著者

木下 秀明

出版者

一般社団法人 日本体育学会

雑誌

体育学研究 (ISSN:04846710)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.51, no.2, pp.151-163, 2006

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Michiaki Nagai, the only professor of gymnastics (now known as physical education) at Tokyo Higher Normal School, was the only person who maintained that the aim of <i>kendo</i> (swordsmanship) should be not simply to advance its techniques but to build up spiritual ability through swordsmanship practice, taking the place of <i>gekiken</i>, a part of <i>kenjutsu</i> (swordsmanship), which was hitting practice with a bamboo sword. He first suggested this idea at the first special school for swordsmanship instructors selected from middle schools across Japan, held by the Ministry of Education in 1911. The aim of this article is to clarify when Nagai decided to change the name from <i>gekiken</i> to <i>kendo</i> by researching all of his articles and books describing martial arts, including swordsmanship, published from 1909, when he returned from abroad study, to 1915, when he wrote the foreword for <i>kendo</i>, the first great reference book for instructors, written by S. Takano, the swordsmanship instructor of the School. It is concluded that because Nagai did not have any idea about the name for swordsmanship with a bamboo sword at the beginning of his research, he used <i>gekiken</i> as the subject name for the School. However, he decided to use <i>kendo</i> instead of <i>gekiken</i> in August 1910, when the School adopted <i>kendo</i> as the subject name. As soon as the Ministry adopted <i>gekiken</i> as the official term for the school subject in July 1911, he acted publicly to use <i>kendo</i> for the School, in spite of the decision of the Ministry.