Calane da Silva writing the story of first African Samurai, “first true Mozambican hero” – Yasuke

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Calane da Silva writing the story of first African Samurai, “first true Mozambican hero” – Yasuke

8:12 CAT | 23 Nov 2016

File photo / For illustration porposes only

Mozambican writer Calane da Silva is writing a new novel based on the story of Yasuke, a slave probably from the Island of Mozambique who in the 16th century became the first black samurai in Japan.

“The idea is to write the story of a man who is one of us, but little known,” Calane da Silva told Lusa. For Calane da Silva, Yasuke is the “first true Mozambican hero”, and a man who helped reunify Japan.

Yasuke arrived in Japan in 1579 as a servant of the Italian Jesuit missionary Alexandre Valignano, who visited the Japanese country from India.

The height, posture and strength of the slave, allegedly from the Island of Mozambique, caught the attention of warlord Oda Nobunaga, who bought Yasuke and taught him martial arts.

In spite of there being little information about Yasuke, and of many of the stories attributed to him lacking proof, the old slave’s name was associated with a great warrior in the battles of Nobunaga, earning the title of samurai.

“This was the first African samurai,” says Calane da Silva, urging the importance of researching similar stories about Mozambican heroes of pre-independence times despite limitations regarding sources.

Thought to come from Mozambique, although his large size might suggest Ethiopia or Somalia, Yasuke eventually became a legend in Japan, but Mozambicans are still ignorant of a story which should “ennoble and motivate” them.

“He was a man with incredible strength of spirit and deserves to be remembered,” the Mozambican writer says.

Yasuke has been the subject of a children’s story and even a video game in Japan, and his name crops up in several books and films about Nobunaga. More recently, the João Ferreira dos Santos Group’s Tecnica Industrial company has chosen the name of Yasuke for a new Mitsubishi all-terrain model, launched last week in Maputo.

Stories of Yasuke’s last years are again shrouded in mystery. According to da Silva, he married a daughter of Nobunaga, who presented him with a house in Japan, but in the end he eventually returned to the Island of Mozambique.

Source: Lusa