Why Samurai Don T Use Shields
Nah foot soldiers did use bamboo shields.
Why samurai don t use shields. Samurai typically didn t use shields. They generally have a tendency to just throw their shield arm way back while attacking thereby making it completely useless. Shields in general during that time period for japan were a strange concept actually and if i remember correctly most infantry didn t even use shields. Simple they are infantry not samurai.
It wasn t unheard of but just very uncommon. Most westerners believe that samurai were swordsmen only but they were multi role fighters and most likely found on a horse and more likely to st. The samurai started as mounted archers. Since you can t use a bow without two hands personal hand held shields became unviable so they instead latched those onto their armor.
When ashigaru lower class infantry came along they had no use for portable shields either because they were usually armed with spears. A samurai on horseback wearing ō yoroi 大鎧 in the beginning soldiers wore their shields so they had two hands to do other stuff like firing arrows using other two handed cqc weapons. Although the preference is not to use hand held shields sometimes the samurai class did use shields whilst riding into battle. In a historical battle that kind of behavior would have gotten them.
On why didn t the samurai use shields as often in addition to the inconvenience a hand held shield poses to a horse borne archer one of the clearest reason is because the unique samurai armour the kogusoku and ōsode. Large armor plates were attached to the shoulders to afford the guy extra protection in place of a personal shield. From my knowledge samurai didn t use shields because they saw it as a dishonourable way to fight for you are protecting yourself with an object and not a sword. There was no use for shields for them because it hindered them from properly using the yumi japanese long bow.
Spider man does not fly he falls with style.