MONGOLIAN MIGHT MEETS SAMURAI STEEL

Waves of the Khan’s forces swept across the shogunate’s lands. They were met by Japan’s outmatched yet determined and skilful warrior class

In 1274, with China’s Southern Song on the verge of defeat and their Korean fleet finally ready, the Mongols set sail with 23,000 Mongol, Korean and Chinese soldiers, plus 7,000 sailors. Landing at the island of Tsushima, the Mongols were bewildered to find the local samurai lord mounting a suicidal defence backed by just 80 cavalrymen. The highly skilled samurai archers were able to pick off scores of enemy soldiers before being surrounded and defeated. Determined to break this unfathomably bold warrior spirit, the Mongols resorted to terror tactics, burning down all the island’s buildings and slaughtering its residents, before pressing on via Iki Island to Kyushu, the southernmost of the main Japanese islands.

Contemporary historian Nichiren Shonin Chu-gassan describes how, as the Mongol armada approached Hakata Bay on Kyushu, the Japanese were appalled to see the invaders had captured scores of Japanese women, punched holes in their hands, threaded rope through them and laced them across the bows of their ships. The next morning, the two armies clashed. For the Japanese, it was a rude awakening.