Giho 57 Kyokuwan Noto/ 曲腕納刀
Wakigebarai II
The here used 曲腕納刀 (kyokuwan noutou – roughly “bent-arm sheathing”) is a unique and exceedingly characteristic noutou method.
Repeating noutou in one’s battou training isn’t simply for performance, or the sake of attaining understanding and spirituality without becoming careless, rather, it’s a noutou technique necessary to foster combat theory as well as the techniques used in actual combat for one’s palm and whole body.
Battou with the kaisho 真 (shin)
So, let’s move on to the explanation of 曲腕納刀 (kyokuwan noutou).
Since this is an extremely unique noutou technique, please watch this first.
While turning the sword around in your palm, bend your right wrist and load the sword’s back onto your left fist.
Then, pull the sword to the right, return your right palm and do the noutou.
Now, please have a look from the side.
Turn around the sword, raise the saya just a little bit and do the noutou.
Detailed explanation of the grip
Well then, let’s explain the grip in more detail.
First, rotate the sword with your palm by 180°. On top of that, while rolling the tsuka in your palm, change the angle and at the same time bend your wrist and elbow to rotate the sword by another 180°. This results in a total of 360° and thus the sword receives one full rotation.
Also, make sure to keep your sword horizontal at this time, in other words parallel to the ground.
Your grip should look like this. Removing the sword makes it clearer, but I’m not gripping the tsuka with my fingers. Instead, they’re in a mostly stretched state.
Load the tsuka onto your fingers and maintain the sword in a state where it’s hard to tell whether you’re pulling or pushing it with your right forearm.
At this time, if your fingers go too far, the blade might stand up or face downwards, so please be careful not to get your fingers get caught too deep around the tsuka.
Turn around your sword, bend your wrist and elbow, place your sword horizontally.
Next comes an extremely tight posture, but as you pull back the saya and stretch your right elbow, change your grip.
As you stretch your right elbow, change your grip so your hand glides around the tsuka, then finish the movement with the same grip you would use for a regular noutou.
Important point
Lastly, there is one more thing to pay attention to.
From here when performing the noutou, we pull back our saya and stretch our right elbow, but at this time, please make sure to keep your sword horizontal, i.e. parallel to the ground while doing that.
Then, once the kissaki enters the koiguchi, raise the sword and do the noutou.
A common mistake is letting the blade stand up like this and ending up with what looks like a vertical noutou. Instead of doing that, please be sure to always keep your sword horizontal and raise it once the kissaki enters the koiguchi.
Battou with the sousho 離 (ri)