It’s a chilly evening in Emeryville, where half-a-dozen martial arts students at a community center are practicing with katana. They kneel, jump and slash, then slowly mimic wiping blood off their ...

A newly translated samurai text called "Twelve Rules of the Sword" reveals the secrets of a sword-fighting school that mastered a technique that seemed to give supernatural powers. Dating back to the ...

Ghost of Yotei gives its revenge-seeking protagonist Atsu a wide range of traditional Japanese weapons to wield, including bows, swords and spears. Last week, however, a Japanese-speaking user on X ...

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. As you enter the suitably frightening half-light of the British Museum’s new Samurai exhibition, you are ...

In Quentin Tarantino’s 2003 movie Kill Bill: Volume 1, vengeful assassin The Bride (Uma Thurman) seeks a sword from the legendary swordsmith Hattori Hanzō (Sonny Chiba). “I need Japanese steel,” she ...