Hence doing a lot of strikes tires you quickly. Your skills wielding a katana won’t help you master this weapon at all!Ī nodachi is a blade heavy weapon. During this time the attacker is extremely vulnerable to enemy counterattacks.Īs mentioned before using a nodachi requires a completely distinct fighting style. Missing a blow with a ōdachi could be a fatal error as the recovery period is rather high. A katana is way better suited for quick combat. It is completely useless when fighting inside a building or in close-quarters. Cons of the Nodachiĭue to the nodachi’s length, the weapon is inflexible and not very agile. Last but definitely not least, this weapon excels at fighting cavalry units. An enemy with a katana would have to come really close in order to hit you. When wielding a ōdachi you almost always have the range advantage. The tremendous weight and power of such a blow will throw their weapon out of their hands. One’s opponents just aren’t able to block strikes from such a monstrous sword. I’ve already mentioned the most important advantage of the nodachi. The other nodachi were delivered as offerings to shrines. This was due to the Shogun enacting a law that prohibited the possession of swords over a given length.įor this reason, most nodachi were cut to the shorter legal size. In the early 17 th century the usage of this sword rapidly declined. In the 15 th century, the ōdachi became extremely popular as an anti-cavalry weapon. This was verified when one 120 cm long and one 140 cm long sword were unearthed in Japan and could be dated back to that period. The first nodachi was forged in the 5 th century AD. During the Muromachi era, it was common practice for a samurai to have such a follower with him, to assist in carrying his weapons or at least help drawing them. The third possibility is to have a follower carry it for you. This might tire you down pre-battle but definitely allows you to quickly unsheathe your sword. The only problem is that this makes drawing the sword impossible.Īnother option is to carry the sword in your hand. So there are three main ways to wear a nodachi.įirstly you can mount it on your back. It should be obvious that it is completely impossible to carry such a huge weapon around your waist.Īs the sword is so large you would severely decrease your agility and thus regularly bump into other soldiers or objects. We now discussed the usage of the nodachi in a battle, but let me also show you how this weapon was used/worn when marching. In an infantry battle, this weapon type offers various advantages and disadvantages which we will explore in detail later on. Altogether the ōdachi’s usage is completely different than that of the other Japanese swords. For this reason, it was feared amongst mounted troops as an overpowered weapon.įighting with this sword involved relying primarily on heavy downward chops. Although the effectiveness of this weapon when fighting infantry is controversial it definitely excels as an anti-cavalry weapon.Ī common foot soldier could make use of this weapon to dispose of attacking cavalry units by slicing their horses. On the other hand, the nodachi was mainly used by Japanese foot soldiers. So in this regard, you can probably compare it with a Chinese Zhanmadao. On the one hand, horsemen could use this sword against cavalry as it offers various advantages over spears, lances and regular swords (long reach, increased weight and more slashing area). The sheer size of the ōdachi allows for completely different use-cases than a katana. This huge difference in weight makes blocking a nodachi strike with a katana completely pointless, as the enormous force would blow your katana away. In contrast, a katana only weighs 1.2 kg (2.6 lbs). Weight of a NodachiĪ regular nodachi with a length of 150 cm (59″) weighs approximately 2.2 kg (4.9 lbs). That’s enough talk about the size of the nodachi let’s move on to its weight. Thirdly, it was impractical to polish a sword of this size. Moreover, this type of sword seldom fitted common quenching mediums. Due to the enormous length of the blade, it was very expensive and complicated to craft such a sword.įor one heat treatment gets rather complex. This makes it the longest type of Japanese sword. Whereof the tsuka (hilt) has a length of roughly 30 cm (12 inches). A typical ōdachi (blade + handle) measures around 150 cm (59 in). The blade length of a nodachi is at least 3 shaku (90 cm/35.8 in). Furthermore, most of them feature a bo-hi in order to reduce the weight of the blade. Ōdachi were almost always differentially hardened. You can easily see the strong curvature of such a sword with your bare eyes. The blade of a nodachi is very long and heavy and thus enables delivering heavy blows to your opponent.
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