What Tom Holland has said about Bushido
2 quotes · 1 episode · Apr 5, 2026
Tom Holland, English actor cast as Telemachus, has been quoted on Bushido 2 times in 1 episode of The Rest Is History, most recently on April 5, 2026. Each quote below is verbatim and links to the moment it was said.
In their words
Holland argues that Bushido was largely a modern, post-Meiji invention fusing Japanese traditions with the English gentleman ideal and European chivalry.
“Far from drawing on a moral code that reached back to the Middle Ages, Bushido was pretty much a modern invention. a post-Meiji restoration invention”
The Rest Is History: 658. Dawn of the Samurai: The Shadow of the Sword (Part 1) (Apr 5, 2026) · Listen from 22:43
Holland says Bushido was appropriated and perverted by the Japanese military in the early 20th century, then banned by the American occupation.
“it's appropriated by the Japanese military and perverted to their own uses. It takes Japan to some really very dark places”
The Rest Is History: 658. Dawn of the Samurai: The Shadow of the Sword (Part 1) (Apr 5, 2026) · Listen from 25:26
Episodes
658. Dawn of the Samurai: The Shadow of the Sword (Part 1)The Rest Is History · Apr 5, 2026 · 1 h 3 min
Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook trace the origins of Japan's samurai, from the Tokugawa shogunate and the Bushido myth back to the 10th-century warlord Taira no Masakado.
Tom Holland on other topics
- Samurai · 9 quotes
- Odyssey · 7 quotes
- Slavery in the United States · 7 quotes
- Fall of Maximilien Robespierre · 4 quotes
- Habsburg monarchy · 4 quotes
- Jefferson–Hemings controversy · 4 quotes
- Apartheid · 4 quotes
- Mona Lisa · 4 quotes