Japanese shields

Last night one of the folks in our study said that the Japanese didn't use shields. That seemed kind of odd, but I'd never seen depictions of armored Japanese warriors with them, so it seemed plausible. Time to find out...

It seems that it is mostly true. The favorite weapons were bows and spears, which are a bit hard to use while carrying a shied. And their armor was quite good, so an armored samurai wasn't at a serious disadvantage without it. Footmen, on the other hand, did carry shields, like European archers did--something to shelter behind while reloading. BTW, some commenters contradict each other on that page.