I guess I'd be asking about all three versions and why the corrections were made when they were. Sometimes corrections are made because new information gets passed to the authors, sometimes there were just typos, and sometimes its to be more politically correct.
Bearing in mind that this is conjecture, as I haven't heard anything one way or another, but my take is that the later editions were due to questions that arose from previous ones, and further investigation by Watatani and Yamada. With regards to the Takamatsuden traditions, the biggest focus has been given to the Togakure Ryu entry, in which case the dates of Toda's death changed, and the history was greatly embellished in later editions. The second edition (1969) apparently originally included a reference to Togakure Ryu being developed from "ninja games", which was removed in later printings. This has often been used to indicate that Takamatsu created Togakure Ryu out of such games, but to me the phrasing is a little more open, and could simply be a misinterpretation of Takamatsu stating that the initial training began in "childrens games", as a number of old stories indicate, or even that his initial training in the Ryu (when he was a young boy, about 11 or 12) under Toda was based around such games while he continued in the more "combative" lessons of Shinden Fudo Ryu.
It should be noted that whenever there was doubt, or when it was clear that there was some embellishment going on, Watatani and Yamada made such things clear in the text.
thanks for the response Chris, and I think Cryo has a good question. I'm curious about that as well.
Cool, let's see what we have.
As a follow up question, since these arguments are used so often to try and "debunk" the arts of the X-Kans, how many other arts listed in the various BRD are also not 100% verified?
Yeah, this is kind of a problem with the way the BRDJ is being used as a source.... because it really shouldn't be used to verify or debunk anything. The simple fact of the matter is that there were two gentlemen, Watatani Kiyoshi and Yamada Tadashi, who were academics with a great love and interest in martial arts. To that end, they collected as much information as they could on the Ryu (and non-classical arts) as they could, by traveling and speaking to instructors, representatives, and practitioners, as well as reading and researching as much as possible, putting everything together in a book originally titled "Bugei Ryu-ha Jiten" (later Bugei Ryu-ha Daijiten), essentially being "Library of Martial Art Systems". While quite an exhaustive list, it was not a complete, nor even "official" list, and included a range of arts that were not independently verified. As mentioned, though, they made notes where verification was not possible, or where aspects were doubted. This included the history (especially in later editions) of Togakure Ryu, the claims of Daito Ryu, even the stories of the life of the founder of Tenshinsho Den Katori Shinto Ryu (they disputed the claims of his birth and death, his age, and the date of the founding of the Ryu).
I'm curious, just because it can't be traced 100% by these editions, is that grounds for it to be "fake" and if so, how many other arts then suffer the same legitimacy issue?
Honestly, it doesn't matter about what's listed in the BRDJ, as it's not an official list, nor is it "tracing" anything. All it means to have the schools listed in the book is that Watatani and Yamada heard of it. Not that it was genuine, Koryu, ancient, authentic, effective, real, historical, or anything else. Just that they heard of it, and wrote down what they heard.
The flip-side, of course, is that, due to the sheer volume of systems that are listed (note: I don't use the term "documented", as that implies official research and a kind of "stamp of approval", which shouldn't be applied here), if something isn't listed, then the question can be raised as to why not (there are some very rare systems that don't appear there, so it isn't an automatic strike against the system, but can raise the question). But, at best, having an art listed is corroborating evidence that someone outside of the system itself had heard of it. That's all.
As a result, something could be in the book, and "fake", and something could be not listed and "real". The appearance, or entry in the Bugei Ryu-ha Daijiten is not indicative of anything to do with legitimacy, just that it's listed there.
I agree that it's a wealth of information, and certainly a first-stop when looking into a system you're not sure about, but it's never been intended to be any "official" statement of anything. And, honestly, it's usually Westerners who don't quite get what the book is who think it fills that role.
