Dai Nippon Butokukai

[RKDAFRICA]

Greetings all

I am new to the forum and have found the threads to be very interesting.

My question is what role, if any, did the Dai Nippon Butokukai have in the recommendation or issuance of medals on behalf of the Govenment of Japan?

Tony

Edited April 28, 2010 by RKDAFRICA

[Paul L Murphy]

They had no role in the issuance of medals. While they are an official organisation their activities were (and are) in the area of martial arts and the promotion thereof.

[RichC]

I wrote up a short (but incomplete) history of the group on my website:

http://www.imperialj...com/budoku.html

In a sense the group did issue the Butoku-kai medals on behalf of the government of Japan since the latter had pretty much taken over the group. Semantics, I suppose, but it is important to know that the group issued membership and merit medals and they were issued with the direct blessing of the government.

And although there is a present-day group with the same name as the older one, they are not directly related. The later group took its name from the former and they both are (were) concerned with the martial arts, but they are not the same group.

Edited April 29, 2010 by RichC

[Paul L Murphy]

I wrote up a short (but incomplete) history of the group on my website:

http://www.imperialj...com/budoku.html

In a sense the group did issue the Butoku-kai medals on behalf of the government of Japan since the latter had pretty much taken over the group. Semantics, I suppose, but it is important to know that the group issued membership and merit medals and they were issued with the direct blessing of the government.

And although there is a present-day group with the same name as the older one, they are not directly related. The later group took its name from the former and they both are (were) concerned with the martial arts, but they are not the same group.

A huge number of organisations in Imperial Japan issued badges and medals with the approval of the government, however they are awards of those individual groups and not government issued awards. The Butokukai, and indeed other groups such as the Patriotic Women's Association or the Imperial Time Expired Soldier's League, were able to issue their own awards that could in many cases be worn in uniform but they had no direct role in deciding who got government awards such as the Sacred Treasure or Rising Sun. I believe this latter point was the gist of the original question in post 1 of this topic.

[RichC]

I don't dispute any of your comments, Paul. I guess the original question was a bit unclear. Of course, I never suggested that that group would have any influence over a government-issued order, but I took the question to refer to the medals of the Butoku-kai. I thought the original post was concerned with whether or not the medals of that group were issued on behalf of the government or just that organization. My point was that the Butoku-kai was in fact a part of the government and run directly by the government, unlike the other groups you mentioned, so the medals issued by that group were issued by the government as well.

Anyway, perhaps I misread the nuances of the first question.