Talk:Jitte - Misplaced Pages

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Bandit ronin hunting

As I understand, this weapon played a key role in the hunting down of bandit ronin. If anyone knows more about this storyline and the role this weapon played, I'd appreciate learning. -- Sy /

Well, if it was a common law enforcement weapon, and law enforcement officers frequently hunted bandits, then naturally it would frequently end up being employed against bandit ronin. -Toptomcat 22:42, 22 November 2006 (UTC) (Also- 'storyline?')

Etymology

The article puts the meaning of the name as "十手; the power of ten hands weapon". Is there a source on that? It seems like an over interpretation of the kanji. I was under the impression that it had more to do with the shape of the jitte.

I can't find anything to suggest that this is a correct etymology. Also, it has the name 実手 according to the Japanese article. --DannyWilde 07:35, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

"Ju" means ten, "Te" means hand or hands. A1ecks

As far as I know, the jutte originally had a cross shape, so "jutte" would mean "ten (in the) hand". I have no valid sources for this. It might give a hinch though

Kennin 17:11, 22 May 2008 (CET)

Why is it sometimes referred to as "jitte", when it is a composition of "jū" and "te"? Jutte I understand, due to the old age of the word. Jitte on the other hand does not make sense.

Kennin 17:15, 22 May 2008 (CET)

The article also later states "it resembled its name of "ten hands", having that many prongs," so the article itself is internally inconsistent on what the etymology is.

As I'm sure many of you know, Japanese the character for ten (十 juu) is a plus-sign shape, and it refers to many shapes of two lines meeting at perpendicular angles. Take the Japanese word for "cross," "十文字 juumonji," which literally means "the character juu (ten)" but often refers to the shape. This seems like the mostly likely etymology to me. Either way, there really needs to be a source.

As for "jitte", the character for ten (juu) is (according to what is taught in elementary schools) actually supposed to be read "ji" in many kanji combinations, but modern usage now allows "juu" as well. Take for example "jitten" for "ten points," even though "juuten" is equally intelligible and in use. Many older people will still use the "ji" reading in kanji combinations.

Also, I'm not sure if we should make a huge effort to try and literally translate the "ten" and the "hand" from the name. A mention of how it references the shape is probably enough.

-Karl —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.23.60.64 (talk) 00:54, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Sword-breaker?

In the Robert Jordan "wheel of time" series, there's a weapon carried by a law enforcement official called a "sword-breaker". Is this (which I haven't encountered elsewhere in fiction) perhaps modeled upon the jitte? --Alvestrand 00:41, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

See also Katar, also a sword-breaker.--Ketin Porta 13:10, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I later found Sword breaker too. Seems Jordan's version is European, after all.... --Alvestrand 14:07, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

jutte not neccessarily a sword breaker

as taught in the bujinkan system, specifically takagi yoshin ryu, the jutte was used to arrest the blade and control its motion, possibly twist it out of the hands of the weilder.

while is is concievable two weapons could break a sword, one alon would yeild a situation that would probly be safest to catch the blade, run the jutte to the tsuba (hilt) and control the attackers arms to disarm them and control thier body movement.

- At my dojo (also bujinkan), we were told that the jitte's tyne is *not* there to break or catch swords specifically -- although it could be used for that purpose -- it's there just as much (or perhaps more) to trap the fingers, to press into pressure points like the clavicle, sternum or wrist, and to hook into clothing. Harry Metcalfe 18:34, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

The tine serves a number of purposes in Juttejutsu. While it can be used to catch swords, the proximity of the hand makes it quite unsafe to catch on the blade side as the sword strikes in. Rather, it was more often the case that one would evade the sword and trap the back of the blade, thereby retaining a stronger position. Other uses would include trapping the wrist at a draw, or trapping extremities, pressing into joints, pressure points, or hooking openings (mouth, nose, etc.). For information regarding Jutte use, I'd suggest looking for information on Edo Machikata-ryu Juttejutsu.Stslavik 18:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I've updated this section based on the comments here. Harry Metcalfe (talk) 22:18, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

I think it needs to be reworded to be closer to Stslavik's original phrasing. As it is now, it essentially says that "it's false the it was used to catch a blade, but was instead used to catch a blade." It's all in the details; Stslavik meant that it wasn't used to catch the edge of the blade, but rather the unsharpened back and thereby control the blade or the blade-wielder's arm or arms. 71.200.140.35 (talk) 11:11, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Pronunciation

How do you pronounce it, anyone?

Ji (Jea as in blue JEAns) tte (te as in TEchnology) Japanese pronunciation of vowels is largely (a)ah, (e)eh, (i)ee, (o)oh, (u)oo

Also, Japanese syllables should be pronounced for an equal length of time per syllable. In the case of a double-t like in Jitte, the doubling indicates a space of a syllable inbetween the two. じって　the character in the middle indicates this space of silence. 24.48.159.136 23:26, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Stub

I removed the stub tag. I think the article contains too much information to qualify as such. Sven Lotz 09:04, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Blunt or edged?

I'm 95% sure that jitte are typically blunt, but the article is somewhat vague on that point. Do edged examples exist? -Toptomcat 22:42, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, they do, either having the hooks or the main bar being sharpened. --Hatsukanezumini 21:21, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

There are some versions that have a blunt end, but if it is ever grabbed or trapped in some way, all the user has to do is twist and the hollow blunt end screws off to reveal a dagger. --Ghostexorcist 17:45, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Trivia

Moved trivia section here per WP:TRIV and WP:WPMA#Trivia and fiction sections. Bradford44 17:27, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

thumb|Inspector Ishida, kneeling, is holding a jutte.

Zenigata Heiji, a fictional okappiki who carries a jutte.
Sodom a character from the Street Fighter Alpha and Final Fight game series who uses a pair of jutte as weapons.
Smoker in One Piece has a large jutte he carries on his back.
In Gundam 0083 episode 09, the RX-78GP01Fb Gundam Full Vernian "Zephyranthes" uses a small beam jutte that flames out of the top wrist to parry an incoming beam saber from a Zeon mobile suit.
Sakami "The Saw" Manzou, a detective in the anime series Samurai Champloo, carries a jutte and puts it to some novel uses.
Manji the main character of Blade of the Immortal has two short-swords shaped like Jutte, as well as two smaller weapons which he notes to be able catch/break a sword in the same style as a Jutte. Additional the secondary character Doa later steals a Jutte from a policemen and sharpens it to use it as offensive weapon.
The title character from the Hanzo the Razor series of films is a constable in the Edo period of Japan. He carries 2 jittes(these having lengths of chain concealed in the handles) and routinely uses them as one of his primary weapons.
In the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan, thief-catchers like Juilin Sandar use a weapon called a sword breaker, which performs a similar function to a jitte.
In the Magic: The Gathering card game, a card called Umezawa’s Jitte is a much played card that is widely considered to be very powerful.
In the Usagi Yojimbo comic book, the police detective, Inspector Ishida, is a formidable master with the weapon.
Inspector Zenigata, the antagonist from the Lupin III series, uses a jutte when not utilizing his famous handcuff-throwing technique.
In the MMORPG Guild Wars, the jitte is a sword that deals blunt damage.
In the film Battle Royale, Keita Iijima obtains a jutte from his day pack.
In the anime series Ronin Warriors, the character Lady Kayura uses twin jutte.
In the Nintendo DS game Contact, the Jutte is a fairly strong Club-type weapon that improves defense.
In the anime series Cyber City Oedo 808, officers of the Cyber Police Squad use the jutte as a weapon and as a method of identification.
In the Soul Calibur video game series, the female ninja Taki has a pair of Jutte amongst her extra weapons.
In the MMORPG Asheron's Call, Jitte are weapons of the mace family. They do slightly less damage than the heaviest mace-type weapons but have a higher defensive bonus.
In the MMORPG Ragnarok Online, the Ninja use the Jutte as a ninja-only dagger family weapon that does not deal too much damage, but can in exchange break the opponent's weapon in a relatively high chance per attack.
The character of the constable in Yojimbo_(film) wields a Jutte, but only as a demonstration of his status as a (corrupt) officer, insisting that the character of Sanjuro seek employment as a warrior for one of the gambling gangs, though Sanjuro enforces the law in the movie more effectively than the constable himself!

Removed photo request

I added a photo of a Jutte and removed the previous photo, as this is more appropriate. --Torsodog 05:09, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Mediation

This article is being mediated here. Due to a lack of responses from other parties, I have advised Samuraiantiqueworld to keep working on the article as seems necessary. If parties object to this, please voice that objection here and do not resort to edit warring or anything like that. Thank you. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:44, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

References for editors to read

Samuraiantiqueworld (talk) 23:35, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Awkward Sentence

The sentence "This law applied to everyone except the shogun's sons and hatamoto, including the palace guards." is almost impossible to parse. Does it mean, the hatamoto (including the palace guards) were excluded? That makes the next part nonsensical, but does seem to be the most obvious reading of the sentence. Instead, I think it means everyone was prohibited except sones and hatamoto, and the prohibition included the palace guards. Perhaps it should read "This law applied to everyone (except the shogun's sons and hatamoto), including the palace guards." It is still ugly, but it reads more clearly. Or maybe even, for the sake of clarity, drop some of the detail and just write "This law applied to nearly everyone, including the palace guards." We don't really need the specific exclusions here, so this works even better. (By the way, this whole section is word-for-word from the web page cited, which seems a bit like plagiarism. I am going to change this one sentence, but the rest may need to be cleane dup too to avoid unattributed, um, "borrowing" from another source.) 76.111.27.52 (talk) 07:37, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

Requested move

The request to rename this article to Jitte has been carried out.

If the page title has consensus, be sure to close this discussion using {{subst:RM top|'''page moved'''.}} and {{subst:RM bottom}} and remove the {{Requested move/dated|…}} tag, or replace it with the {{subst:Requested move/end|…}} tag.

Jutte → Jitte – The actual name is "jitte" (十手). "Jutte" is a misspelling along the lines of "Tokio". Konjakupoet (talk) 13:47, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Comment "Tokio" isn't a mispelling, it's a different romanization scheme. -- 70.24.250.103 (talk) 22:58, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

It's an inaccurate different romanization scheme that doesn't differentiate between the vowel -i and the consonant -y-. And most of the time it is used (in English, anyway), it is in the same sources that for more obscure words and names stick strictly to some form of Hepburn, so it can't be treated as a different romanization system in those cases. Konjakupoet (talk) 03:22, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Comment what about Juttejutsu ? -- 70.24.250.103 (talk) 22:58, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't know. That article doesn't cite its sources. But the word "juttejutsu" doesn't appear in any of my Japanese dictionaries. And no one in Japan seems to think that the word is pronounced "juttejutsu": 7 hits for "Juttejutsu" -Misplaced Pages < 579 hits for "Jittejutsu" -Misplaced Pages. Konjakupoet (talk) 03:22, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Japanese language results are frankly irrelevant in determining English usage. Many words borrowed into English are corrupted but it is not Misplaced Pages's job to prescribe usage. — AjaxSmack 04:00, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

The above post was about a separate word. Honestly if we can't use professional, scholarly sources in Japanese and are limited to martial arts magazines, then Misplaced Pages is doomed. Konjakupoet (talk) 10:38, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

No, Misplaced Pages is not doomed. It is a general (not a scholarly) reference work that reflects common English usage, whether scholars agree or not. — AjaxSmack 01:55, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Oppose without further rationale. Almost all of the article's sources use jutte. See also the latter part of this section above for more info on the spelling and pronunciation. — AjaxSmack 02:20, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Check Japanese Misplaced Pages. The Japanese dictionaries Daijisen and Meikyō Kokugo Jiten, as well as the encyclopedias Britannica and My Pedia, and the J-E dictionary Progressive Wa-Ei-chū Jiten all say it is pronounced jitte and make no reference to jutte. It appears this is another case like "jigai" and "nodachi" where "Cool Japan" books written by westerners who don't speak Japanese and don't live here have picked up some mistaken understanding of the meanings of Japanese words and it found its way onto Misplaced Pages. Konjakupoet (talk) 03:08, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Additionally, see GBooks and GScholar for the evidence that even though this misunderstanding is widespread, the spelling "jitte" still wins out in terms of reliable sources. (The vast majority of the yielded books written by people with the name "Jutte" that had nothing to do with Japan, so the qualifier Edo weaponry is needed.) Konjakupoet (talk) 03:22, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Good points but English Misplaced Pages treats Japanese usage as less relevant than English usage and dictionary entries of Japanese pronunciation are not considered acceptable evidence of English usage. The Google results are more convincing but, when I use "'Jutte' samurai weaponry" and "'Jitte' samurai weaponry" as search terms, I get aa over 2:1 majority of hits for "Jutte". — AjaxSmack 04:00, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages uses reliable sources, regardless of language. There are hardly any reliable sources on this subject readily available in English, but thousands in Japanese. By including the phrase "samurai weapon" you have biased your results in favour of unscholarly "Cool Japan" books and magazines. The jitte was not a "samurai weapon" -- it was a weapon used by police enforcers (捕吏, which are not the same thing as samurai) during the Edo period. Konjakupoet (talk) 05:57, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

I checked your results: of the first 50 hits for each, 40 for "jutte" are just different issues of the non-academic martial arts magazine Black Belt, compared to only 21 for "jitte". "Jitte" also came up with hits in the highly-respected Japanese studies journal Monumenta Nipponics well-known multilingual magazine Nipponia. Konjakupoet (talk) 07:22, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Complete analysis: It was actually 28/83 for "jitte" come from Black Belt, compared to 113/153 for "jutte". Additionally, several of the more reliable-ish non-Black Belt sources that use "jutte" make it subordinate to "jitte". So basically if we disregard this one non-scholarly magazine, we are left with not a 2:1 majority for "jutte", but a 55:40 majority for "jitte". Additionally, I forgot that GBooks search results estimates are usually completely bogus: for my earlier search, the results were actually 35>15 in favour of "jitte". Konjakupoet (talk) 07:41, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't find your arguments extremely convincing. Misplaced Pages is a general reference and not a scholarly work. And the Japanese pronunciation is irrelevant if said pronunciation is not reflected in English usage (cf. ginkgo, yen, rickshaw). I got the info on samurai usage from the sourced intro of the Misplaced Pages article. However, I will withdraw opposition and let others decide on the merits. — AjaxSmack 01:55, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Oppose, Don Cunnungham who is a recognized authority on these weapons discusses why this is called "jutte" and not "jitte" then the is the fact that another weapon which is similar to the "jutte" is called "jitte". He discusses this in his book Taiho-Jutsu p.73 for anyone who is interested in reading that section. . — Preceding unsigned comment added by Darkness walks (talk • contribs) 05:07, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Don Cunningham is not a scholar of Japanese history. He is an English lecturer. Any Japanese dictionary will tell you that this word is pronounced jitte. Please explain why you think these "Cool Japan" books are reliable sources? Additionally, the link you gave is not referring to this word (十手, jitte, "ten hands"), but to the separate (made-up?) word jutte (術手, jutte??, "art hand", although if it were a real word it would properly be read jusshu). Konjakupoet (talk) 05:57, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Comment:Konjakupoet, you either do not do very reliable research or you are deliberately adding misleading statements, Don Cunninghan a well respected author on the subject of Japanese weapons, he has written three books on the subject, he is a PHD and an associate professor at Radford University, and an adjunct professor at Virginia Tech's Language and Cultural Institute, hardly a "lecturer" He also lived in Japan for many years, he researched his book with help from curators and scholars at Meiji university's criminology museum, Fukogawa Museum and the Japanese National Museum.
Support per all the reliable sources I can find and the ones I own have "jitte" as the correct pronunciation. "Jutte" is simply a corruption of that. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 06:16, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Support - About 1,500 GB results jitte + sword vs jutte + sword 800 results 2001-2012 ; seems that more recent sources are spelling the sword per standard Japanese. In ictu oculi (talk) 17:04, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
FACT:There is another weapon which is named jitte, p.36 of Classical weaponry of Japan: special weapons and tactics of the martial arts By Serge Mol devotes a section to this weapon, clearly a completely separate weapon from the jutte, there are several different varieties of jitte shown. Serge Mol has written several books and he has lived in Japan for years and is a fluent speaker of Japanese as well as having a Japanese wife, he has studied and practiced martial arts in Japan. He provides a detailed history and usage of this weapon. There are pictures of several different types and well as pictures of it being used, how can you rename an article to a name that already has a weapon with that name. What if someone were to write an article about this particular weapon, what then??? Here is a link to a similar jitte that sold online.
COMPROMISE, I think that under these circumstances the best thing to do would be to add a section in the jutte article were people like Konja can explain why they feel the wording in incorrect, I would have no problem with that.Darkness walks (talk) 08:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

--karakuri jitte--

Oppose Although the correct Romanization of the Japanese pronunciation is Jitte, an article title is determined by the most common English name rather than the correctness of Romanization. According to the Google Book search, the most common English name is Jutte.

"Jutte" weapon 1,500
"Jitte" weapon 980

―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 12:43, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Could you try that again with some restrictions like "-Misplaced Pages" and so on? IIO and myself have already pointed out that in GoogleBooks, and I noticed your results include such things as "www.narutoforums.com". Konjakupoet (talk) 13:14, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, KP, but Ajax has got it right. WP:COMMONNAME says we use the name most commonly used in English-language sources, regardless of how it appears in sources in other languages, even the language from which the term was adopted, and with little weight to how it appears in glossaries or Japanese-English dictionaries. Remember, interlingual dictionaries are tertiary sources, so they have narrower applications to WP articles. Since secondary sources are preferred for researching/writing an article, they also get preference for naming the article. I see where you're coming from, KP, but for better or worse, the convention on en.WP is to give strong preference to English sources over those in the topic's source language. Sometimes it's frustrating to me too, when the English sources butcher terms from another language, but WP is descriptive, not prescriptive. Wilhelm Meis (☎ Diskuss | ✍ Beiträge) 16:59, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, no, not in this case. IIO and I already pointed out, this subject is best-known in reliable sources by its correct name jitte. The majority of the results in Phoenix7777's above search are Misplaced Pages mirrors, random blogs and message boards, and other websites that don't meet WP:RS. "Google Books ... is a better measure than a normal Google search". Konjakupoet (talk) 14:56, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Comment Ajax has withdrawn his oppose !vote, but this is still kind of giri-giri. He commented before withdrawing his vote that all of the sources currently cited in the article use jutte rather than jitte. This is actually completely wrong, as I will demonstrate.

Of the nine sources currently in the article:

(1) Kirby & Lee is of questionable reliability. "Ohara Publications" is a perhaps-notable publication of martial arts books (not history books) that seems to have been inactive since the late 1980s.

(2) Turnbull uses jitte and not jutte.

(3) Cunningham (as cited by the blocked sockpuppet DW above) appears to use jutte, but he clearly establishes that he means 十手 ("ten-hands"), which is always read as jitte, and (perhaps mistakenly) claims that jitte is written as 実手 ("truth-hand").

(4) Mol uses jutte, but makes a similar mistake to Cunningham, thinking that jitte is a different weapon/written with a different kanji.

(5) Deal use jitte and not jutte.

(6) Pauley & Pauley uses both, apparently with no preference, even specifically stating that the jutte is also known as jitte.

(7) Louis & Ito use jutte -- can't argue with that.

(8) vancouverjujitsu.org cites Kirby & Lee as its only source, and if we use the home pages of random martial arts schools as sources for our military history articles we are going to get into trouble down the road.

(9) guildwiki.org, judging from its name, almost certainly fails WP:RS.

So of 7 independent, possibly-reliable sources (dismissing vancouverjujitsu.org as subordinate to Kirby & Lee, and guildwiki.org as a wiki) we have 2 that prefer jitte, 1 that uses both, 2 that prefer jitte, and 2 that use both but prefer jutte but really seem to prefer jitte because their authors don't appear to know what they're talking about. And one of the two that prefer jutte doesn't even belong because it only backs up a dictionary-definition.

Konjakupoet (talk) 15:11, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

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