Samurai Name

A samurai was usually named by combining one kanji from his father or grandfather and one new kanji. Samurai normally used only a small part of their total name.

For example, the full name of Oda Nobunaga would be "Oda Kazusanosuke Saburo Nobunaga" (織田上総介三郎信長), in which "Oda" is a clan or family name, "Kazusanosuke" is a title of vice-governor of Kazusa province, "Saburo" is a name before genpuku, a coming of age ceremony, and "Nobunaga" is an adult name. Samurai were able to choose their own last names.

During the course of Samurai's life, he could expect to be known by a series of names. Sometimes confounding to the historian, this tradition occasionally produced a myriad number of tags for a single well-known samurai. Each name carried with it a certain significance.

Childhood. At birth, a samurai was given a name by which he would be known until his coming of age ceremony. These were occasionally chosen to sound fortuitous or simply by fancy. In a well-known example of the former, Takeda Shingen was born Katsuchiyo, or '1000 Victories in Succession', or, simply, 'Victory Forever'. These childhood names were often superceded to an extent within a samurai's household by a certain nicknaming custom. By tradition, the eldest son in a household was known as 'Taro', the second, 'Jiro', and the third, 'Saburo'. These familial names might even linger into a samurai's adulthood, especially while his father was still in charge.

Adult Names. A samurai typically received his 'first' adult name upon the event of his coming of ag ceremony (normally conducted in his 14th year). This almost always consisted of two characters, one of which was hereditary to his family and another that might have been given him as a gift from an exalted personage or simply by whim.

Some samurai, especially lords, might opt to change the characters in their name at some future date, often as a result of the sort of reward mentioned above. Occasionally this name change might be made to mark a fortuitous event, or for political expediency.
Uesugi Kenshin provides us with a nice example of the various reasons a daimyô might change his name around. Originally called Nagao Kagetora, Kenshin later changed his name to Terutora when he was honored by the shogun, Ashikaga Yoshiteru (Kenshin being exceptionally filial to the Ashikaga). He changed his name again, to Masatora, when he was adopted by Uesugi Norimasa around 1551.

Religious names. Of course, the name Kenshin is the best known, and this provides us with an example of a Buddhist name. Many samurai - both daimyô and retainer - adopted Buddhist names at some point in their life, at least nominally taking up a monk's habit and shaving their heads. Some daimyô took this much more seriously then others (Kenshin being one of those), while a certain few, including Ôtomo Sorin, went from layman to Buddhist monk to Christian - and sometimes back again to Buddhist monk.