Kanegawa no Nicho Kama

Quick Facts

About the kata

Kanegawa no Nicho Kama is an Okinawan kobudo kata for a pair of kama sickles, held in both hands at once. The Ryukyu Kobujutsu Hozon Shinkokai lists it among the three surviving sickle kata, in two versions: small Kanigawa no Nichogama (Sho) and large Kanigawa no Nichogama (Dai). The third is Tozan no Nichogama. According to the association, the kama is the only bladed weapon in its system. The sickle movements, it says, carry techniques known from karate: kuri-de, kake-de, and the elbow technique hiji-ate. The movement count, embusen shape, and what distinguishes the small and large versions we have not been able to document in the sources. According to the association's site, Taira Shinken founded it in 1940 after returning to Okinawa, while the English Wikipedia places its founding after the Second World War. Taira collected weapon kata scattered across the islands, compiled them into a set of 42 kata for eight weapons, and passed all of them on to his student Gansho Inoue. The kata is today also listed on the official WUKF kobudo kata list, in the sickle section as Kingawa (Kanegawa) no Nicho Gama Sho/Dai.

The kata in different styles

Meaning of the name

The Japanese notation 鐘川の二丁鎌 is given by the Ryukyu Kobujutsu Hozon Shinkokai on its Japanese site. According to ryukyu-kobujutsu.org, nichogama means a pair of sickles: 二 (ni) is two, 丁 (cho) a counter word, and 鎌 (gama, kama) sickle. The characters 鐘川 form the name Kanegawa, also transcribed Kanigawa; the WUKF list uses Kingawa. Alan Godshaw's kata dictionary also gives the reading Kanigawa nu Nichogama, translating the name as Kanigawa's two sickles.

Creator and history

According to ryukyu-kobujutsu.org, the kata bears the name of Gima Kanigawa (Kanegawa), a recognised expert in sickle fighting. According to usadojo.com, Taira Shinken first encountered weapons at the hands of his grandfather Kanegawa Gimu, though some sources say someone else introduced him to kobudo. The blog Isshin – Concentration the Art, citing a 1977 association publication, writes that his grandfather, here called Kanegawa Gibu, taught him to handle the two sickles nichogama, as well as the suruchin, tekko, and the shield and short spear tinbe and rochin. We believe this is the same man the kata is named after, since both the name and the weapon match, but we have not found the two accounts explicitly linked in the sources.

Differences between styles

The English Wikipedia lists Kama Nu Ti as the only sickle kata of Matayoshi Kobudo; Kanegawa no Nicho Kama we have not been able to document in this lineage. It belongs to Ryukyu Kobudo, the branch systematised by Taira Shinken according to Wikipedia, whose association Hozon Shinkokai lists both versions. Both, Sho and Dai, are also in the WUKF kobudo kata list.

Competition status

• WUKF (World Union of Karate-Do Federations) – Okinawan Kobudo — Official kata list ↗