DAWG an African slave who became the best friend of Japan's greatest lord?

Dawg

An African slave that contributed to the unification of Japan?

DAWG

An African slave who became the first foreigner ever to be granted the title Samurai?

DAWG

This real life Afro Samurai has one of the most badass tales ever

And it all started somewhere in Mozambique when an Italian guy found out that his African slave that he just purchased was pretty damn strong

I said your name is TOOBIE

KUNTA KINTE

NYAH

DAMN

STEVE

What'd I say about hitting so hard, man?

I'm sorry, are you alright?

I'm sorry

I'ma show you sorry, man

I'ma show you sorry, bro

So the Italian guy, who went by the name of Alessandro Valignano and lived in Portugal and was a big shot Christian missionary decided to actually make this slave his bodyguard which decidedly made the slave not a slave anymore and as his bodyguard, former slave

Yasuke was to accompany Valignano on his journey to Japan where Valignano planned to spread the word of Christ like

Oh, save me, Jeebus

So in 1579

Valignano and Yasuke set sail from Portugal for Japan and once Yasuke arrived there, man, the Japanese were like

Seriously, I'm not exaggerating

Though there were black men in Japan for most people, it was still literally their first time ever seeing a black man because Japan is a big place after all, it's a country

So in this particular town, at this particular time this was akin to an extraterrestrial suddenly showing up in your city and people lost their damn minds

I really mean that, they are questionable

Historical texts that state that people trampled over each other stampede-level things, you get me to the point where people died just to see this strange, tall, black man all to catch a glimpse of the six-foot-two dark giant who at 188 centimeters towered over the average Japanese at the time of 160 centimeters

So at about the same time, a bunch of Japanese women discovered a new fetish that Black.com later perfected

One of Japan's greatest men also happened to be in this very town

Oda Nobunaga

And calling Oda Nobunaga a great man is actually an understatement

Dude was literally in the process of unifying Japan for the first time ever which still is a massive oversimplification but Nobunaga will get his own video on this channel very soon

Just know that Oda Nobunaga walked around Japan like

I'm him! I'm him!

Of course, Oda Nobunaga noticed the commotion all the hustle and bustle and the excitement so he went to see what's going on and once he saw the African man even the great lord was shook like

NANI?!

He too was not familiar with black man so he was sure that this must be some Robert Downey Jr. type of situation going on here and he was sure that at any given moment

Yasuke would drop the act and reveal

I'm a dude playing a dude disguised as another dude

But no, despite Oda Nobunaga seriously trying his best to reveal

Yasuke's literal true colors by stripping him down having him washed and scrubbed the man stayed black and once Nobunaga realized that Yasuke was in fact truly of dark skin and Oda Nobunaga was happy and amazed, ain't no racism here dark skin and superior height and physique was often the way that Buddha was described and depicted at the time so to Nobunaga this was a sign that

Yasuke might just be of divine parents

Not that Oda Nobunaga believed in any of this religious stuff because this is a guy, Oda Nobunaga that once told a monk that pretended to be holy and walked around from village to village spreading his monk ways

Nobunaga told that monk to kill himself and resurrect if he is so damn holy

Spoiler alert, the monk did kill himself but he stayed dead and didn't resurrect

So yeah, Oda Nobunaga was famously non-religious but also famously clever and knew how to use everything to his advantage for his cause was greater than his detest for religion his one mission was to unify Japan and having a divine appearance by his side could only help his cause so Oda Nobunaga told the Italian man from Portugal that he would make him a vessel to Japan and the dude can spread his Jesus stuff if he gives Oda Nobunaga what he truly cared for

Yasuke and you would not think that a story that starts off with a Japanese man buying a black man after trying to wash away his blackness turns into a story that can cure racism but...

Oda Nobunaga was known to value merit over everything else he had previously turned peasants into noble lords if he saw something in them so he fast-tracked Yasuke into a serious position of power by his side and before long Yasuke was the first foreign samurai an honor that to be honest is historically disputed to be accurate but numerous accounts have him down as the first foreign samurai so we'll go with that and Yasuke definitely did have his own house he did have his own retainers and was well on his way to becoming a lord of his own he was living his best life but of course first and foremost

Yasuke was valued for his strength which also translated into a skill in battle it was obvious that this guy must have had some kind of military background or something because Yasuke was so good in battle that he officially became the first foreign samurai with his own katana and he wielded it in the name of Oda Nobunaga's campaign to unify Japan by murdering other Japanese clans because that's how bringing peace and unifying Japan is done and when not shedding blood in his name

Yasuke told Oda Nobunaga about the world outside of Japan the foreign lands that Nobunaga had never seen tales of Africa, India, Europe tales that put the company of everyone else in Japan to shame so eventually Yasuke and Oda Nobunaga were like

Did we just become best friends?

Yup!

Yasuke even became a regular dinner guest of Oda Nobunaga which doesn't sound like much now but back in the day having dinner with Oda Nobunaga was like the highest honor there were lords praying for the day that Oda Nobunaga would invite them for dinner like itching for it

Yo please man you know the scene you know if you know the scene you know you know you know

I can't it's not this is this is PG right here it was it was a great honor

Oda Nobunaga and Sasuke

I knew I was gonna slip up at some point and say Sasuke is too damn

I blame Naruto it's goddamn Naruto

Sasuke?

SASUKE!

Oda Nobunaga and Yasuke were so close that it would have made many others quite jealous and worried since Yasuke was a foreigner who many felt was no better than an animal so his close friendship with Lord Nobunaga only fueled the despise for Oda Nobunaga that many of his enemies had and Oda Nobunaga had many enemies

I mean this guy was trying to unify Japan that at the time didn't particularly want to be unified so he kind of killed everybody against their will so for Oda Nobunaga at the time was basically like if you're not with me then you're my enemy everybody but Oda and his allies was an enemy and even within his allies not all saw eye to eye with Nobunaga and so eventually one of his men betrayed him

Akechi Mitsuhide how big of a factor was Nobunaga's love for the African foreigner and Mitsuhide's betrayal?

probably not a decisive factor but it certainly didn't hurt Mitsuhide's efforts when he recruited 13,000 men to his side in order to launch an attack against the man they had sworn their loyalty to at the time of the betrayal the majority of Nobunaga's army was out on war campaigns so with Mitsuhide turning thousands of Oda's men against him

Nobunaga was completely blindsided by the attack and had less than 200 men to defend himself against the 13,000 traitors but amongst those 200 men was Yasuke and there is a reason they made an anime about him because once Nobunaga's castle came under attack

Yasuke awakened his inner ocular powers that would later inspire the Sharingan and he single-handedly killed thousands of the men

I'm just messing with you

Oda Nobunaga and Sasuke got absolutely ragdolled they didn't stand a chance this fellow was not even close 13,000?

13,000 against 200?

come on

Mitsuhide and his men set fire to Oda's castle and Nobunaga's defense wasn't really a defense at all before long the lord was wounded in the fighting and retreated to his castle retreated to one room telling all his non-fighting staff to flee and save their lives and to not die unnecessarily for the enemy is only here for Oda Nobunaga's precious head a noble gesture by a great lord but there was one man who would not leave Nobunaga's side and let his head fall into the wrong hands

Yasuke locked away in Nobunaga's chamber just the two of them facing death

Nobunaga chose the Japanese way out and committed seppuku a traditional and honorable suicide that has you slit open your own stomach and is often completed by a person you trust who chops your head off and so once Oda Nobunaga slit open his stomach

Yasuke ended the man's life by decapitating him a former African slave delivered one of the most sacred and honorable killing blows of mercy to the man who almost unified Japan what are the odds?

this is crazy also remember how I told you it's weird that a story about how a Japanese man buying a black man that he once tried to rid of his collar is a story that cures racism?

yeah how about the story that should single-handedly cure racism ending with that black man then decapitating the Japanese man but as strange as both beginning and ending were they were just as pure as the love that had existed between Oda Nobunaga and Yasuke so once Nobunaga's castle was besieged the traitor Mitsuhide came looking for Nobunaga's head he came looking to claim his head as a trophy but he never found it because Yasuke had taken it upon himself to deliver Oda Nobunaga's head to his son Nobutaga obviously the great lord's son Nobutaga was furious once he learned of his father's death at the hands of a cowardly traitor so he enlisted Yasuke and together they formed an army that would avenge the great Oda Nobunaga and complete his dreams of unifying Japan they got defeated too again this is bad but not even close the army Oda Nobunaga's son and Yasuke put together got slapped around by Mitsuhide and his men and Oda Nobunaga's son also committed seppuku and Yasuke he was captured by the traitor Mitsuhide and for any other man this would be the end of the story however Yasuke's story does not end here because Mitsuhide did not consider Yasuke to be worthy of seppuku nor did he even consider him worthy to die by the blade of a true Japanese man to him Yasuke was nothing but a pet and so he returned the pet to its previous owner

Mitsuhide had Yasuke return to the Portuguese Christians to take their pet back and see to it that it leaves Japan and for a long time this was thought to be the end of Yasuke's story until a discovery was made that changed everything it has long been known that one of Oda's closest associates later assembled an army that would avenge Oda Nobunaga and continue his quest of unifying Japan by finally defeating the traitor Mitsuhide at the battle of Yamazaki in 1582 what was not known is historical text that was later discovered text that confirms that at the battle of Yamazaki amongst the forces that avenged Nobunaga was one man one warrior who was described as having a complexion as dark as coal it was Yasuke you down