British and Japanese forensic scientists are examining remains from the 1333 Battle of Kamakura, a critical moment in Emperor Go-Daigo’s short-lived Kemmu Restoration.
The detailed examination of the skeletal remains – revealed in a special Channel 4 documentary, tomorrow evening – has yielded crucial new information on sword and arrow wounds, fighting styles, ritualized coup de grace death blows and the practice of taking heads as battle trophies.
Most of this sounds like what we already knew, but maybe there’s more in the details.