A NAGAMAKI AND A RED LACQUER SCABBARD

During the Nanbokucho period the style of warfare changed from essentially individual combat between well armed groups of mounted samurai, to include conscripts from the farming communities, or ‘kachi-musha’. These soldiers would attack the mounted samurai in groups with arrows from a distance and cutting at the horse’s legs with agricultural instruments to bring their enemy down. Long naginata, swords called ‘o-dachi’, and yari (stabbing and cutting spears) became popular among the samurai. Although naginata were used by samurai in the Heian and Kamakura periods, the use of long bladed swords, naginata, and nagamaki became prevalent during the Nanbokucho and Muromachi periods.
The word naginata can be translated as ‘long cutter’ and applies to curved glaive-like blades mounted on long wooden poles. Nagamaki, or ‘long bound’, applies to long blades mounted on long poles bound with braid like the hilts of normal-length swords. Most existing blades were shortened during the Muromachi period, and the present example maintaining its original condition is very rare. The original lacquer scabbard from Muromachi period is equally rare as there are not many lacquer scabbard like this example are known to exist.