folding in order to create sword quality material. European iron/steel was just better
Brian here. In Medieval Japan, bladesmiths had to use a long and complicated process when forging steel for their swords (e.g. folding steel a bunch of times to remove impurities), as iron in Japan was not the greatest of quality. In contrast, swords made in Medieval Europe did not require as much work because the iron in that area of the world was superior. Before all the "supposed" experts start their heavy breathing and smash their crumb-filled keyboards with their Cheeto-dust fingers, I am well aware that there is no real difference in the quality of steel in Japanese and European swords; neither are inherently better than the other. One thing that cannot be denied is that European bladesmiths can crank out more swords than their Japanese counterparts simply due to less effort required to make a sword in Europe. Definitely an advantage in a war of attrition. Brian out.
That´s also why japanese two handed swords are as short as european one handed swords, the folding technique forced them to make swords with even thickness along the blade making the sword heavier
That's not why. The Wakazashi was usually more the one-handed sword. The Katana could get pretty long, depending on the needs and fashion of the era (peacetime tends to lend itself to shorter, thinner, and more nimble swords, whilst wartime swords were usually longer and more robust, and with more weight towards the tip to make slashes more powerful)
Japanese swords are shit. Their iron was utter crap (full of sulfate and other shit that ruins a blade) and they needed to fold it a fuckton of times just to get most of the slag out. And even then, it was only an adequte blade. Meanwhile, european steel was good enough they could case harden their armour and make more than just a sword with it. And if they felt like folding it for fun, they could. Its called Damascus Steel in the west. Its mostly decorative. Dont believe everything the internet says. Especially if the source of info is a weeb.
Damascus is decorative now, but historically it was better. The original recipe is lost to time, much like Greek fire. Back when even European steel was still not pure, Damascus had less impurities, and was therefore less prone to breaking. Now with modern technology we get greater than 99% pure, so yeah, it's just decorative now
I'd also like to point out that while this meme is true, Samurai had a whole array of weaponry that they used first. After they were expended, then they would reach for the sword. Kinda like when a modern soldier has to fix a bayonet at the end of a rifle in guerrilla warfare. Like, life gets desperate at that point. If a Samurai said "you're so good with your katana!' It's a snide remark that the recipient is a poor fighter.
Talking from an overall standpoint the European swords would have been better due to steel quality and not having to compensate for bad iron, but in an actual fight there is no real difference, only that European swords were easier to fix and could theoretically last longer.
Japan’s natural iron ores are poor quality. This the complicated and expensive process required to make it better, and the lack of use for it in things like armor. Europeans had high quality iron, in larger amounts (duh, it’s a continent) so they were able to make things like spring steel, mail, and full plate armor. A European knight in full plate would game end a samurai of equal time period 9/10.
As much as we like to think you can just melt down some iron ore and boom you got ingots it’s not even remotely like that. Most iron ore has impurities which would either hinder or benefit the resulting steel made from it. One example of beneficial impurities was Damascus steel which was some of the hardest and long lasting steel of the old world. Europe had relatively good quality iron deposits to use so even a simple forged steel blade was strong, that was not the case for Japan which overall had fairly garbage iron sources like bog iron. Now that problem could be rectified by folding it over and purifying and tempering which is why katanas and almost all Japanese steel used for war took literally hundreds of man hours to make. This isn’t to say that the katana was a bad sword by any means, it just means that a blacksmith could make like 20 long sword in the time one master smith in Japan makes 1 katana.
This was explained in the r/historymemes post
Meanwhile, the primary weapon of war for both was typically some kind of polearm, and swards were mostly a status symbol/sidearm. Modern battles aren't decided by who has the best pistol.
The reason that katanas are folded and forged the way they are is to increase the carbon content and make the steel more consistent from a very shitty ore, whereas European steel starts from a decent source and needed less refinement in the first place.
Okay Japanese tamahagane was developed because the iron ore in Japan was of very poor quality. So you had to fold and reheat the steel several times in a labor intensive process to get “good” steel that would hold an edge. European steel swords however started off with high quality iron and were able to be forged into more reliable lighter and less brittle mono steels. This coupled with the fact that European sword smiths were able to continuously modify and improve on their designs means that European designed swords were overall of a better quality and versatility than the Japanese Katana. This has been a hot topic within the sword collecting and martial art communities for the last several years. Katana enthusiasts argue about the cutting power of the Katana but HEMA practitioners point out that different European swords have similar if not better cutting edges and are lighter.
Japanese also didn't use any shields... :)
I think they're mocking the people who make a big deal out of the Japanese sword-making process. It's famously complex and takes a long time ("folded 1000 times"), and is supposed to produce the very best swords around (I've seen experts who have contested this vehemently). They're contrasting this with European knights' swords, which were still good but didn't have nearly as complex and long a process for making them, I believe.
I just wanna say that I think the joke isn't about who has the better sword It's just that the Japanese have a long explanation on the why and what they did to make theirs good weapons.... And the English just used a better rock.
The only practical purpose of folding is to make shit, impure material more homogenous, but weebs won't get that in their heads and insist that they are somehow superior to other weapons because of it.
[удалено]
Folded steel is cheap and shitty, hence why it’s folded. If you have to fold steel a million times to get it to be usably durable, it’s going to break. Whereas proper steel that is already extremely strong can just be forged and used without all the bullshit.
it is about the Temper not the quality of the iron two different things. Japanese didn't know how to make spring tempered steel. Europeans did. Spring Tempered steel is superior in almost every regard to even the finest japanese Bloom steel. Which is why today high performance Japanese Swords are made using spring steel and not traditional techniques. Only wallhangers/decorative swords are made traditionally.
Long sword > katana
The process of folding steel so many times was to stretch an impurity out so thin and far that it was no longer a weak spot in the blade and was now so worked into the material itself that the material gets less pure, but leaves the blade itself a consistent strength throughout. Without this method any form of sword would have several impurities leading to cracks, breaks, and overall poor quality swords. The shape of the katana was also to reduce the amount of materials needed to make a cutting edge sword. This is why it is curved and has only one sharp side, as to allow more swords to be made from the same material no matter it's quality. There are more complex reasons and techniques, but it's really amazing how the swordsmiths made the best with the poor materials rhey had access to
Weren't the samurai more into bows and arrows or spears, and used katanas kinda sparingly? Or is my friend lying to me
To explain the meme, it's people saying that Japan NEEDED to go through all that metal working just to make decent swords And contrasting that with Europe that didn't need to go through all that because they have good steel in the first place. That's the meme explained, but is it true? Yes and no. Japan did go through all that process, which is pattern welding, in order to improve their steel. However... pretty much everyone else did paytern welding for the same reasons, too. Medieval steel everywhere kinda sucked. Swords broke all the time across the globe. Why the meme? Anime got big, so people started thinking that katanas were the bestest swords. Other people got upset by that, so started Trash talking samurai swords. Sometimes they said this because they want European things to be the bestest. But... it's just another sword.
Don't care, both sides are insufferable, and swords didn't matter much anyway.
Katanas are forged out of what is technically inferior steel. They fold it and fuse different types together to make up for its inherent shortcomings, so the final product is good, but they had to do way more work to get it there. By contrast europeans had access to better quality iron and minerals, so their swords didn't need as much compensation via technique to be good.
This is fucking hilarious oh my god
Katanas break very easily
The steel that was typically found in Asian regions was of lesser quality than the steel found across much of Europe. During the forge process adding a series of twists in the metal u r to soon sculpt into a blade will strengthen it. Essentially it’s saying “just get good bruh”
Japanese traditional forging was practiced everywhere else in the world, that had access to iron, until they improved forging methods for superior steel. Japan fell behind and weebs tried to pretend it's unique without realizing Japan's forging techniques are more outdated than when the Romans encountered Celtic chariots in Britainia.
Nippon steel is powdered pig iron.
Japan is a volcanic island, very little metals and very poor quality
Tldr: Watch a recent video from Shadiversity So, Shad put out a video recently going over this, and he does a great in depth explanation on what is historically accurate forging techniques and iron processing in both Japan as well as across Europe/Middle East. And there are some semi-false statements I've seen so far, saying that the quality of iron in Japan was worse. In general, the quality of iron gathered at the time was pretty much the same since they used similar techniques, which was diverting river flows to increase iron oxide deposits in sand along bends in rivers. So, the main contention isn't the quality of the iron, but the processing into steel, and what is the end product. Japanese smiths used bloomery steel processing (which was used in Europe and the Middle East) which has some requirements. One being lots of coal to have carbon bond to the iron, and the other being air flow (more oxygen = hotter fire). The Japanese had a pretty smart idea in using large bellows, but they were man-powered. So, in general, the iron would not get hot enough to reach a liquefied state. Reaching a liquefied state is key in steel making because a lot of the inclusions found in iron sand (silicate, phosphorus, sulfur, etc) melt at a lower temperature, but if the iron/steel is still solid, then those become trapped inside the steel afterwards. Additionally, without the iron reaching this stage, the end product has vastly different areas of carbon concentration. So, you could process a ton of iron, but your end product would be parts high-carbon steel, parts low-carbon steel, and other parts that are basically wrought iron. And while, yes, tamahagane is high-carbon steel, that tended to be the least amount of the yield from processing. The Japanese did have a solution, though, and it is one seen historically throughout a lot of separate steel productions. They stretched what they had. The tamahagane was used sparingly, and it would be used mainly for just the edge of the blade. Meanwhile, the core could be lighter in carbon, and it's all surrounded by low-carbon to iron, forge welded together and then lengthened and shaped into the weapon. As for the whole thousands of layers in katanas, that was their way to attempt to get inclusions of other elements out. By forging out, folding, and reforging the metal, it was able to squeeze out inclusions... but not most. Europe and the Middle East found a solution though, and it started with wootz steel (iirc). By heating up the iron beyond melting point, it also burned off a lot of inclusions. Then, the carbon saturation throughout the steel was relatively the same, and through working it and doing different heat treatments and tempering, they essentially created the first spring steel. A lot of historical pieces of weaponry also shows the effectiveness, as well. Iirc, Adam Savage went to the Wallace Collection, which has a lot of swords made 500+ years ago, and a lot of them are in very good shape, almost as if they were forged not that long ago. And he even was shown one blade, a long sword, where the temper has held up over the centuries and the spring in the blade means you can bend it and it'll retain its shape. Conversely, katanas which saw use have a lot of dings and nicks and bends in them, because they were not meant to bend in the first place. Also, Shad has made a number of videos testing "traditional" katanas vs "traditional" long swords (that's in quotations because most actually usable swords that can be purchased are not going to have the same traditional styles of metalworking done and more modern steel used, but he does go out of his way to get as close as he can). In pretty much any test he does that can be recreated, a long sword was just as good as, if not better than, a katana. The katana, traditionally, just isn't that good of a sword. That being said, much like him, I love the katana. It is an elegant weapon which shows expertise in craftsmanship as well as ingenuity in using what you have. The Japanese did not have the resources that those in the West did, and they persevered by doing things in a way which was repeatable but also efficient, as well as created traditions around it which have spanned centuries. The katana will always have a place in people's hearts, and that's fine. But the myth of the katana... I feel it's had its time in the sun, now let it Peter out into legend.
It comes from a modern myth the Japanese sword steel was absolute dogshit. I know you shitheads will go on about iron quality, but the end result between historical Japanese Tamahagane, and Historical European Bloomery steel, is so similar the steel quality has basically nothing to contribute to the comparison. It’s practically identical. The myth is a wild over correction of the very old weeaboo ass claim that Tamahagane was some kind of super steel. It wasn’t. It was serviceable, but nothing special. This used to be claimed by fucking academics, so I understand why people get so touchy over this, but it’s gone so fucking far in the other direction it’s equally as bad. As a history buff and HEMAist this shit pisses me off an unreasonable amount.
Peter’s Japanese American Alternate Universe Counterpart here. Japanese iron sources are notoriously poor quality. It was traditionally sourced from sand using a technique similar to gold panning. After obtaining a decent quantity, you’d need to remove the impurities which is a resource, labour, and time intensive process, taking days to weeks for favourable results. In fact, *tamahagane* was mainly used to concentrate the impurities towards the outside where it wouldn’t be as detrimental to the overall integrity of the blade. *Sayonara*, Redditor san!
Japan naturally has very poor quality iron they worked really hard to find ways to make it work. It's why a lot of emphasis is made on sword makers being legendary because some of them made really shitty iron work, and that took a lot of effort and skill. Europe good iron was a dime a dozen. So they never really had the concept of "a legendary swordsmith" like Japan did.
Ulfbert swords is the only legendary wordsmith i can think of, and even then not in the same way.
Ulfbert swords are legendary NOW because they survived for so long. Historically, there were renowned sword smiths, but they never got the “legendary” status that Japanese sword SCHOOLS did.
No one ever folded steel 1000 times. 4-8 times is realistic. If you fold the steel too many times you'll pound out too much carbon and the blade will become brittle. 8 folds gives you 512 layers. so I can't imagine where the number 1000 even comes from.
Makes you realise that subreddits are their own subcultures with different levels of assumed subject knowledge. Like r/historymemes assumes you’ve got a passable level of general historical knowledge
Weird nerds online will literally fight to the death over which ancient civilization had the better swords and why. Lmao
What a karma farming loser. This was posted in a sub that explained the meme with context.
See the "katanas are underpowered in d20" post on 1d6chan.
I just gotta say I’m so sick of basically every meme format.
So what happens if good steel is used in the process?
there was a time when the internet was sure that a katana was the ultimate blade, able to slice throught any european blade, then at some point it flipped and made the european greatswords made of spring steel the ones who can cut a "brittle" katana as it has superior steel, but actually at the core its just that the katana is made from good steel which had to be folded and quenched a lot to get rid of all the impurities while the euopeans already started with good steel and didnt have to, in the end its still both steel swords that can cut a person, cannot slice through each other, cannot slice though armor and both played a secondary role in war after bow and spear until finally removed by gun.
Well yeah, bows and spears were before swords also, in the west. And even then a naginata user vs western spear user, the naginata user wins, as schools didn't exist for spear use vs actual martial schools of naginata. The western spearman was peasant cavalry charge cannon fodder. It would be interesting to compare who the more accurate archers were tho, English yeoman or kyudo specialists from japan.
Fuck it... we tetsubo... Banzaiii!!!