Garlic Eaters

“Garlic Eaters” is a contemptuous label wielded in a confrontation between Buntaro and Ishido. The phrase turns talk of military strength into an insult: Buntaro uses it to boast that his men could overwhelm their enemies, while Ishido deploys it to provoke him into a fight.

The Insult in Use

Buntaro makes the phrase part of a defiant claim about his troops. He says they can take on ten opponents for every one of their own, and fifty “Garlic Eaters,” then condemns men who abandon comrades as cowards. His boast links the label to an imagined enemy force and presents his own soldiers as steadfast by contrast.

The Gateway Confrontation

At the castle gateway, Ishido answers with a taunt: “Perhaps you’ll get an opportunity soon—to stand against real men, not Garlic Eaters!” By contrasting the supposed enemy with “real men,” he turns Buntaro’s boast against him and invites him to prove his courage in battle. Buntaro responds by challenging Ishido to fight that very night, there at the gateway.

Yabu’s Intervention

Yabu moves between the two men and insists that they are among friends, not enemies. He has fought in Korea and recognizes that both men have some truth on their side, while trusting neither—Buntaro even less than Ishido. His mediation is practical as well as immediate: a clash inside the castle could leave them trapped there indefinitely. In the scene, the epithet serves not merely as a slur but as fuel for a provocation that Yabu must prevent from becoming violence.