Final answer:
Chivalry was a code of conduct for European knights that blended Christian values with military virtues, aiming to regulate knightly actions and instill nobility. Bushido was the Japanese equivalent for samurai, combining Confucian and Buddhist principles within a military ethos. Both of these codes shaped the respective warrior classes and left a lasting cultural legacy.
Step-by-step explanation:
Chivalry is a code of ethical conduct associated with the medieval European knights. It combined the Christian virtues with the ethos of noble warriors, emphasizing ideals like protection of the church, the defense of women and the defenseless, and adherence to battle conduct, such as observing truces and sacred days. While it aimed to Christianize knightly behavior, it evolved to represent a secular chivalric culture, which included courtly love and grand tales conveyed through vernacular literature by troubadours. Similarly, in Japan, the samurai followed bushido, the "way of the warrior" which originated from the blending of Confucian obedience and duty with the Buddhist acceptance of transient life and suffering. Bushido was particularly emphasized during the Sengoku and Tokugawa periods when samurai not only engaged in warfare but also participated in government and cultural developments, such as Nō theater and the tea ceremony.
Dynastic and military struggles towards the end of Japan's Heian period led to the samurai's rise as decentralized power brokers, eventually exemplified in the establishment of the shogunate. With the fall of the Ashikaga shoguns and the rise of regional daimyos, the samurai's loyalty, martial arts proficiency, and adherence to bushido became ever more vital. Bushido eventually evolved to serve a modernizing Japan, aiming to instill loyalty and discipline in a burgeoning urban population. This resulted in bushido's idealization and international cultural export through works by filmmakers like Akira Kurosawa.