{"id":2442,"date":"2025-09-10T09:45:26","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T00:45:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/budobooks.jp\/?p=2442"},"modified":"2025-09-10T09:45:26","modified_gmt":"2025-09-10T00:45:26","slug":"budo-beat-35-island-of-legend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/budobooks.jp\/?p=2442","title":{"rendered":"Budo Beat 35: Island of Legend"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The \u201cBudo Beat\u201d Blog features a collection of short reflections, musings, and anecdotes on a wide range of budo topics by Professor Alex Bennett<\/a>, a seasoned budo scholar and practitioner. Dive into digestible and diverse discussions on all things budo\u2014from the philosophy and history to the practice and culture that shape the martial Way.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

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On Ganry\u016b-jima two bronze statues face each other across the mound. Sasaki Kojir\u014d, unveiled in 2002, crouches ready and composed with his great nodachi \u201cMonohoshizao.\u201d Opposite him is Miyamoto Musashi, erected in 2003, holding the oar he shaped into a sword, his body leaping forward to crush his foe. The timing of their unveiling reflects the story, with Kojir\u014d waiting first and Musashi arriving after. The statues hold the centre of the island in a permanent standoff, capturing the spirit of the 1610 duel as the sea breeze sweeps across the strait.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

I was in northern Kyushu the last few days on business, making the rounds of a few companies in the construction industry. Meetings done, I stepped outside into weather that was frankly too damn good to waste on balance sheets and hard hats. A flawless blue sky, crisp air, and really sharp light that seemed to mock anyone wasting time indoors. Since my translation of Yoshikawa Eiji\u2019s novel\u00a0Miyamoto Musashi\u00a0is set to be published in March 2026, what better time to make another pilgrimage to the very place where the novel (and Musashi\u2019s most celebrated duel) comes to its dramatic close?<\/p>\n\n\n

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Two short boat trips: the first from Moji in Kyushu (on the right) over to Karato in Honshu. Then over to the island. It only took about 30 minutes.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Ganry\u016b-jima is a flat, uninhabited island in the Kanmon Strait, only 400 metres from the Honsh\u016b shore at Shimonoseki. Once feared for reefs that wrecked countless ships, it even saw Toyotomi Hideyoshi rescued here by the M\u014dri navy. The reefs were blown up during the Taish\u014d era and the land reclaimed, making the island six times larger than it was in Musashi\u2019s day.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

All it took was a quick train hop from Kokura, followed by a couple of brisk boat rides, and then suddenly I was stepping onto Ganry\u016b-jima Island. Better known as the stage for Musashi and Kojir\u014d\u2019s legendary duel, it\u2019s a tiny, flat island in the Kanmon Strait off Shimonoseki. Once called Funashima, its shape and size have been altered by land reclamation, naval fortifications, and even shipwrecks. At different times it has served as a cholera facility and later as a restricted military zone where cameras were banned. Settlers lived there after WWII, but it has been uninhabited since 1973, apart from the odd raccoon dog said to have wandered over from the mainland. Who knew the little buggers could swim?<\/p>\n\n\n

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The Kanmon Bridge stretches across the narrow strait between Shimonoseki on Honshu and Kita Kyushu. Opened in 1973, the 1,068-metre suspension bridge soars above the water as part of the Kyushu Expressway, linking Japan\u2019s two islands and standing alongside the Kanmon Tunnel as a vital gateway through the strait.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Today, the island is a quiet park redeveloped in 2003 alongside NHK\u2019s Musashi drama. Visitors arriving by ferry find bronze statues of Musashi and Kojir\u014d facing each other across an open plaza, monuments, a fishing deck, and trails that hug the shoreline. Smoking and swimming are forbidden, there are no shops or vending machines, and much of the land is still private. Yet the place retains a calm dignity. It’s an oddly fitting memorial to a duel that\u2019s grown far larger in legend than the island itself. Being a weekday, and apart from a few gulls and the odd Chinese tourist, I pretty much had the island entirely to myself. It felt tranquil, almost absurdly so, when you consider that this quiet patch of rock was the stage for the most famous one-on-one in Japanese history.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Looking across the Kanmon Strait from Ganry\u016b-jima, the quiet setting today belies the legendary duel once fought here, around this spot.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The official story is tidy. In 1610 (not 1612 as is commonly thought) Musashi faced Sasaki Kojir\u014d, known as \u201cGanry\u016b\u201d after the school he founded. Kojir\u014d wielded his famous three-shaku (91-cm) sword (Drying Pole), already longer than most. Musashi arrived with a four-shaku (121-cm) wooden sword, supposedly carved from an oar on his way over in a little boat. The match began… And, you’ll have to buy the novel to find out what happened \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n\n\n

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The type of vessel that would have ferried Musashi across the Kanmon Strait. He was rowed over and, according to the legend, used the time to fashion an old his oar into the weapon that changed history. No, this isn’t the actual boat!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Well, most people already know how it turned out. In any case, standing on that island with the sea glittering around me, it was hard not to replay the scene in my mind. Yet as with most legends polished over centuries, the details quickly slide into fog. Kojir\u014d wasn\u2019t some braggart lured into a trap. No, sir. He was a respected instructor for the Hosokawa clan, the “Demon of the West”, a man with real standing. Musashi\u2019s challenge was formally registered through a senior retainer, Nagaoka Sado-no-Kami Okinaga, who in turn obtained permission from his lord, Hosokawa Tadaoki. For the Hosokawa to sanction the match was astonishing. Kojir\u014d risked everything: his reputation, his life, and by extension the clan\u2019s stability. If he fell, his disciples could well have rioted. For an outside lord like the Hosokawa, drawing shogunate attention to violent disruptions was the last thing they wanted. And yet, they allowed it, under strict conditions: the fight would happen out of the way on Funajima Island (renamed Ganry\u016b-jima after the fact), with only appointed officials present.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Who else but Musashi would bring an oar to a sword fight?<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Why did Musashi push for it? Was it a blood feud, as later popular culture liked to frame it? The records hint at something more political. After the fight, Musashi hurried to Moji and sought refuge at the residence of Numata Nobumoto, a high-ranking Hosokawa vassal. Nobumoto sheltered him and eventually arranged an armed escort to reunite Musashi with his father, Munisai, in nearby Buzen. That detail complicates things. Munisai had connections with the Hosokawa, even instructing some of their retainers, including, possibly, the very man who arranged the duel. Was this Musashi\u2019s fight at all, or was he standing in for his father in a simmering rivalry?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The idea isn\u2019t far-fetched. In many domains, multiple schools of swordsmanship co-existed. Harmony was never guaranteed. Students could be zealously protective of their teacher\u2019s style and rivalries ensued even within the same clan. Munisai\u2019s T\u014dri-ry\u016b dual-sword method (yes, Musashi’s father taught it) must have looked eccentric, perhaps even ridiculous, to Kojir\u014d\u2019s camp. Mockery is timeless, and it\u2019s easy to imagine Kojir\u014d\u2019s disciples sneering. Musashi, newly arrived in Kyushu, might have been only too happy to return the favour. In such an atmosphere, the Hosokawa leadership may have decided it was better to let the matter burn itself out in one controlled match. If Kojir\u014d won, his supremacy would be unchallenged. If Musashi won, the loss was against a swordsman of great repute, not another clansman. And once Musashi moved on, the storm would pass.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Kojir\u014d depicted with the massive nodachi he was famous for, aptly named Monohoshi-zao, or Drying Pole.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The accounts we have are unanimous on one point: Musashi emerged the victor. But even that hasn\u2019t stopped conspiracy theories. For example, the\u00a0Numata-kaki<\/em>\u00a0claims that Musashi\u2019s disciples had smuggled themselves onto the island, and that they, not Musashi, delivered the fatal blow to a wounded Kojir\u014d. Outraged, Kojir\u014d\u2019s men sought revenge, hence the armed escort out of town. More likely, this version was a convenient fiction crafted by Nobumoto to cool tempers and save face. After all, if Musashi had really broken the strict terms of the duel by sneaking in assistants, the Hosokawa would have had no choice but to act against him.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Walking around the island, the gap between the story and the quiet present felt almost comical. The striking bronze statues capture Musashi and Kojir\u014d in the instant before swords connect, frozen mid-swing for eternity. A small shrine pays homage to Kojir\u014d, whose fame, ironically, rests on his defeat. It\u2019s a humbling reminder of how much he staked on that single encounter. One moment he was the dominant swordsman of western Japan. The next, he was reduced to a cautionary tale, remembered more for his downfall than his triumphs.<\/p>\n\n\n

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A small shrine on Ganry\u016b-jima is dedicated to Kojir\u014d. The signboard telling its history was lying flat on the ground when I visited, which felt unsettling. I couldn\u2019t help but suspect vandalism, though I hope that is not the case.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Between the duel with Kojir\u014d in 1610 and the Siege of Osaka in 1615, Musashi pretty much slips from the record. This silence was probably no accident. The Tokugawa regime was cracking down on unsanctioned duels that threatened public order. Sword fights to the death had to fade into the shadows until protective equipment and regulated fencing methods emerged much later, in the 18th century. For Musashi, though, the gap marks something else: a turning inward. After Ganry\u016b-jima, he seems to have shifted from proving himself with the sword to seeking the deeper philosophy of combat that culminated in\u00a0The Book of Five Rings<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That change in Musashi is something I felt keenly as I stood on the island. For me, too, Musashi has never been just about the duels. His life and writings have been threads running through my own journey; first as a student of budo in Japan, then as a researcher and teacher, and as a translator tackling Musashi\u2019s own works and Yoshikawa\u2019s mammoth novel… To walk the ground where Musashi and Kojir\u014d clashed was not just sightseeing. It was a personal checkpoint. It reminded me of how myth, history, and individual obsession can intertwine, crossing epochs and oceans.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Ah! I almost forgot. I even found a poem on the island on this notice board. It was written by Sait\u014d Mokichi (1882\u20131953), one of the most important Japanese poets of the modern era, when he visited the island in 1921.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u308f\u304c\u5fc3\u3044\u305f\u304f\u60b2\u3057\u307f\u3053\u306e\u5cf6\u306b\u547d\u304a\u3068\u3057\u3057\u4eba\u3092\u305e\u304a\u3082\u3075<\/strong>
Waga kokoro itaku kanashimi kono shima ni inochi otoshishi hito o zo omou<\/em>

\u201cMy heart aches with deep sorrow,
as I think of the one who lost his life
on this island.\u201d<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
In Japanese cultural memory, Ganry\u016b-jima is usually framed as the heroic site of Musashi\u2019s triumph. Sait\u014d flips the lens: instead of praising Musashi\u2019s strategy, he honours Kojir\u014d as a tragic figure, the one who \u201clost his life.\u201d It\u2019s an act of humanisation and mourning, giving voice to the defeated rather than just the celebrated. I thought it was very poignant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nhttps:\/\/youtu.be\/KaFCcttQ1MQ\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
I left Ganry\u016b-jima on the same boat I had arrived on. For all the speculation, all the conspiracy theories, all the stories stretched thin by time, one fact remains: from that encounter sprang one of the defining episodes of Japanese culture. Four centuries later, on a Tuesday afternoon with the island almost to myself, I felt oddly grateful for that duel. Without it, I doubt I\u2019d have spent so much (if any)\u00a0of my life chasing Musashi through training halls, books, and translations. I\u2019m sure I\u2019m not alone in this sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you want the real Musashi, you can read my translation of his works in the book shown below. And if you\u2019re up for a not-so-historically-reliable but utterly gripping retelling, get ready for Yoshikawa Eiji\u2019s Musashi, which I\u2019ve translated, and which will be published in March 2026. It\u2019s a ripping yarn, even if it plays fast and loose with the facts.<\/p>\n\n\n
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All the research is in here. <\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
I\u2019ll also be making a series of podcasts and videos in the coming weeks to dig into Musashi\u2019s life. There\u2019s far too much garbage floating around about him, and it\u2019s time to sift the substance from the dross. Ganry\u016b-jima may be calm and quiet today, but standing there in the stillness reminded me how the island\u2019s silence throws the endless noise of debate into sharper relief. That contrast, I think, is Musashi\u2019s real legacy: a calm core that endures even as the arguments rage on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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