Shanks is one of the first and most important characters of One Piece, who is also the strongest pirate and he fought with Mihawk, the “Strongest Swordsman-in-the world”. They used to be rival swordsmen of all time.
Shanks lost his arm to save Luffy from a Sea King, Mihawk obviously became the strongest swordsman in the world. So who was stronger before? There has been great fuss over this in One Piece community and lately, Oda explained who is the strongest swordsman.
Shanks and Mihawk, Who is the Strongest Swordsmen?
In the One Piece databook, Oda cleverly chose his words to mention that Mihawk is better than Shanks at swordsmanship, meaning that Red Hair is still stronger than Mihawk overall.
There is no doubt that Mihawk is the most powerful swordsman in the world. However, in other aspects of battle, such as Haki, leadership abilities or aspects that have not yet had a chance to be showned.
More to that, when the Cross Guild was established, the Bounties of every member started increasing, but still Mihawk alone could not surpass the Bounties level of the Four Emperors.
Given the fact that Shanks met his match against Mihawk, it is without doubt, Mihawk being the true winner of such a pure sword fight. On the other hand, if Shanks had been permitted to perform at optimum levels in war, then there is no doubt that he would clearly be superior to Hawkeye.
However, Shanks real strength, has not been showed yet. In the past, Red Haired pirates had “ignored” One Piece and just wanted world peace.
Now, this does not imply that Mihawk is in anyway weaker than these two characters or that he is not as strong. Oda likes Shanks a little more than Mihawk because Shanks is Luffy’s target and idol but Zoro admires Mihawk. Luffy and Zoro will surpassed them as well.
