Ninja

Ninja (??) or shinobi (??) (literally, "one who endures") were agents of espionage in feudal Japan. Some modern practitioners of budo ninjutsu argue that ninja were used primarily as spies, not assassins. It is popularly believed that the ancient ninja were peasants, forbidden under law from studying the samurai swordplay techniques because of feudal Japan's caste structure. Others contend that many ninja were also samurai, operating as spies in the service of their daimyo. The latter is more likely as there aren't any records of peasant ninja, while there are many samurai families who are recorded as being ninja. Contrary to popular belief, bushido didn't in fact stop samurai from being ninja.

Related Topics:
Espionage - Japan - Caste - Samurai - Daimyo

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Whether of peasant or samurai descent, ninja needed to travel without being noticed, so they made use of weapons that could be easily concealed or disguised as common tools. Common ninja weapons included shuriken and bo. In popular folklore, ninja also used special short swords called ninja-ken (or ninja-to see below for explanation). Ninja-ken are smaller than katana but larger than wakizashi, and were supposedly created by grinding down broken samurai katana found on battlefields.

Related Topics:
Shuriken - Bo - Katana - Wakizashi

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For references to ninja in popular western culture, including film and comic appearances and the recent spate of websites devoted to ninja-centric parody, see Ninja in fiction, below.

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