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Man this one again... if you do a search you'll find a LENGTHY thread on the subject (sometime last year)
What I recall from the last thread:
-Katana is HEAVIER than the typical longsword (Katana is a two handed weapon, longsword one handed). It's Center of Gravity is also farther forward than the longsword (it had a VERY sharp blade that was a fairly uniform size through it's length, the longswords had a distal taper that left it's cg just forward of the guard). A katana wielded one handed would be MUCH slower than a longsword, however, since the Katana was intended but used two handed, I'm unsure which would be faster.
-Samurai would probably rather use a bow... and many would have chosen a spear as a melee weapon as opposed to a katana. Both would have had advantages and disadvantages in a 1 on 1 confrontation.
-A knight would be using a shield, which the Samurai would have had no experience fighting against.
There were no documented confrontations between Western and Eastern martial traditions. The closest thing was a fight between Portuguese sailors (armed with a fast weapon, the rapier) and samurai. The samurai were 'dismantled' without a single Portuguese casualty if the account is creditable (open to debate).
In my opinion the winner would be dictated by a combination of skill, training, and luck. If both combatants were equally well trained in their repsective tradition, I personally believe the Western Knight would have an advantage, but not a overwhelming one.
Give me a couple Genoese Crossbowmen and I'd spank em both (given adequate defenses).
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