In the early twenty-first century, the samurai are global icons.
They are present in countless films, video games, anime, manga and other forms of popular culture around the world. This was not necessarily predictable when the samurai class was abolished 150 years ago. As a warrior elite that had ruled Japan for more than six centuries by the 1860s, the samurai in the late nineteenth century were seen as victims of modernization and Westernization processes that led to their abolition. However, these same processes also led to the rehabilitation of the samurai image as a symbol of Japan. Furthermore, it was this period of turmoil and transition that led to the reinvention and popularization of the concept of ‘bushidō’ (the ‘way of the samurai’ or ‘way of the warrior’), which itself became a household word around the world in the early twentieth century.
Who were the samurai?
The popular view of bushidō today is that it is a supposedly ancient ethic that guided samurai behaviour over the centuries, including a range of virtues such as loyalty, honour, duty, self-sacrifice and others. Many of these virtues are based on Confucian and other Chinese precedents, while other portrayals of bushidō stress supposed Buddhist, Shinto or other religious influences. However, these interpretations tend to suggest a much more homogeneous and widely accepted warrior ethic than ever existed in pre-modern Japan.
The warriors now collectively referred to as ‘samurai’ were an incredibly diverse group across different periods, regions and levels of social status. The elite mounted archers of the twelfth century differed greatly from the warlords of the fifteenth century, who might command tens of thousands of foot soldiers armed with guns, pikes and other weapons. These again were very distinct from the largely bureaucratic warrior class that emerged in the peaceful Edo period under the Tokugawa shoguns (1603–1867). It was only at this time that warrior status was formally defined and became hereditary, with two swords as the symbol of the samurai class. Even within this group, however, the great lords and senior retainers had little in common with those on the bottom rungs of samurai society, many of whom were under or unemployed.
Samurai fictionalized
Throughout all these periods, idealized and fictionalized accounts of famous warriors and battles were popular not only among the samurai, but also provided material for tales and media consumed by all strata of society. These narratives were often both heroic and tragic, and could involve figures torn between loyalty and duty towards family, superiors or even the supernatural. While the obligations and motivations in these stories were often highly engaging, they didn’t necessarily reflect the historical reality or the ethical norms in the eras in which they were produced and consumed.
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One famous example is the tale of the 47 rōnin (masterless samurai) who took lethal vengeance on the man whom they held responsible for the death of their lord in the early 1700s. This historical incident was soon dramatized and has since provided the basis for countless plays, books and films over the past three centuries, including The Loyal 47 Ronin (1958). The fictionalized accounts are often referred to as Chūshingura, the ‘treasury of loyal retainers’.
Despite its popularity and fame, the revenge killing itself was unique in the early modern period, and its meaning and the legitimacy of the rōnins’ actions were fiercely debated at the time. While some commentators condemned the rōnin for going against the law in their action, others praised their dedication and loyalty. Yet another opinion, voiced especially by the samurai Yamamoto Tsunetomo (1659–1719), was that the rōnin should have immediately sought vengeance after their lord’s execution, rather than biding their time and planning for two years – although they would almost certainly have been killed and failed in their mission, Yamamoto felt that this would have preserved their honour. As the controversy around this incident reflects, although warriors may have had ethical guidelines and beliefs, there was no commonly accepted samurai ethic, under the label of bushidō or any other name.
Historical development and the evolving meaning of bushido
In fact, the very term bushidō came into widespread use only from the 1890s onward, long after the samurai themselves had been abolished. After the collapse of the Tokugawa regime in 1867, the new imperial government formally eliminated hereditary social classes as well as samurai privileges. A new military was created on Western models, using conscripts rather than samurai, and the latter were widely seen as problematic relics of the recent past. As the Japanese empire strengthened and modernized, the state increasingly emphasized education and the promotion of patriotism and national identity.
In the last decade of the nineteenth century, in their search for a national spirit, several Japanese thinkers began to conceptualize and promote bushidō as a moral code that could represent all Japanese. Many of these intellectuals were fluent in European languages and were inspired by the idealized knightly virtues that were being celebrated in the West as part of a sweeping ‘chivalric revival’ in the nineteenth century. Bushidō was posited as a counterpart especially to British notions of chivalry, and became especially influential after Japan’s victory in the Sino-Japanese War in 1895 seemed to provide evidence for Japan having a pronounced martial spirit.
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Outside of Japan, the greatest influence on views of bushidō was Nitobe Inazō’s (1862-1933) book Bushido: The Soul of Japan, written in English and published in 1900. In line with Japanese authors of the previous decade, Nitobe presented bushidō as a Japanese equivalent to European chivalry, drawing parallels between famous texts and figures from Japan and the West, and focusing on virtues such as honor, loyalty and honesty. His book rapidly became a bestseller after the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05.
If Japan’s victory over China sparked discussions of bushidō within Japan, the concept went truly global after Japan defeated Russia. This was a much larger conflict than the war with China and was the first time an Asian nation had won a war against a major European empire. Media accounts of bravery and sacrifice by Japanese troops attracted attention around the world and bushidō was widely portrayed as the reason for their success. In this context, Nitobe’s book quickly became and remains the most popular book on the subject in English and many other languages into which it has been translated.
In spite of Nitobe’s global success, however, his book was widely criticized within Japan as being ahistorical and written for foreigners. Nitobe’s attitude towards European chivalry was seen as too deferential by many of his contemporaries, and was blamed on his own Christian faith. In contrast, by the time Nitobe was writing in 1900, mainstream bushidō theories in Japan had become more militaristic and promoted the idea that bushidō was far superior to chivalry and other foreign ethical systems.
In the following decades, bushidō became a key pillar of the nationalistic ideology of imperial Japan, until defeat in the Second World War in 1945. It was also popularized through novels, films, plays and other samurai-themed media that were eagerly consumed by the Japanese public. At the same time, bushidō remained highly influential abroad, especially due to the influence of Nitobe’s work. Throughout this period, Japan was widely seen as being guided by the legacy of the samurai, which was considered either positive or negative in countries that were allied or in conflict with Japan.
Bushidō post-war
After the end of the Second World War, bushidō was rejected both within Japan and in other countries as a supposed cause of Japanese militarism. Under the Allied Occupation of Japan that lasted from 1945 to 1952, samurai films, martial arts and other activities and cultural products deemed to be ‘militaristic’ by the occupation authorities were banned.
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From the mid-1950s, however, bushidō and samurai narratives once again became popular, albeit with a focus on the premodern era safely removed from the excesses of the imperial state. Samurai films by directors such as Kurosawa Akira were big hits, although the samurai they featured were often more complex and troubled figures than in the idealized films of the 1930s. These samurai films were also consumed in other countries, where they inspired many remakes, most famously cowboy Western films such as Magnificent Seven (based on Seven Samurai) or A Fistful of Dollars (based on Yōjimbō).
As Japan’s economic power grew rapidly in the second half of the twentieth century, its cultural influence also expanded and samurai content was increasingly consumed and produced around the world. In the twenty-first century, samurai are once again a global icon and more popular than ever before. At the same time, bushidō remains a key element of samurai content, even if its more modern origins are often overlooked.
Discover more about classic samurai films in Japan House London’s film season Samurai on screen, on until 24 June 2026.
Oleg Benesch is Professor and Head of the Department of History at the University of York, with a focus on the history of Japan in a global context. He has spent more than six years studying and researching in Japan. He is the Research Partner on the British Museum special exhibition Samurai, and co-author of the exhibition book (British Museum Press, 2026). His other publications include Inventing the Way of the Samurai: Nationalism, Internationalism, and Bushido in Modern Japan (Oxford University Press, 2014).