With the decline of the fortune of samurai families during the Edo period, many chose to give up life as a warrior and migrate to Shakotan and other coastal areas of southern Hokkaidō to farm and develop the rich herring industry.

The samurai class as a whole however was not ready to give away power, so the alliance between him and the Ashikaga was bound to be only temporary.

The characters in the movie either give up samurai status or fight to attain it, and samurai are seen behaving both honorably and very badly.

Following artistic success and critical acclaim in the American independent film community, he achieved mainstream renown with his far-East philosophical crime film Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, shot in Jersey City and starring Forest Whitaker as a young inner-city man who has found purpose for his life by unyieldingly conforming it to the Hagakure, an 18th-century philosophy text and training manual for samurai, becoming, as directed, a terrifyingly deadly hit-man for a local mob boss to whom he may owe a debt, and who then betrays him.

At a young age his father encouraged him to take up sumo wrestling and swimming and entertained him with stories of his great-grandfather Kichiemon who was considered a very strong samurai in his era.

The samurai accept him, bringing their number to seven.

A serious, stone-faced samurai and a supremely skilled swordsman ; Katsushirō is in awe of him.

In his text Feudal and Modern Japan ( 1896 ), historian Arthur May Knapp wrote: The samurai of thirty years ago had behind him a thousand years of training in the law of honor, obedience, duty, and self-sacrifice ....

Takamatsu died in Nara, Japan in 1972 after advancing Hatsumi from student and bestowing on him " all the art of the nine schools ", three of which he indicated were ancient ninja schools and six samurai schools of martial arts.

The Satsuma man abused and insulted him, and kicked him in the face ( to even touch the face of a samurai was a great insult, let alone strike it ), and spat on him.

At that, Ōishi went on his knees, and in consideration of Kira's high rank, respectfully addressed him, telling him they were retainers of Asano, come to avenge him as true samurai should, and inviting Kira to die as a true samurai should, by killing himself.

The samurai agree that four of them will follow him: two who believed in him and two who did not.

He demands the four samurai tie him up, and is found in disgrace.

With the exertion of Taira power and wealth and Kiyomori's new monopoly on authority, many of his allies, most of the provincial samurai, and even members of his own clan turned against him.

Tajōmaru, a notorious brigand, claims that he tricked the samurai to step off the mountain trail with him and look at a cache of ancient swords he discovered.

Tajōmaru honorably set the samurai free and dueled with him.

The samurai claims that Tajōmaru, after raping his wife, asked her to travel with him.

His mother Tess Struan, and Gordon Chen urge Malcolm to return to Hong Kong to formally become tai-pan, but he is unable to travel due to a samurai ambush which nearly kills him, and leaves him severely wounded.

His association with the samurai clans above, and his interest in samurais generally seems to have contributed to his gaining the nickname the " Scottish Samurai ".

Ito often heard from fellow co-workers that Tasogare Seibei was a very unfortunate character, a most pathetic samurai with no luck at all.

Set in mid-19th century Japan, a few years before the Meiji Restoration, it follows the life of Seibei Iguchi, a low-ranking samurai employed as a bureaucrat.

His wife receives a grand funeral, more than what a lowest-ranking samurai such as Seibei could afford.

Seibei works in the grain warehouse, accounting for stores inventory for the samurai clan.

Even though he is a samurai, Seibei continues to neglect his own appearance, failing to bathe and being shabbily dressed.

Seibei stoically regrets how his departed wife suffered in his care, who came from a higher samurai family.

In the final act, the head of Seibei's clan, having heard of his prowess with a sword, orders Seibei to kill a samurai retainer, Yogo Zen ' emon, who has been " disowned " and who stubbornly refuses to resign his post by committing seppuku.

The following morning, Seibei attempts to get ready, but there is no one to help him prepare in the rituals that are customary of samurai before battle.

Yoji Yamada, director of the Otoko wa Tsurai yo series, made a trilogy of acclaimed revisionist samurai films, 2002's Twilight Samurai, followed by The Hidden Blade in 2004 and Love and Honor in 2006.

This was possibly the riskiest move Ieyasu ever made — to leave his home province and rely on the uncertain loyalty of the formerly Hōjō samurai in Kantō.

During the six-week scriptwriting process, Kurosawa and his screenwriters realized that " six sober samurai were a bore — they needed a character that was more off-the-wall.

The Edo government eventually formally recognized such tekiya organizations and granted the oyabun ( leaders ) of tekiya a surname as well as permission to carry a sword — the wakizashi, or short samurai sword ( the right to carry the katana, or full-sized samurai swords, remained the exclusive right of the nobility and samurai castes ).

Notable samurai, though certainly not all ( e. g. Amakusa Shiro ), have throughout history held such aims or beliefs in disdain, or expressed the awareness that their station — as it involves killing — precludes such reward, especially in Buddhism.

The story unfolds in flashback as the four witnesses in the story — the bandit, the murdered samurai, his wife, and the nameless woodcutter — recount the events of one afternoon in a grove.

The Shimabara Rebellion of 1637 – 38, in which discontented Catholic Christian samurai and peasants rebelled against the bakufu — and Edo called in Dutch ships to bombard the rebel stronghold — marked the end of the Christian movement, although some Catholic Christians survived by going underground, the so-called Kakure Kirishitan.

A Satsuma man, passing by, was infuriated by this behaviour on the part of a samurai — both by his lack of courage to avenge his master, as well as his current debauched behaviour.

The first futures exchange market was the Dōjima Rice Exchange in Japan in the 1730s, to meet the needs of samurai who — being paid in rice, and after a series of bad harvests — needed a stable conversion to coin .< ref >

Tabi are also essential with traditional clothing — kimono and other wafuku as well as being worn by samurai in the feudal era.

Her daughter is a beautiful, strong-willed 19-year-old named Masago, married to Kanazawa no Takehiro — a 26-year-old samurai from Wakasa.

Interestingly, training in these weapons is akin to the training given to the brides of samurai ; Haruka's training in these weapons may or may not have been inspired due to her desire to be a perfect Japanese bride for a person of high standing — like her brother.

This tells us that shunga reached all classes of society — peasant, chonin, samurai and daimyo.

These are traditional establishments where the patrons of Gion — from the samurai of old to modern-day businessmen — have been entertained by geiko and geisha in an exclusive manner for centuries.

She has always admired her father ( who left his samurai family in Japan to protest the declining social status of the samurai ), and fondly remembers how he conducts himself — from his courtship of Jeanne's mother to his virtuoso pig-carving.

Together, they are a trilogy following the character growth of Musashi from brash — yet strong — young soldier to thoughtful and introspective samurai, culminating in Musashi's duel with the greatest opponent he would ever face.