Historical manga, usually dealing with samurai, are among the most popular types of Japanese manga in the West. These are also referred to using the term "chanbara," an onomatopoeia for the sound of swords clashing together. Typically set anywhere from late medieval Japan of the 16th century to the end of the Edo period (1603-1868), some remain close to historical fact and others are highly fictionalized. In prewar Japan historical dramas were a favorite theme in films and popular novels and after the war historical themes were taken up in television dramas popular among the older generation. Historical dramas in manga form, however, have followed a slightly different course.

There is nothing corresponding to historical drama in the prewar predecessors of contemporary manga. More typical of the Taisho period (1912-1926) were humorous children's manga like Miyao Shigeo's Dango Kushisuke Manyuki ("The Adventures of Dango Kushisuke"), the protagonist of which is named after round mochi balls on a skewer. In the prewar years of the Showa period (1926-1945) wildly popular works like Tagawa Suiho's Norakuro Nitohei ( "Canine Private Norakuro") and Shimada Keizo's Boken Dankichi ("The Adventures of Dankichi") were both marked by the militaristic atmosphere of the time but neither was set in the age of the samurai.

For seven years after Japan's defeat in the Second World War no manga emerged which dealt with historical themes. These same years also saw the disappearance of the battlefield dramas which had been so popular during the war. This was a result of restrictions on freedom of speech imposed by the Allied (mostly American) Occupation forbidding the production and distribution of novels, dramas, films, and manga dealing with samurai, martial arts, or the Japanese military. The ostensible purpose behind these restrictions was to prevent the resurgence of militaristic sentiments. The implementation of the San Francisco Peace Accord in 1952 brought an end to these restrictions and Japanese were once more free to enjoy historical and wartime dramas.

This was also the time of the first boom in contemporary manga, when works like the 1952 Igaguri-kun (Master Crew Cut) and the 1954 Akado Suzunosuke, about a great swordsman who wore a red suit of armor, were overwhelmingly popular among children. Both of these were written by Fukui Eiichi but the latter was taken over by Takeuchi Tsunayoshi when Fukui dropped out soon after the beginning of its serialization. Both works spawned an enormous number of derivatives and sequels.

In terms of both narrative and description these manga were explicitly intended for children and typically served up a moral together with a good deal of humor. This is attributable to the fact that they were produced before the transformation of manga that took place in the late 1960s.