African Samurai

<strong>A readable compassionate account of an extraordinary life. --</strong><strong><em>The Washington Post</em></strong><br /><br /><strong>The remarkable life of history's first foreign-born samurai and his astonishing journey from Northeast Africa to the heights of Japanese society.<br /><br />Warrior. Samurai. Legend.</strong><br /><br />When Yasuke arrived in Japan in the late 1500s he had already traversed much of the known world. Kidnapped as a child in Northeast Africa he served as a bodyguard to the head of the Jesuits in Asia traveling to India and China and eventually arriving in Japan where everything would change.<br /><br />Most Japanese people had never seen an African man before. Some believed he was a god. Others saw him as the black-skinned Buddha.<br /><br />Among those drawn to him was Lord Nobunaga head of the most powerful clan in Japan who made Yasuke a samurai in his court. Soon Yasuke was learning the traditions of martial arts and ascending the upper echelons of Japanese society where he would live on to become a legend for the centuries to come.