Hello everyone, this is my first post here, I've being reading you since long time, but before studying tsuba and kodôgu for some years now I feel I can be a little good writer for this forum.
I'm sure I'm still younger than most of you (32 years) but since I finished the 5 years of university to get the grade in Art History, I began to study about Japanese art and then about tsuba and kodôgu.
3 years ago I started my PhD doctoral degree about tsuba, being the first in Spain who makes such a research, but I'm still a fool in this field so I hope that most of you let me learn from your wisdom.
This year is the 400 aniversary of international relationships between Spain and Japan, as Hasekura Tsunenaga came from Sendai with the Date Masamune "Keichô embassy". This year we have many events about Japan, and in art, we focus on the namban period.
As a PhD tsuba student and member of the Asia Research Group of Complutense University of Madrid I'll speak soon about namban tsuba. After studying the work of such specialists as Haynes, Yumoto, Ogawa, Torigoye, Lissenden, Iida, Hiruta, Civita..I have my own opinion about namban tsuba.
For me:
Namban tsuba are a style or group of tsuba with such foreigner but also oriental designs as karakusa or seigaiha, covering almost all the hira, and with such things like strange seppa dai o strange forms in tsuba more similar to chinese guards than Japanese ones. It is doesn't matter where they make it, in China or in Japan, but all this fashion style could be catalogued as Namban tsuba.
Nihon tsuba with namban decoration is any tsuba make it in Japan with western motifs, such as christian crosses, dutch ships, clocks, western characters, arabic numbers, nambanjin...
Please, excuse me if my english is not so good, it is a pleasure to read all of you
