Historic fiction is a slippery slope. I am currently writing about Japan in the historic period in and around the Gempei War—a war of historic record. My main character is Yamabuki, a female warrior, a person who is recorded in some annals, but whose life is almost unknown. How much can a writer make up while entertaining her audience, while staying more or less faithful to the period? Some writers will go completely around this problem....
To most Westerners, Japanese samurai films show Japan after the Tokugawa Shogunate–from about 1600 and onward–replete with two-sword retainers with shaved pates, clean shaven for the most part, and living in a very regimented society with strict adherence to the rules set down by the Shogunate. But like my earlier post, “Murasaki’s World – Heian Japan,” Japan was different then, as were the warriors. Some examples: the warriors wore less sophisticated armor than in later periods, but still unmistakable Japanese....
This photograph was taken over a century ago. The young woman is wearing samurai gear. Thus, it was not just during the Gempei War that women saw themselves as warriors.
Woman warrior during the Gempei Wars. Several women fought in the Gempei Wars, 1180-1185, for control of Japan.