The prisoner's body guarantees sharpness of swords.How was the trial cutting 試し斬りdone?
Tameshigiri試し斬り was an experiment to test the sharpness of a sword, and during the Edo period (1603-1867), the bodies of prisoners who had been executed by beheading were used to cut them into pieces. This was because the era of war had ended and it was no longer possible to test the sharpness of the sword in actual combat. There are parts of the human body that have a lot of bones and parts that don't have a lot of bones. Naturally, areas with many bones are difficult to cut, and areas with few bones are easy to cut. Since it would be impossible to know the exact sharpness of the sword if these were mixed up, names were given to the places where the cuts were made, and records were recorded during trial cuts.Trial cuts were made on both the head and torso of the corpse. Of these, the trial slashes on the torso were not limited to just one, but were also made on multiple torsos. When two were stacked on top of each other, it was called 二つ胴(two bodies) , and when three were stacked on top of each other, it was called 三つ胴(three bodies). Swords with good sharpness were given nicknames based on this image. For example,八文字(character of the Eight). This means that when a straight cut is made from head to torso, the corpse's body is neatly divided into left and right sides. This nickname was carved into the stem as an inscription, and also served as a guarantee of its sharpness.Many of the trial cuts were done by agents. The most famous one is Yamada Asaemon山田浅右衛門. It has been confirmed that there was not just one Asaemon, but ten Asaemon in eight generations throughout the Edo period. After 1881, trial cutting using the human body was no longer performed.
1.trial cutting
2.cutting points
1.trial cutting
2.cutting points