Source Register

Writing

The Truth of the Calm Spirit

For more information on Kashima-shinden Jikishinkage-ryū in English, please see:

• M. Raugas, The Truth of the Calm Spirit: The practice of Shinkage-ryū Heihō as Taoist Internal Alchemy (opens in a new tab), Inner Dharma, 2025.

This is a collected set of works that stem from martial arts essays centered around Shinkage-ryū, which were first hosted online at Inner Dharma (opens in a new tab) – that blog contains some of my personal training narrative.

From the Kōbusho to the Butokukai

In writing that work I became intrigued by the late Edo practitioners of Jikishinkage-ryū, the bakumatsu Kōbusho many of them taught at, and important traditions that had lasting impact as Japan modernized. The result of that investigation is now also available:

• From the Kōbusho to the Butokukai: Japanese Swordsmanship in Transition (opens in a new tab), Inner Dharma, 2026.

It is a survey of the late-Edo and early-modern institutions around Japanese kenjutsu — the Kōbusho, gekken-kōgyō, the Battōtai, the Keishichō police schools, the Dai Nippon Butokukai and the Busen — together with a register of the schools and teachers who carried the arts through their modern transformation.

Primary sources

Classical manuscripts and archival documents, with archive and shelfmark where held.

Secondary scholarship

Modern scholarship, reference works and tabulations.