Seppuku

Seppuku ( lit."stomach-cutting") is a Japanese word that means ritual suicide by disembowelment. Seppuku is better known in English as hara-kiri () and is written with the same kanji as seppuku but in reverse order with an okurigana. However, in Japanese hara-kiri is considered a colloquial and somewhat vulgar term. The practice of committing seppuku at the death of one's master is known as oibara (?? or ???); the ritual is similar.

Overview

Seppuku was a key part of bushido, the code of the samurai warriors; it was used by warriors to avoid falling into enemy hands, and to attenuate shame. Samurai could also be ordered by their daimyo (feudal lords) to commit seppuku. In later years, disgraced warriors were sometimes allowed to commit seppuku rather than be executed in the normal manner. Since the main point of the act was to restore or protect one's honor as a warrior, those who did not belong to the samurai caste were never ordered or expected to commit seppuku.

Related Topics:
Bushido - Samurai - Daimyo

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In his book The Samurai Way of Death, Samurai: The World of the Warrior (ch.4), Dr. Stephen Turnbull states:

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:Seppuku was commonly performed using a dagger. It could take place with preparation and ritual in the privacy of one?s home, or speedily in a quiet corner of a battlefield while one?s comrades kept the enemy at bay.

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:In the world of the warrior, seppuku was a deed of bravery that was admirable in a samurai who knew he was defeated, disgraced, or mortally wounded. It meant that he could end his days with his transgressions wiped away and with his reputation not merely intact but actually enhanced. The cutting of the abdomen released the samurai?s spirit in the most dramatic fashion, but it was an extremely painful and unpleasant way to die, and sometimes the samurai who was performing the act asked a loyal comrade to cut off his head at the moment of agony.

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Sometimes a daimyo was called upon to perform seppuku as the basis of a peace agreement. This would so weaken the defeated clan that resistance would effectively cease. Toyotomi Hideyoshi used an enemy's suicide in this way on several occasions, the most dramatic of which effectively ended a dynasty of daimyo forever, when the Hojo were defeated at Odawara in 1590. Hideyoshi insisted on the suicide of the retired daimyo Hojo Ujimasa, and the exile of his son Ujinao. With one sweep of a sword the most powerful daimyo family in eastern Japan disappeared from history.

Related Topics:
Toyotomi Hideyoshi - Hojo - Odawara - Hojo Ujimasa - Ujinao

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