Katori Shintō-ryū (香取神道流) or in full:Tenshin Shōden Katori Shintō-ryū (天真正伝香取神道流) is one of the oldest extant Japanese martial arts, and an exemplar of koryū bujutsu.

The school was founded by Iizasa Ienao in 1447 and was popularized in the west by the writings of late Donn F. Draeger.

Links:

• All Katori Shintō-ryū weapons in our shop
• Wikipedia page on Katori Shintō-ryū

Different woodtypes

Hornbeam (Carpinus betulus) is the prefered wood for us at Koryu Bokken for the bokken used in daily practise. Hornbeam has many similarities to the Japanese white oak bokkens used to be made from some 15 years ago.

It has few vessels and the vessels it has are very small; it is about the same desity as Japanese white oak; it is strong; absorbs shocks; the wood dents without splintering and it's color is not to far from white oak to stand out in a dojo, if that may be a problem.

All the hornbeam is cut from our carpenters own private forest in Croatia. Pieces as selected for their shape to follow te sori of your blade and then dried for one year before being procesed.

Hornbeam can be used for both small and long weapons so you can order a full set of weapons with exactly the same colour.

Other woodtypes we offer for long weapons:

• Beech (Fagus sylvatica)
• Wild Cherry (Prunus avium)
• European oak (Quercus petraea)
• Acacia (Albizia procera)
• Jatoba (Hymenaea courbaril)
• Walnut (Juglans cinerea)
• Ipe (Tabebuia serratifolia)

Engraving options

Our woodworker Pero, can engrave your name in you yari by hand. If you like to personalise your bo this way, please select the position and number of caracters. When you have finished your order we'll contact you for your choice of kanji or perhaps help in translating your name to katakana. All engravings will be done in the japanese "regular script" unless you specificly ask us otherwise.