This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Kizor: Props for coming up with this trope - completely true, excellent conceptualization! That said, the roots of the assumption run deep a few links to authoritative sources would probably help in convincing the populace.
Pepinson: And it's only fair to mention that, technically, the katana is better. Remember, European swords were usually regarded as ordinary weapons, and their quality consequently varied greatly—but in Japan, not only was weapon-quality iron a rare commodity, but the katana and wakizashi (collectively, the daisho) were badges of nobility. Thus, the Japanese swordsmith (who, by the by, was one of only a few people even allowed to touch a sword) didn't have the option of wasting metal on cheap, low-quality blades. Therefore, the average katana is, in fact, superior to the average European sword.
Note, however, that this does not extend to other Japanese weapons; common infantrymen (usually civilian militia members) typically carried curved pikes called naginata, which were roughly equal in utility to their continental counterparts. Furthermore, the swords of European nobility were made with just as much care as the daisho, and their wielders just as skilled as the samurai. And while we don't have the names of any great European swordsmiths (i.e. counterparts to Masamune and the other Japanese masters), there are entire regions of Europe and the middle east, like Toledo and Damascus, known for the quality of their blades.
Tulling: I would like to remark that the use of this trope by non-japanese may have something to do with it being "permissible" to romanticise or idolise an exotic culture, and buy into the myth of something rather than examining it properly and depicting it in a reasonable fashion. It is supposedly common in Japan, among those that are truly interested in history and are reasonably level-headed, to consider the samurai a reactionary ruling class that oppressed the rest of the population. It would be interesting to see some inversions of this trope: a reasonably realistic example would be samurai that hacks away at a knight in full plate armour and all the blows glance off, then the knight punches through the samurai's armour with a spiked mace, which historically were specifically designed to defeat armour (It is fairly simple physics, a matter concentrating force in a single point rather than along an edge). By the way, are thieves really the counterparts of ninjas? I would say no, that there is no "western" stock character type that corresponds to the depiction of ninja in popular culture.
Ununnilium: Ninja were... a lot of things. Anyway, the "permissible to romanticize" thing is part of it, but I think the reaction that I cited in the entry might be, too.
Roland: Yes, there's no exact parallel to the ninja in the West, but at their core the ninja were essentially just guerilla warriors, thieves, and spies who happened to use superstitions to enhance their reputation. It's the closest equivalent- another good one would be the hashashin, who you barely even see mentioned.
Robert: There are quite a few assassin's guilds in fantasy, ultimately inspired by the hashshashin from whom the name comes.
Roland: True, Robert, but while an assasin's guild may be portrayed in a variety of ways, they don't generally have the 'superior mystique' aura that ninja characters do, despite the fact that they are essentially the same thing.
Space Ace: Of course, assassins were active in Europe at those times as well, as they've been in nearly every civilization, although organisation was different. One detailed example is the killing of William of Orange, who had a price placed on his head. But I feel part of the ninja mystique is in part their exotic nature and the fact that they formed an elite.
Good trope, by the way. I can't count the times I've heard/seen people mention it. It seems to go hand in hand with the preposterous belief that plate armour was too heavy and unwieldy to be practical (while it was, in fact, lighter than the equipment a modern infantryman carries into combat).
Tulling: What kind of people mention that? My prejudices make me believe it is fanboys with a Japan fetish. And you are right that such a belief is preposterous; Those people evidently haven't asked themselves this very simple question: If plate armour was so impractical, why did it remain in wide use for at least 200 years? I seem to recall that the first suit of fully covering plate were created in the 1430s-40s, partial plate in use significantly earlier, and that cuirassiers of the thirty years wars still used a form of plate mail that covered everything below the knees, on which they wore leather riding boots.
10Kan: Part of the reason that Western weapons are often disparaged compared to the romance surrounding the katana are the later Western arms instructors, who created many of the popular misconceptions about Western swords. Since they practiced their art in a time when swordplay had been relegated to sport fencing and duels of honor, they considered the weapons of previous ages crude and unwieldy compared to their featherweight smallswords or epees. Such narrow foyning weapons were well and good for civilian purposes, but only rose to dominance once firearms had made steel armor a liability. It's from these individuals that we get the fallacious ideas that a broadsword was little more than a 'club with edges' and that swords weighed dozens of pounds.
Video games may also contribute to the romance in more fundamental ways than displaying cultural chauvinism. As far as I know, no one has yet designed a game where swords behave in a realistic fashion. They always travel through their target in a clean arc, and when used for defense they can simply be held in place to receive an attack without risk of being deformed or broken, not even giving the wielder's hands a nasty sting. This isn't just a reflection of the katana mythos; it would be extremely difficult to simulate actual parrying swordplay due to its complex, freeform nature. Since most people see swordplay in video games more often than in other parts of society, the trope is strengthened.
Ununnilium: Hopefully, the Wii will lead to some attempts at realistic swordplay.
Pepinson: Oh, and one more little historical gem; plate armor actually did get pretty cumbersome in the 1600s, in an attempt to protect the wearer from firearms. They gave up on that after they realized that armor sturdy enough to stop a bullet was so heavy that fighting effectively in it was nearly impossible—the fact that people could even walk wearing that much metal is a testimony to the perfect articulation of the suit!
Space Ace: Tulling, it seems a lot of people buy into the armour misconception (arguably, Japanophilia only compounds it). Like 10Kan said, it might be the result of Renaissance duellists considering themselves superior. Or it's just that people simply conclude that enough steel to cover a person must be incredibly heavy. At any rate, I've heard several times that it weighs about 20 kilograms. I've also once worn a chainmail shirt, and it felt more like a heavy sweater than armour.
Pepinson, I believe full plate was mostly abandoned around that time, although breastplates and helmets were still in use. There could stop the bullets of the period (although I don't know how efficiently). Some were tested after manufacture, resulting in a dent that would be seen as a mark of quality. At least, that was what I read a long time ago.
Roland: The 1600s was pretty much the twilight of true plate armor, yes. That said, they still wore a good amount of plated armor, and yes, a good breastplate could stop a bullet- from range. Same with a longbow arrow, actually- point blank from either would always penetrate. Even from range they sometimes penetrated on a solid hit. The thing to remember is that Medieval and Renaissance/Reformation era warfare didn't have particularly accurate weapons as common battlefield weapons.
A good archer or gunman wasn't so much a pinpoint marksman as he was a fast shot- he'd basically blast an area with shot after shot, artillery style. When you add the fact that most period firearms missed a lot to the fact that a breastplate had a decent chance of protecting you, it begins to look like a very good idea to wear one.
Burai: Removed ...
- "* In many fantasy {{RPGs}}, the katana is a fantastic sword when compared to most Western blades."
Seth: I dont know i think it had its place.
Seven Seals: "Exception: In 3rd edition Dungeons And Dragons, a katana is a just a masterwork bastard sword under another name, no better or worse than its identically-priced European equivalent". Correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't katanas actually better (in the sense of doing more damage) in 2nd Edition AD&D?
Roland: Actually, I think you may be right.
Seven Seals: Hm, I can't find my D&D materials (what little I have) right now to confirm this, but I know at least that one game based on 2nd Edition did this (Baldur's Gate 2). If AD&D really did this, it would be an interesting case of the Katanas Are Just Better nerdfest making way for more "realistic" mechanics. (Not to say that 3rd Edition is realistic, mind you...)
HeartBurn Kid: Yeah, katanas actually were better in 2nd edition, doing 1-10 damage as opposed to the longsword's 1-8. That's one of the 3rd edition tweaks that does serve to make the game a little more realistic (even though 3rd edition was explicitly designed to be easier to play, not more realistic).
Duckluck: I think that's actually why they did it. Because of the new proficiency system, there was no longer any real difference between katanas and bastard swords so they just combined them. It should be noted that the fact that all katanas are automatically masterwork is still an example of this trope. Plus you could make a good argument for katanas being the equivelent of longswords not bastard swords.
Master TMO: I think they went with bastard swords because, like a katana, it can be used either one or two handed. And the katanas all being masterwork quality would be believable *IF* the realm that used them was also metal-poor. Since few campaigns are seen that way, it makes much less sense.
Darktalon: Of course, what D&D calls a longsword is actually an arming sword (one-handed, about 3-3½' long) - a true longsword (4-4½' long, usable with one or both hands) would be indistinguishable from a bastard sword (or a katana) in D&D terms. The bastard sword was more of a thrusting weapon designed to be effective against armour, but D&D doesn't draw the distinction.
Ununnilium: Taking out:
- 2nd edition complicated things further by introducing different damage values against medium sized creatures and large creatures; the No`Dachi was an interesting example in that used against a large sized creature, it had 1d20 damage dice. With Combat and Tactics weapon mastery rules, it was unclear as to whether or not one was supposed to use a 1d30 (which most players didn't have available) or 1d100. (The sage was once asked this and gave a response for 1d30, suggesting that a 1d6 in conjunction with 1d10 used properly generates identical results. I lost the documentation though, so ask him yourself).
...because, while it's interesting, it doesn't have a lot to do with the trope.
Bob: Cutting:
- While there's no katana for comparison, The Slayers has a scene in which the swordsman Gourry whips a broadsword around and buries it in a tree... then, from a dead stop, goes right through the tree to attack another bad guy. So katana aren't the only things that can cut things they logically shouldn't be able to cut. (Magic sword? what are you talking about? the normal blade wasn't magic.)
... because it has nothing to do with this trope. At all.
Vague Troper: rewrote much of the opening text to be less stuffy, contorted and overgeneralizing.
Rogue 7: Don't know how many times I've seen this trope, particularly with regards to Samurai as a whole. Now, I haven't seen Heroes (I still need to catch up on Lost), but what, did Hiro do something to screw up the Tokugawa Shogunate? Because prior to that period, firearms were used by the Japanese just as much as (and possibly more than) in the west. The Shogunate, in their (admittedly pretty damn successful) attempt to close off the country, banned them later on.
Eponymous Kid: Is it just me, or is this trope starting to think it covers ever instance of katanas ever in fiction, not just the times when they're explicitly better than other similar weapons for no reason?
Rogue 7: Quite possibly true. Some pruning would be good.
Eponymous Kid: Because, seriously, just because a katana that Randomly Drops from a powerful boss late in the game is better than the cardboard longsword you start out with doesn't mean Katanas Are Just Better. And I love how there are examples from media taking place in pre-Bakumatsu Japan. What are the katanas being compared to, there?
And Pulp Fiction is in there, but I don't know if it fits. Butch couldn't have gone with the chainsaw; the noise would've given him away. And if he went Batter Up! on Maynard, Zed would've had time to retaliate because just hitting a guy with something once usually won't cut it. It was the natural choice, is what I'm saying.
The Nifty: It's fairly common when Japanese swords are compared to western swords in movies etc, for the Japanese sword to be remarked upon as being much lighter and faster than the western equivalent (The only examples I can think of off the top of my head are the Highlander movies and especially the TV show, but I've Seen It A Million Times.) It's total BS - Katanas are heavier than almost any western sword - only late middle ages (15-16th century) two-handers weigh more. Average weight of a Katana is 4 to 4 1/2 pounds. Western swords vary from 2 to 4 pounds, and even two-handers are often only about 3 1/2. As a result of that and their heavy blade presence they're also slower than most western swords. Probably a way of showing their superiority (of course the weight or speed of a sword doesn't say anything about the quality) . Common enough to add to the main?
Nornagest: I'm afraid you're misinformed, The Nifty. Katana vary widely in weight, but average about 2 1/2 pounds — actually a little less, since historical katana tend to be noticeably shorter than modern ones. That's comparable with Western swords of the knightly pattern. Blades meant exclusively for heavy-duty cutting might reach four, but those should not be considered combat weapons. They do have a modest distal taper by Western standards, but that's balanced out by their longer grips.
They're not much lighter than Western swords filling similar niches, but not much heavier, either. Which should go without saying, really; the niche a hand-to-hand weapon fills is largely determined by its handling characteristics, and weight and blade presence are hugely important there.
I think the whole argument is silly, but as a martial artist who's studied both Japanese and Western styles of swordsmanship, I'd say the Edo-period katana that you see in media are roughly equivalent to European longswords of the 15th and 16th centuries. They have similar length, weight, and balance, and most of the moves you can do with one can be adapted to the other; katana are incapable of false-edge cuts and aren't so accurate on the point, but they cut better (with good form) on the true edge thanks to different edge geometry and the shallow curve in the blade.
The Nifty: *shrug* that'll teach me to get my info on katanas from a book on medieval German longswords.
onyhow: (If I'm wrong, help correct) "That said, a Katana is far more *flexible* than a European sword." Uh, what flexible? If you mean the sword itself, katana is built to be more stiff than western sword, and if sword technique, one-edged sword is much less flexible to use techniques...
Yea, maybe I just don't understand what this trope is about but I have no idea where it came from. There are far more games and animes where the characters, especially the main character, use European swords and where the European swords are the ultimate weapons (most notable, the FF series i suppose). It's even more surprising (not really though) since these games are made by Japanese and some of these games/animes are actually set IN Japan. When they do have katanas, its usually not the main character who uses it, its some stereotypical Japanese samurai guy/girl. Also, most people, I believe, do say that Japanese swords are indeed, in reality, superior overall to most other swords. There are many gamers and such who are interested, i suppose, in Japanese culture though.
If you're talking about games and films made by Westerners than it is likely that if a katana is used, its used by the main character. I don't know if this is because katanas are deemed as more rare to the west and therefore more interesting that the main character use it. I do think that katanas or non-European swords are less seen in the Western media though but perhaps that makes European weapons seem more common and dull. Regarding Japanese games and animes though, European weapons are the dominant brand used.
Roland: Speaking as the original maker of this trope, I can assure you that anyone who knows anything about swords realizes that Japanese swords are not better; against armored opponents they're actually worse. The trope describes
onyhow: Okay, by virtue of this discussion, I will delete that line.
Fancy Santa Statue: What, no mention of the swords of the Vikings, which were supposedly of higher quality due to their use of pattern-welding?
Roland: Not exactly. Viking swords used the pattern-welding style because it was a good choice for the time. They're good by Dark Age Europe standards, but very few would claim them as superior- if anything they seem to be simple and businesslike in design.
Eponymous Kid: I still say that this article is beginning to think it covers every use of katanas ever. Like, ever. Without exception.
Roland: I call BS on the recent explanation that the katana is technically better. Anyone else want to defend it, or shall I cut it?
Nornagest Cut all of the following. Get some coffee, this'll be a long list —
- * Using katanas (occasionally made of wood) Miyamoto Musashi was able to win dozens of duels who wielded weapons ranging from spears to staffs to scythes. He later wrote The Book of Five Rings in which he describes the katana as being the most versatile weapon, being able to be used in virtually any environment.* By World War Two, comparing a Japanese military katana to one of its European counterparts would give the impression of this trope being a case of Truth in Television. In reality, most European nations learned about the obsolescence of the sword the hard way in the First World War, and by then the semi-automatic pistol had replaced it as everything but a uniform decoration, to the point where they didn't even bother sharpening them anymore.** Except that the vast majority of katanas carried by officers in WWII were cheap, mass-produced pieces of stamped machine steel, no better or more useful than any other hunk of sharpened steel.*** Really the only swords from World War II came from the countries that still thought horse-mounted cavalry were a viable tactic.*** They were, however, more useful than the Japanese semi-automatic pistol of that period
, which was arguably more dangerous to the firer than the target and could accidentally discharge in full working order. These are universally considered one of the worst weapons ever produced- and they entered service.
*** Its worth noting that Japanese forces (using katanas) would have come into combat with Gurkha soldiers in the British army (using kukri, which lie somewhere between big knives and small swords). In cases where they would have engaged in close combat (which would have been fairly often), the kukri's maneuverability and design (which made it ideal for hacking off limbs and heads) would have made it the superior weapon.
* A famous piece of film showed a master swordsman using a katana to cut the barrel of a machine gun in half. The footage was, surprisingly, undoctored; the sword was real, and no camera tricks were employed. But the barrel had already been cut through, and was held together by the cooling shroud, which for the shot was made of little more than aluminum foil, and the actual cut was made by a tamashiwara master. Marvellous propaganda, though.** Memetic Mutation turned this into the idea that a katana can cut a tank in half. "I'd like to see a sword that can cut through a tank" was posted to a message board in response to this, and someone replied with a picture of Anakin Skywalker with his lightsabre.** Mythbusters took this one on, and found that while a manufactured reproduction of a Nihonto swung with extreme power and against a heated barrel still wouldn't cut through, it would definitely screw up the machine gun. (And the reproduction katana.)*** In the same episode, they also test the strength of the katana against various different kinds of weapons such as a Scottish Claymore, a Gladus, and a Rapier. Every weapon the katana struck against except the rapier ended in the katana getting nicked and damaged while the opposing sword was undamaged.** The rule as I heard it was that only modern cheap display katana were banned, and that weapons traded for martial arts or historical re-enactment purposes, or authentic Japanese antiques, were OK. So, cheap rubbish in the hands of a common thug, illegal. Genuine razor-sharp deadly samurai weapons of old Japan, in the hands of trained iaidoka? Not a problem.*** You joke, but when one considers the likelihood of being mugged or assaulted by a trained iaidoka, the above scenario seems perfectly rational.* In spite of that however, some folks who collect or at least admire the Katana had to admit Japan's lack of metalworking technology they made a pretty damn cool sword** It should also be noted that there is a difference between simply hitting something with the sharp side of a blade and slicing it. Doing this properly at speed requires a fair amount of skill.
Mostly natter and irrelevancies, plus the odd Justifying Edit. Let me just reiterate that this trope is about perceptions, not realities. I could go on for hours about the strengths and weaknesses of sword designs, but the real-world performance of katana versus other swords should not be on trial here. All that matters is that the authors of various media give katana outlandishly high capabilities or unusually prominent billing without doing the research — which is pretty obvious.
I'm also not completely sold on the veracity or relevance of the jiann example. A jiann is a completely different kind of sword — straight, single-handed, double-edged, and pommel-heavy where the katana is curved, two-handed, single-edged and tip-heavy. And the claimed capabilities are just this side of ludicrous. About the only reason I didn't cut it is that I didn't want to track down the references.
The Nifty: Just a little more detail in the differences between Japanese and European swords:
Japanese swords were produced from poorer quality steel, with a less effective, colder forging technique. Their folding process was analogous to the pattern-welding techniques used in Europe in the 5th-10th centuries. The Japanese never developed the overshot waterwheel, which, producing about 4-8 HP, was capable of producing more airflow for forges, resulting in greater heat, and allowing European development (as opposed to Indian development by different processes) of crucible steels. Japanese swords are an amazing product of the technology they had, but the tech was pretty crap; the failure rate of Japanese swords was woefully bad and the steel was poor. European swords benefited from a far less static, stagnant culture which allowed evolution and development of new ideas and techniques, resulting in such a wide range of blade typologies.
All that said, it's not really possible to compare Japanese and European swords and say for sure whether one method or design is superior to the other - they were mate to be used in different circumstances - it'd be like asking whether a sports car is "better" than a pickup truck.
Klendt: Removed the following:
- *(note: the bullets hit from the sharp edge of the blade and were essentially having to go through an inch and a half of steel. Shoot side-on and you'll get a very different result).
Thank you for sharing that nugget of joy. How surprising that the blade of a sword is better at cutting and resisting impact than the flat. Any other pearls of wisdom? The testudo formation is much less effective at repelling arrows fired from underneath, you say? An M1 Abrams' armor is much less impressive when its crew is not inside it?
Phartman: Wow, you seem like kind of an asshole.
Klendt: Such a statement was made with no intention other than to make the other side's argument seem less strong. This isn't about arguing. I'll not entertain that. Furthermore, the argument that all that's needed is thicker steel to make a weapon better is an insult to craftsmanship and engineering, and to also ignore the fact that steel core .50 BMG is designed to go through things like steel plate armor in the first place. I won't dignify that either. But have I become rude and jaded after having come out of what may be a five day self-trolling-fest, an asshole, even? Probably.
- Speaking of which... the main article states that .50 BMG ammunition uses copper-jacketed lead projectiles. It is possible that such things exist but NATO spec for it requires use of the original M2 Ball projectile, which has a mild steel core under the copper jacket. There is also M33 Armor Piercing, which has a hardened tool steel core instead (and Army machinists scrounge the MG qualification ranges for M33 projectiles, because once the copper jacket is peeled off, they make dandy center-punches). I do not know which type, if either of these, was used in the testing, but it seemed worth mentioning.
Gambrinus: Took out:
- While there are too many to name, including titles that do not make it over, most j-RP Gs draw on medieval European fantasy. Of which, very few end with the hero chopping up the last boss with a katana. Not to mention games like Onimusha that take place in a time and location where katanas were the norm make for poor examples. This entire entry is a misleading sham.
Someone has an axe to grind, I guess?
Tipz: intro reads like an essay that would perhaps be better off in a Useful Notes page? I did a bit of shortening, but i'm putting the rest here to keep it. It does have some interesting tidbits in it, but just way too many tangents and side notes for a proper trope intro. For more debates, go to the forums: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=jviubju1v3oztnkf68wqbp5e&page=1#6
Intro here:
Most gamers are Nippophiles — the popularity of Ninja and samurai makes this fairly clear. Not only this, Japan is the country of origin of a large number of games. This trope is essentially a manifestation of that love for Western pop-culture conception of Japanese history and culture. Rule of Cool says swords are cooler than guns (except for a certain type of gun), and Japan, historically, didn't take to guns as extensively as the West and in fact repressed their development.
This means that in some games or fantasy universes where Eastern and Western archetypes exist side by side, such as knights in shining armor vs. samurai, ninja vs. thieves, and so forth, the Japan-themed selection tends to just be better. Flashier, more honorable, more skilled, sometimes portrayed in a more positive fashion. (The overwhelming positive representation of ninja in anime and fantasy is an example.) In some extreme cases, anything Eastern/Japanese is just inherently better, logic be damned.
Perhaps the single most obvious example is the ancient Japanese vs Western Swords debate In many games where, say, a katana (and on film, Every Japanese Sword is a Katana) exists alongside Western swords, the hero is more likely to wield the katana and it is definitely more likely to be the superior sword. Chinese and other 'eastern' weapons are often subject to a lesser version of this. This trope may sometimes be used even if it's utterly out of place or anachronistic. Wielders of such weapons frequently possess Implausible Fencing Powers, particularly the kind where a katana can slice through things it really should not be able to cut. Katana-wielders may be shown to be able to deflect bullets with the blade and then cleave the firearms they were launched from — but someone wielding any (non-magical) European-style blade, regardless of whether it is a huge two-handed claymore, a katana-equivalent longsword/sabre or a lightning-quick rapier, will never be shown to manage such feats.
Since fencing with katanas will usually be depicted as being an "honorable" manner of fighting, it will in most cases be implied if not stated outright that using firearms is despicable, cowardly or somehow "low". At the same time, fencing won't be depicted as "low" compared to hand-to-hand combat, nor will it be "low" for a katana wielder to attack people armed with less effective melee weapons, like knives or farming implements. Other standard melee weapons like mauls, flails, and polearms are generally not subject to this trope, but Rule of Cool says none of them are cooler than a sword to begin with. In either case, they're usually given to secondary characters or foes whose sole purpose is to die to the hero with the sword.
It's not just Japanese ethnocentrism, either — this trope appears even in some Western productions, probably part of the mystique that Japanese medieval culture and archetypes holds over anime fans and many gamers. Part of it may be backlash, part of it may be fascination with a view of the Japanese as very traditional, obsessed with honor, and willing to commit ritual suicide at the drop of a hat.
As this trope has its roots in Rule of Cool, occasionally designers just create a unique sword that would be useless in real life, if not outright impossible to wield.
Strangely enough, a number of modern myths about the strength of a Nihonto have been confirmed. In one notable video, a Nihonto blade withstood, with some chipping, seven direct strikes by .50 BMG heavy machine gun bullets before snapping. [1] The same sword had previously been struck by a .45 ACP bullet and been subjected to a sheet metal shear without obvious damage. Of course, since the .50 BMG bullets are made of lead with a copper jacket, the hard Martensite edge of the sword resists the projectile (traveling at 1200 meters/second) and the soft Pearlite core dissipates the impact. A sword should be able to replicate it only if created with the differential hardening used in the tempering process of some sword production. Modern factory-made Japanese-style blades have been shown to be rather less impressive by the Mythbusters.
At the same time, other myths regarding the katana's capabilities against modern weapons have been discredited. While the katana can withstand several high-caliber rounds, as described above, actually blocking a bullet, let alone several, would require reflexes that can be charitably described as "superhuman." Chopping a bullet in half with a katana is not only even more difficult, but it would only create two bullets flying toward the wielder.
Most importantly, the myth of the katana being a better weapon than equivalent European swords (namely the medieval longsword) is debatable. Japanese swords use vastly inferior iron for katanas compared to that available for medieval European swords, necessitating costly and time-consuming efforts by Japanese master swordsmiths to remove impurities from the iron, such as the famous "folding of the blade". Folding iron is a common forging technique not unique to Japan, but Japanese blades were folded many more times than many (but not all) European ones to compensate for the inherent lack of quality in material. (One exception was Viking swords, which were commonly more folded, by orders of magnitude, than most ancient Japanese swords.) Contrary to popular belief, folding a sword does not aid its cutting or edge holding properties at all; it merely makes it more durable by ensuring an even distribution of carbon within the steel (while some other alloying elements will remain layered).
There is some truth to the myth; as stated above, European swordmakers had access to better iron than their Japanese equivalents. However, they also had far more of it, meaning that the relatively materials-intensive sword was much more common in Europe, while in Japan spears were the standard infantry weapon. That means, simply, that the average European sword was little more than a sharpened chunk of metal handed to the peasants in the local militia. In contrast, katanas in Japan, due to their cost, were reserved for samurai and other elite—hence the comparatively large amount of effort that went into making them. European swords made for knights were, as illustrated above, often equal or superior to Japanese swords, not least because the European swordsmiths simply had more experience in the craft.
On the other hand however, European swords are just as good, if not better than the katana. Besides aforementioned better material quality, the longsword was double edged with a point, which was far more difficult to forge than a single edged weapon. The longsword is a much more versatile weapon, able to cut and thrust, and the cruciform hilt construction is a lot better for parrying off blows than the katana. And the second edge allows the weapon to cut in either direction; blows with the "short edge" (which faces the wielder) are a major component of many Western martial arts. Contrary to popular belief, many longswords of equivalent size were just about the same weight. The western swords also aren't the 'blunt, barbaric weapons inferior to the katana in sharpness' many like to claim. While the ability to cut a person in half with a katana has been proven in Deadliest Warrior, western weapons like the longsword and the cutlass were shown to be able to do the same.
Cutting motions were of relatively limited use against armor. Sword designs begin to heavily diverge here, as Europeans wore increasingly sturdier armor made of hardened and spring-tempered steel plates, while the Japanese, due to their poor mineral resources, continued to use armor made largely of soft iron plus non-metal components such as horn. Consequently, European weapons began to focus more on stabbing to overcome more vulnerable sections, while Japanese weapons evolved primarily as a result of warfare against those outside of Japan; the tachi, the main ancestor to the katana, tended to break its tip off when used against Mongolian and Korean armor.
But generally, the only thing that matters is the man behind the sword. Both European and Japanese weapons have been developed through centuries of martial tradition and along with them various techniques to use them effectively, responding to changes in the combat environment as they occur. So in a match between unarmored competitors, the more skilled swordsman will win out.
Now that we got that over with, lets move on.
This trope is distressingly common amongst Mary Sue characters (especially in tabletop roleplaying). Indeed, the image of the purple clad girl with Kaleidoscope Eyes walking down the roads of Middle Earth with her trusty katana by her side is one that seems to come naturally to a lot of amateur writers. It's not so much the ownership of the blade that marks the Sue as it is the total out-of-place anachronistic implications of having one in settings that either shouldn't realistically have them or have rendered them obsolete. Add in the rest of this trope and you can practically hear the eyes rolling. Dual Wielding full-size katanas is pretty much the instant giveaway.
Wooden Katanas Are Even Better is a Sub-Trope. Those wielding a katana may Swipe Their Blades Off.
