Were eastern weapons ever seen in medieval Europe and western weapons ever seen in medieval Asia?

by Toxinz1181

Like could some trader in medieval France be selling a katana or urumi amongst his wares that he obtained in his travels? Could a merchant in Japan have a zweihander or flamberge in his collection?

ParallelPain

According to Jesuit Luis Frois's History of Japan (Book 5 P.92 in my Japanese translation, allow me to note that for next time), Viceroy of Portuguese India Duarte de Menezes' sent gifts to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, presented on March 3rd, 1591 as part of the ceremony to receive the returning Tenshō embassy, and they included:

  • Two gorgeous white Milanese armour with gold accessories
  • Two all silver, partially gold-plated, very finely decorated, estoc longswords of the same (also Milanese I'm guessing)
  • Two espingarda (long-barrel guns). They are specifically noted to be ignited with stones (so snaplock, snaphance, wheellock, or flintlock), which were incredibly rare in Japan.
  • One well-decorated pistol-sword (!)
  • Four fine oil-painting tapestries first seen in Japan
  • One Arabic horse with very fine accessories. There were originally supposed to be two horses, one for long stirrup, the other for short stirrup, but only one arrived, with purple or black velvet horse blanket, tack, bridle, silver gear, and gold-plated stirrup
  • One beautiful tent for military campaign

The samurai Ōwada Shigekiyo visited Nagasaki in 1593. In his diary he recorded that he saw "a small gun that does not need a fuse" on August 26 and bought a handgun including gunpowder on August 27. He doesn't say if he bought the same or similar type of gun that he saw before, but if he did he'd be one of the few Japanese to own a snap/wheel/flintlock.

So were they ever seen? Yes. They were even owned.

Were they ever used though? We know the Japanese were quick to copy and produce their own matchlock, plate armour, and (to a much rarer extent) cannons. As for the others, I haven't seen accounts of European swords being used or know of any surviving ones. So if they were any more than prized collections, they were rare beyond rare. It was the same for the matchless guns. Reinier Hesselink think the one Shigekiyo saw was a wheellock, and Hesselink's of the opinion that one of the reasons they did not spread was that it must have been too hard to copy, which seems possible to me consider Japanese smiths didn't even know how to screw and seal one end of the gun barrel until they were shown by Europeans.