The subject pretty much explains the question: when was the last time someone formally commited seppuku? What was the situation surrounding it?
I’d prefer if it weren’t simply a case of someone emulating the ritual; he or she must have considered their action to truly be seppuku.
I recall an issue of Life maybe(how ironic is that?) that covered a group of samurai committing ritual seppuku in Japan in the sixties. Very graphic photos too.
Sorry I can’t be more detailed.
Last one I know of is Yukio Mishima in 1970–though I wouldn’t be terribly surprised if there have been cases since then (nor if more occur for centuries to come.)
Mishima was a writer and patriot, who did not believe that Japan should subvert itself to the rest of the world and the US and felt very much that the warrior spirit was the very soul of Japan. And as a famous writer he knew several politicians and such and had actually been allowed (and encouraged by some) to form his own personal military squad. Then, in 1970 due to the renewment of the Security Treaty with the US–he and his squad invaded the headquarters of the Japanese Self Defense Force and he commited seppuku (i.e. slicing open his own stomach and having his head chopped off–which apparently wasn’t a one shot kill…)
Personally I am not satisfied that Mishima was really all that concerned with the future of Japan and the message he was trying to get out–but so goes the official story. I would also note that he had a wife and two (?) kids, and his male lover is the one who chopped off his head (after a couple hacks…) If nothing else, he didn’t lead a boring life.
You’re likely to find the movie inspired by this incident (and other aspects of Mishima’s life) interesting. With a terrific score by Philip Glass, too.
So, was this guy charged with murder, or assisted suicide? Or is this the sort of thing that’s only a $100 fine in Japan?
actually I seem to recall reading about some upper management type doing himself in this manner after the banking fiasco of a couple years ago. Trying to find cite. No decapitation but there was ritual disembowelment.
According to this essay (PDF) it would appear that his lover was a guy named Morita and that after Mishima died, one of the other guys cut off Morita’s head as well–though it doesn’t state whether Morita sliced open his stomach.
The remaining followers were arrested and…it didn’t say any more. My guess would be that nothing good happened to them; probably a long long jail sentence.
I would also note that my college was overtaken by students in 1970 as well, and several of the teachers tied up kept hostage for a day or so. Since then no student government or anything which allows students to band together is looked upon favorably. So this appears to have been a good year not to have been in Japan.
Well, to do some real research instead of just puling stuff out of my…ear. According to this webpage:
11/25/1970 Mishima Yukio and Morita Masakatsu
5/25/1979 Kageyama Shouji (Head of Tokyo Daigaku Juku?) commits seppuku and then shoots himself*
9/28/2001 Judo gold medalist 猪熊功 commits seppuku
I couldn’t find anything more complete with google Japan and it strikes me as somewhat slim–but that’s the best I can do with my resources.
*Cutting open your stomach doesn’t finish things very fast, so usually you follow with a faster technique
I thought that the decapitation was done only as a favour to women and children who were expected only to touch the blade to their abdomens rather than going through with the self-disemboweling.
Originally this was fairly accurate. However, over time the Japanese decided that waiting for yourself to slowly keel over from shock and bloodloss wasn’t very manly, so they cut off the heads. It kept them from crying out or anything like that (it’s really hard to keep quiet after an hour or two with no bowels). As the Japanese became less warlike and more philosophical, the ritual moved to cutting off the head as soon as the individual put the knife to their stomach or even picked it up.
Yes, I was once told there is a kabuki play where–essentially–a guy cuts open his stomach and then goes “Now let me tell you a story…” and proceeds to talk for an hour before finally dying.
…this has not been on my list of kabuki to watch.