I was following a link about how to make Sesshomaru's outfit for Cosplay purposes, and I ran across something very interesting. The woman who wrote the articles actually broke down his entire outfit piece by piece historically, and only a few parts of his outfit are actually Japanese. From there she actually dug pretty deep into his could-be background, speculating his and his family's "heritage." It's a very interesting read. Check it out!
www.squidoo.com/LordSesshomaruHistoryThe thing I found most interesting about that article is how long this person managed to make it without being able to get a single fact right.
Takahashi has never indicated any age for Sesshoumaru, other than he is equivalently 19 years old.
What...? What in the world is this referring to? The best I can guess is that this person got "700 years" from the third movie, which references 700 years from
Kagome's time, making the events at the beginning of movie 3 take place 200 years before Inuyasha's era. Either way, there was no war then, and movie 3 is non-canon, anyway.
Now this piece, I just have no idea, and it looks like it came straight out of a fanfic. It is, like everything before and after this, not something from canon, and something that was never, ever mentioned by Takahashi or anyone else working on the series.
Stop attributing fanon to Takahashi! This is absolutely never said in the manga, and the manga actually suggests otherwise, that Sesshoumaru inherited nothing from his father but his sword and dashing good looks. And we call him "Lord" because that's what "sama" was translated to in English. "Sama", however, does not necessarily imply any position of power, merely a position of respect. Miroku and Kagome each refer to each other as "sama" in the series, but you don't see either of them with large tracts of land.
A closer study of the series would suggest that what was translated as "Western Lands" was originally "Saigoku" in Japanese,
an actual named region of the Japanese landscape. This region is known in the modern era as the Kinki region.
"Each time" happens precisely once, and it was in the first movie, which, you guessed it, is not canon. And Menoumaru and his cohorts wore clothes that looked nothing like Sesshoumaru's. They looked, you know, Chinese. Any other instance of this is relegated to fanfiction, which I suspect is where this person got the majority of their information.
WTF are you talking about? In the manga series, China isn't even
mentioned. EVER. Any youkai described as being from the "Western Lands" (which is limited to Inu-papa in canon and the Hyounekozoku in filler) came from Saigoku.
Sesshoumaru's outfit is in no way Chinese.
This piece of art shows the layers of Sesshoumaru's clothing, which are:
Hada-juban (short undergarment)
Naga-juban (long undergarment)
Kikkou-gara Furisode (hexagon-patterned long-sleeved kimono)
Hakama (pants)
Yoroi-tare (lower armor)
Yoroi-dou (upper armor)
... What? There has never, EVER been a hanyou in the entire series who was accepted in the community. Besides Inuyasha, the only other two hanyou were Jinenji and Shiori, both of whom were regularly abused by those in the community.
Well, maybe YOU have determined that, but the series determines that, Inu-papa at least, was from Saigoku.
But looking at the general contempt for Chinese demons in the series, (who are always portrayed as being very evil, btw) we must ask the question: Is InuYasha not only half demon, but also half Japanese?No. Just... no.
.... WTF WTF WTFFFFFFFF?!?!?! WHERE IS THIS STUFF COMING FROM!?! I'm assuming this is some weird role-reversal of the third movie's intro, but... what? Inuyasha was born in
Izayoi's castle, which
Inu-papa stormed to rescue her before the men of her own castle murdered her and his son.
The castle's own guards burnt it down with him inside because he was an intruder, not because it was his castle. And either way,
movie 3 is not canon.
@___@ Whaaaaat? This is just getting too ridiculous. It was IZAYOI'S castle that got burned down. It was staffed with SAMURAI, which are not particularly common in China.
No, it was because the human owner of the castle was having a tryst with a youkai and bore his child, and her castle staff freaked out and tried to kill her, and he came to rescue her. Seriously, what were you smoking when watching movie 3, this is not that hard to figure out.
Holy crap, this is actually almost sorta right! At least, the part about a lot of old Japanese mythology having its roots in China.
What the f***********ck. @__@ Where did this pet dragon come from (Ah-un, maybe)? Now we're totally delving into the realm of fanfiction.
Does this person even know where Portugal IS in relation to China and Japan?! This sounds so massively unlikely, it's just... ridiculous. Just like the entire rest of this article.
Anyway, I'm stopping there, because this is just too ridiculous and painful to read. I've already ripped this person enough of a new one, anyway.