is an overall designation for gamefowl in Japan. There are seven recognised

breeds A breed is a specific group of domestic animals having homogeneous appearance (phenotype), homogeneous behavior, and/or other characteristics that distinguish it from other organisms of the same species. In literature, there exist several slig ...

of Shamo

chicken The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domestication, domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey junglefowl, grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster ...

in Japan, all of which are designated

Natural Monuments of Japan Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...

. The Shamo breeds are thought to derive from fighting chickens of Malay type brought from Thailand in the early part of the 17th century.

History

The name ''Shamo'' is a corruption of the word ''Siam'', the historical name for

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...

, and first entered

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

during the early

Edo period The or is the period between 1603 and 1867 in the history of Japan, when Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and the country's 300 regional ''daimyo''. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengoku period, the Edo period was character ...

(1603–1867). Even though the breed was originally from Thailand, it has been selectively bred for several hundred years and is very different from the original stock. The breed is used in naked-heeled

cockfighting A cockfight is a blood sport, held in a ring called a cockpit. The history of raising fowl for fighting goes back 6,000 years. The first documented use of the ''word'' gamecock, denoting use of the cock as to a "game", a sport, pastime or ent ...

in Japan, where it is still legal. It is also bred all over the world for its show quality and unique upright posture. O-Shamo and Chu-Shamo are designations for different weight categories of large fowl, whereas the Nankin-Shamo is a bantam chicken. The , unlike O-Shamo and Chu-Shamo, is merely an ornamental breed not used for cockfighting, although it is bred to be temperamental and show the spirit of a fighter. While it is not related to the other breeds, it is often assumed to be because of the similarity of their names.

Breeds

The seven recognised Shamo breeds designated as

are: * Ehigo-Nankin-Shamo * O-Shamo ("large Shamo", ) * Kinpa * Ko-Shamo ("small Shamo", ) * Nankin-Shamo ( Nankin Shamo, ) * Yakido or Ygido () * Yamato-Shamo or Yamato Gunkei Other Shamo variants are the Chu-Shamo ("medium Shamo", ) and the Chibi Shamo.

In the West

In the United Kingdom, the Shamo, Ko-Shamo, Nankin Shamo, Yakido and Yamato Gunkei are recognised as distinct breeds, while Chu-Shamo and Chibi Shamo receive a passing mention in the '' British Poultry Standards''. The

Entente Européenne Entente, meaning a diplomatic "understanding", may refer to a number of agreements: History * Entente (alliance), a type of treaty or military alliance where the signatories promise to consult each other or to cooperate with each other in case o ...

recognises the Shamo, Ko-Shamo, Yakido and Yamato Gunkei, and lists the Chu-Shamo and Nankin Shamo as unrecognised. The Australian Poultry Standards have only one form of Shamo, which has a minimum weight of 3 kg. The

American Poultry Association The American Poultry Association (APA) is the oldest poultry organization in the North America. It was founded in 1873, and incorporated in Indiana in 1932. The first American poultry show was held in 1849, and the APA was later formed in resp ...

recognises the Shamo as a breed, both full-sized and bantam.

References

{{Chicken breeds of Japan Chicken breeds Chicken breeds originating in Thailand Chicken breeds originating in Japan