How long was the odachi used for?

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The odachi seems to have both emerged and enjoyed its by far greatest popularity in the Nanbokucho period, 1336-1392. After that its use has most likely been rather limited. Most remaining odachi blades were cut down to katana in the Momoyama period (1573–1615).

>>34273608
WHY!?

>>34273631
Turns out that polearms>Everything else, especially when it comes to ultra large completely impractical swords.

>>34273608
I think you're talking about the tachi, not the odachi.

>>34273653
But the Odachi was a cavalry sword, not an infantry sword.

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>>34273631
The Nanbokucho period seems to have been a period where wargear tended somewhat towards the flashy and extravagant, possibly as a form of a not entirely conscious propaganda face off between the two Imperial courts they had at the time.

In the Muromachi period that followed warfare would become mroe and mroe dominated by alrge amounts of infantry fighting in close formation, making the yari rise to dominance over weapons that wanted mroe space, that is odachi and naginata.

>>34273654
I'm not. The tachi emerged back in the mid Heian period and was replaced by the katana as most people's battlefield sword of choice in Muromachi period. See Nagayama, "The Connoisseur's Book of Japanese Swords".

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>>34273661
That's the tachi, kinda, largely.

The odachi is a large twohander, it'd be decidedly unwieldy in the saddle.

Whoa, its nice to see someone who knows what they are talking about

>>34273724
but I'm not.

>>34273698
So the Odachi came AFTER the katana!?

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>>34273753
The Nanbokucho period, when the odachi appeared, came before the Muromachi period, where the katana rose to glory. The odachi is an oversized tachi, not an oversized katana. It's even in the name, the o means large or great, dachi is the same as tachi, the japanese just preferred to soften the t a bit.

I guess one possible source of confusion is that if you're not terribly familiar with Japanese swords, you may having issue telling the tachi and katana part. Many would look at the two and just see two katana. Pictured here is a tachi.

Though strictly speaking you may be right. The very earliest katana show up back in the kamakura period, which is in between the Heian and nanbokucho periods. It remained somewhat obscure for quite a while though, and I guess I shouldn't feel entirely certain that we don't see the odd oversized tachi back then as well.

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>>34273608
>cut down to katana
WHAT CAN CUT NIPPON STEAL?!

Like a day or two idk lol

>>34274484
They just folded it over one more time anon.

>>34273518
until the newdachi came out

>>34274484
The only thing strong enough to cut nippon steal is nippon steal

>>34273724
Yeah, it's nice to see that /k/ is capable of doing something else than memeing.

>>34273518
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWtEBW8cmAo

>>34273839
So whats the diffrence between a katana and a tachi

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>>34276151
There's basically one "hard" rule, and then a number of more or less fuzzy ones.

The one pretty hard rule relates to how you carry it, and the associated hardware on the scabbard. A tachi has a pair of straps or loops or whatever we're to call them attached to the scabbard (well visible here), with which you hang the scabbard off of your belt, hanging edge down.

The katana on the other hand is meant to be carried thrust through your sash, edge up. The scabbard has a small lump on the side with a hole though which a cord is passed, but this is generally not used to suspend or secure the scabbard. It seems to be mroe fashion, or perhaps if you happen to need a bit of cord...

As for the blades themselves, the easiest sign to look for is the signature (if the blade is signed in the first place), which will always be placed so that it is on the outside when the sword is carried in its scabbard, so different sides for katana and tachi.

Tachi blades will tend to be a bit larger than katana. In some periods the difference may have been somewhat pronounced, in others the difference would be minimal. There are also more or less stylistic differences, varying through the eras. Though these things will also to some degree not be strictly between tachi and katana of any given period, but also to a large degree a matter of the styles that were popular when the tachi was king, and the styles of blade from when the katana was the most popular.

Some styles of the fittings (hilt, scabbard) will also be associated with katana or tachi, even if we can't point as clearly to specific features as we can with the suspension.

To make things even fuzzier, it's relatively easy to swap fittings of a Japanese sword, many blades in history would have had a number of different sets for different occasions. Thus a single blade may in itself be a tachi or katana blade, but the complete sword will change type with the fittings.

>>34274484
Is that a dick fish?

>>34273608
dat ass tho.....

Thats just too long to work. You would have so little leverage at the tip.

As a side note, why are Japanese and Chinese weapons so aesthetic ?

>>34273608
T H I C C

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>>34276590
Sorta
It likes being petted

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>>34273839
>soften the "t"

It actually hardens the "t" since the [d] sound is the same as the [t] sound with respect to place and manner of articulation (alveolar and stop), with the only difference being the sonorization, or voicing of the consonants.

Say a [t] sound while feeling your throat around your Adam's apple. Nothing happens, right?

Now, say the [d] sound while holding your throat. You feel a rumbling or a humming, don't you? That's the glottis partially letting air become obstructed, which is what voicing is, an important aspect of phonology and distinguishing human sounds.

Now, Japanese does this pretty frequently. The word "senpai" is actually pronounced [sempaJ], with the [m] sound. The reason for this is called assimilation. Despite being spelled with the [n] sound, the following consonant [p] is the voiceless bilabial stop, meaning you don't use your glottis while making the sound, the sound is made between your two lips and the airflow is sharply cut off. The [n] sound is the voiced alveolar nasal (technically all nasals are naturally voiced, but that's besides the point) and so going from an alveolar (the area behind your gums and incisors) sound to a bilabial sound can be a chore for the tongue. So, in Japanese the [n] sound is shifted to a bilabial nasal (the [m] sound) as it is assimilated by the following bilabial sound.

t. Linguistifag

>>34275670
that's not an odachi.

>>34273518
Defender of the Cookout

>>34279075
It really much is, shidachi is using an oversized katana which is here referred to as an odachi.
Why wouldn't it be an odachi for you?

Were odachi still used in sengoku period?

I know legend said sasaki kojiro used an odachi.

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>>34281008
Some would have been around, but probably somewhat rarely used. The great shortening spree of the Momoyama period comes after the Sengoku period. Perhaps a bit more popular in skirmishes than pitched battles if I'm allowed some unadulterated guesswork.

As for the sword Kojirô is supposed to have used the claimed length would seem to be up towards odachi territory, but whether there may have been some stylistic reason or similar for classifying it as a nodachi or something else is unknown to me. In a similar vein, we have the chokken used by Kage ryu, which may or may not be considered a kind of odachi. Hopefully I'll find some text elaborating on it all some day, but these are pretty obscure things I fear.

Whether Kojirô actually used a sword of such size is another matter. That may have been an invention for a film trilogy about Musashi. Kojirô's lineage instead would supposedly suggest the opposite rather, that he would have used a rather short katana/tachi.

>>34273608
>52 year active service life

so was it actually useful then? thats not a super long time to have a niche weapon used in abdundence but it appears it wasnt complete trash right?

I thought they were just ceremonial and only weebs came up with the 'decapitate the horse AND rider" shit

>>34276512
I was told by a sword collector that the difference was originally in the thickness of the spine, width of the blade, curvature of the blade being more pronounced in the katanas of the earlier era, and like you said the various bitty doo dads on the scabbard and one other thing the tsuba were 1.5-2x as big as well. the blades also taper more on the longers swords, from about the 2/3rds mark, vs the katanas being the last 3rd to the point.

they were made for BIG GUYS, to fight men on horses, and as ceremonial gifts to temples and shines, as well as showoff skill set and masterpieces

sometimes going to the gunshow isnt a total waste of time. he was buying WW2 trophy swords for the japanse cultural office.

>>34282959
It is used in the same role as the naginata i.e. anti cavalry.

>>34282954
Are there any proof of Kojiro lineage? His myth suggested he was taught by the same master of Ittosai so it makes sense he uses one long katana/odachi.

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>>34282959
It's probably less that it saw widespread use during 52 years, and more that it had its main popularity spike there (I'm not sure it ever really got to "used in abundance" though), with a significant dropoff around the end of the period followed by a more gradual decline. Fashion doesn't jump quite instantly after all, and historical periods are very artificial things, so matching one to another is rarely a very exact science.

Ceremonial us,e dedication to temples and the like, probably pre-dates this and would have continued afterwards too. Very big blades are impressive and expensive, simple as that.

As for their usefulness I suspect they'd work quite well enough as long as you had the space to use them. Street battles, skirmishes, such things. Looking towards what was said in period about European twohanders they may be relatively good at keeping superior numbers at bay, a necessity when you're outnumbered or to give your friends opportunities when you're not.

The horse decapitation things keeps popping up, said about a wide range of swords form a number of settings. This makes me suspect it's a somewhat recent notion with no historical basis to speak of that has just spread around a lot. Though it's probably entirely possible to behead both a man and a horse with a single swing with a sword like this, it's just bloody unlikely to happen in combat. Tie them down and let someone who knows what he's doing try though and I'd be more surprised if he failed. And I'd expect the same performance out of a somewhat cut-optimised European greatsword.

>>34283054
Profile taper, length, tip shape, tsuba size, degree and distribution of curvature, cross-section and so on of Japanese swords all vary throughout history, and not in a straight lines where some things decrease from the mid Heian period until today, and other increase. And on top of that there's also been some periods where there's been revivals of old styles, to greater or lesser extent.

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>>34283132
Haven't really looked into it, I just saw this: http://www.swordforum.com/forums/showthread.php?88620-Monohoshizao-can-anyone-tell-me-what-schools-would-use-this-weapon&p=1006609#post1006609 and Meik Skoss is someone I think we can quite safely assume knows his shit about these things.

>>34283177
Oh so it is the fact that his master, Toda Seigen, was specialized in short sword.

>>34283154
they were more of a general guideline, not set in stone IT HAS TO BE THIS.

mostly because of the method of construction, and how physics work when using or carrying them.

its like a guy using a giant gag baseball bat in the world series. people laugh unless he starts nailing 110MPH fastballs out of the park.

like i said too, these were like big showoff pieces and basically advertising models.