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Price down to 800€

河内守藤原正広 Kawachi no Kami Fujiwara Masahiro

I do have both digital and physical copies of the first two, the third only physical one. I just checked it, it does show some tsuba and mention "pig iron" in a totally different section, nothing about tsuba made by cast iron. So far no evidence those quotes were accurate

If i recall correctly should be the 1997 version, i think 1968 version is only in Japanese. You can also rule out "The Craft of the Japanese Sword", no reference to tsuba in that book either I should check but also in "The Art of the Japanese Sword: The Craft of Swordmaking and its Appreciation" but i don't recall any reference to tsuba there either. So now it's 3 wrong quotes on 3 books, my guess is that it just takes titles regarding Japanese swords and put the quote you're looking for in it Especially most of those books are not digitalized, so no way chatGPT could have read them

It's ok I can just keep a couple that can have enough material on them and the rest give to you if you really wanna do these tests

Did you proof check those statements? Cause for example in "The Connoisseur's Book of Japanese Swords" not only there's no such statement, but it doesn't even mention tsuba in it. ChatGPT can be a great tool, but not something you should put blind trust on

This is pretty much what they look like, this one is the one i restored

Indeed the patina recipes usually use red clay, copper sulfate, saltpetre, sulphur. So maybe the traces of copper might be on the patina only The tsuba come from a ship wreck, i managed to restore one, but the rest are too badly corroded. Tho despite the corrosion there's still enough "good iron" to make analysis. I was thinking to use them as blank to make new tsuba, but i can sacrifice them for your experiments.

Yes you're reading correctly, other tsuba has just traces of other elements, only a couple of tsuba have some high content of extra elements

Someone in Japan already did an analysis on many tsuba, also high grade ones https://cdn.fbsbx.com/v/t59.2708-21/348839532_969136647835640_438820047155320693_n.pdf/tsuba-analysis.pdf?_nc_cat=106&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=0cab14&_nc_ohc=Cd6sQgNJyhUAX9Ne4U0&_nc_ht=cdn.fbsbx.com&oh=03_AdTZ77s5Y2Hvl_iXbq3So4biQd2yMT8y3ML-8nLOFoCRsQ&oe=646DDD59&dl=1 (tell me if link doesn't work) That said i might have some tsuba that can be used for this purpose, i managed to save one, but others are beyond repair

another drop to 850€

Classic Akasaka school design, bell cricket and fern. I used to own one myself with Kanzan hakogaki other examples :

George Miller aka Tanto54 was kind enough to write me the meaning of the story depicted on the tsuba: "Your Soten Tsuba’s theme is Filial Piety (a perfect gift from a Samurai Parents to their son). It depicts some of the “Twenty-four Paragons of Filial Piety”. For example, I see on your tsuba: Meng Zong (known as Moso in Japanese) digging bamboo shoots, Huang Tingjian pouring out his Mother’s chamber pot, Wang Xiang lying on ice to get a carp for his Step-Mother, Yang Xiang wrestling a tiger to save his father, etc. Hopefully this can help you and your sale."

Price drop to 900€ plus shipping

Tsuba signed 江刕彦根住 藻柄子入道宗典製 "Eshu Hikone Ju Mogarashi Nyudo Soten sei" with Tokubetsu Kicho papers from Showa 40 (1965). The details are astonishing, there are many characters depicted, which probably tell a story but i couldn't figure out which one. There are hon-zogan of copper and silver, gold nunome zogan, intact gilded mimi and shakudo hitsuana plug. The quality of work becomes even more impressive once you hold it in hand, because you can really see how small everything is, those faces are 2mm tall. Comes with a good quality box with pillow. Dimension 77x74 mm Price 1000€ plus shipping and Paypal fees I'll be at Japan Art Expo in Utrecht so i can hand deliver it there as well.

Bamboo leaves or feathers i'd say

i'm not sure it's the same guy tho

If it can help, after a quick research i found a company registered in the UK with the name "KOKUSAI NIHON KACHU BUGU SHINKO KYOKAI LIMITED" here https://www.companysearchesmadesimple.com/company/uk/14572429/kokusai-nihon-kachu-bugu-shinko-kyokai-limited/ As you can see there's also the following address : 10 John Street STRATFORD-UPON-AVON CV37 6UB Which is a building owned by https://leighgraham.co.uk/ So you might question them about it

Ito suguha with bo-utsuri on a Bizen tanto

HIDETOKI (秀辰), 2nd gen., Enpō (延宝, 1673-1681), Musashi – “Hitachi no Kami Hidetoki” (常陸守秀辰), “Yamashiro no Kami Fujiwara Hidetoki” (山城守藤原秀辰), “Hidetoki” (秀辰), first name Zen´emon (善右衛門), he later took over the first name Gonbei (権兵衛), according to a theory he was the son of Ōmi no Kami Fujiwara Kiyoshige (近江守藤原清重), he moved later in his career from Ōsaka to Edo

it looks like 包派 but can't find any swordsmith with that name

But kageuchi are not signed in the same way as the commisioned sword, more likely there was multiple individuals that had to recieve a sword in the same family, that would make sense with the company i found with the same name, probably all (male) family members got one

Congratulations on the great find, i see nothing in the signature that makes me think it might be gimei. About the date on the swords, we shouldn't take the date inscribed on the sword as the actual day it was made, many times the date inscribed might represent something specific, only the year should be taken in consideration. A good example of that is how many Bizen swords were dated "August", they either work only one month or most likely because the number "8" is considered the luckiest number. So in this case maybe that date might represent something for the family (i'm having a mamori tanto made with the date of birth of my son inscribed) or just they were made for several members of the family so none of them can say it got the first one. Regarding the family you might try investigate on this https://www.kimuraya-sohonten.co.jp/ayumi, they're one of the first baker society of Japan and presented their products to the Emperor, so there's a good chance these blades used to belong to them.