IanB

Jan, An interesting helmet - you keep pulling them out. Decoration on chochin kabuto is unusual in my experience, in fact, yours is the first one I have ever seen. Most of this type of helmet seem to have been made for munition use. As I understand it, the original idea was a type of helmet that could be stored flat, taking up less space in a munition storeroom. Similarly, the karuta gane type kabuto (or zukin) was another solution to the same problem, as were karuta gane dou. You do come across this type of helmet of far better quality, made as part of good quality armours from the Edo period (see p.54 of the Galeno Catalogue). The perceived wisdom is that they were armours made for travelling and certainly the small size of the box must have been easier to handle, but deep down I have never really been convinced by this argument. This is a learned way of saying I haven't a clue why these later ones were made. As for the significance of dragons, I don't think there is one other than the fact that the dragon is auspicious. Your helmet is different from most since, as you say, there is no lacing, the rings locking into each other by their taper. Normally there is a hinged curving bar that pivots up to lock with the upper plate - yours doesn't seem to ever had have one. I have also seen helmets with sprung studs that pop out to hold the helmet extended. They must have been a devil to operate since you had to press 4 lugs at once to collapse each plate. In the case of your helmet, I assume it only stayed extended when you were wearing it. Roy, A Myochin example would be quite a rarity - a pity you haven't any pictures. Ian Bottomley

Jan, No, not really. Even in the Heian most of the scales in an o-yoroi would be of nerigawa with iron scales concentrated over vital areas. Even where iron scales were used, they were always alternated with hide ones - an arrangement that gave good protection against missiles since the iron scales resisted penetration whilst the rawhide between them absorbed energy by being compressed. During the Sengoku Jidai lesser parts of the armour were often of nerigawa to help keep the weight down. By coincidence, I have just bought an armour that is entirely of rawhide except for the sleeves, haidate and shinguards. Most remarkably the lacquer is all in good order so there is no warping or distortion of the parts. The lacing is in a bit of a state so it will need a bit of TLC when it arrives and before it can be mounted. I will get some images posted asap. Ian Bottomley

Jan, A menpo of wood would be totally impractical. Far more likely is that it is of rawhide, nerigawa. Although not as common as iron, leather masks do occur reasonably often. The wet hide was hammered into a wooden mould and then allowed to dry. It was then lacquered to keep out moisture. Contrary to common belief, leather armour was expensive. It was also very practical, being nearly as tough as iron but much lighter. Ian Bottomley

Peter, You don't surprise me. By and large armourers were quite prepared to stick their names inside helmets, and occasionally masks, but seem to have been a bit reluctant to sign other examples of their work. You say the do in question is an uchidashi do. Is it by any chance a yukinoshita do with uchidashi work on the front plate? If so, I have a theory about these. Ian Bottomley

Peter, The usual place for a signature on a go-mai-do is on the outside of the front half-plate under the right arm. Having said that, I have also seen them on the inside the front plate, chiselled in the iron, the area being left free of lacquer. Yet another place might be on the inside of the lower edge somewhere. I once played with a yukinoshita do for a couple of days before I noticed it was signed in the latter position. Ian Bottomley

Ron, You are quite correct. I was sloppy in my wording. There is something odd happening to the breech area of the barrel on the opposite side to the lock. On the lock side the barrel seems to have been roughly filed down where it butts against the brass band. It also seems to have the same treatment on the back as well - one wonders why. Ian Bottomley

Piers, These are indeed an interesting and rare collection of SE Asian guns. I wonder how accurate the origins claimed for these guns are. Jan, That gun is a very late one made after the American's had introduced percussion cap ignition. Prior to this the Japanese were making 'pill-lock' guns that used small pellets of detonating compound. These latter must have been very difficult to use, the tiny pills being about 2mm diam, and explosive to boot. Ian Bottomley

All, By chance I was in work today and noted the following on a fellow curators desk. I was led to believe these items had passed through Herman Historica sale. The link connects to another forum: http://forum.velizariy.kiev.ua/viewtopi ... 44&start=7 Now, these items are interesting on several counts. The gun with the Togugawa kamon is of the type that was produced in Indonesia and does not have a Japanese barrel as the caption suggests. How it made its way to Japan is a mystery but it could have been brought by the Dutch or it may have been a gift to the Shogun from the King of Siam, the two having extensive correspondence with each other. I am a bit suspicious of the serpentine which looks too refined and a different colour brass. I suspect it has been added recently before it was put into the sale. The second gun is very similar to one of the two early Goan guns in the Tokugawa Art Museum, Nagoya. The Nagoya gun having a Tokugawa kamon fixed to the pan cover. This gun is a bit odd. Why has there been no attempt to fit the lock into the stock? It is said to come from Vietnam like the third gun. That at least has the lock properly inlet into the stock. Three interesting matchlocks that all derive from those produced in Goa, each with their individual national takes on the basic form. Ian Bottomley

Piers, That is interesting. The name Tsure yamamichi is supposed to mean 'mountain paths coming together'. Whether Unkai Mitsunao was the one who introduced the idea of shaping the edges of the plates I am not sure, but the Kaga group did take on several characteristics that are unusual. Apart from the plate edges they started piercing the corners of the lowest plates with inome and also used a rather unique gilded leather having the surface punched with small circles and is usually embellished with reddish painted dragons. Mitsunao himself introduced a style of hottoke dou with an asymmetric cloud-shaped overlay, often of red leather, at the waist (possibly an allusion to his name) - the plain space above this overlay being decorated with a russet iron cut-out of something like a ho-o bird, or pawlonia leaves and flowers, invariably splashed with sawari. Two other positive identifiers were that the interior of the dou was lined with an open weave cloth glued to the surface and generally gilded, although I have seen one done in red lacquer and that there is often a strong Buddhist theme. When he died, the group continued to produce similar armours that gradually became simpler. Some of the latter ones having the cloud-shape at the waist just done in reddish lacquer. Ian Bottomley

Ian, Are you referring to the shape of the edge of the plates? If so, it is usually called tsure yamamichi (see Chukokatchu Seisakuben by Sakakibara Kozan - edited by H. Russell-Robinson, 1962, Holland Press). Although not exclusively so, this kind of shaping of plate edges was very much a feature of armour made in Kaga province during the Edo period. According to the family documents of the Maeda preserved in Kanazawa, They employed Haruta armourers to turn out quite considerable quantities of armour, aided by the low ranking soldiers of the Han. It was this group who employed Unkai Mitsunao, the grandson of a Korean armourer brought over by Hideyoshi. Ian Bottomley

Peter, In my experience Chinese armour, other than helmets, is rare. Odd armours turn up from time to time, but rarely in anything like reasonable condition. You can find some information in H. Russell-Robinson's book 'Oriental armour' - Arms and Armour Press, but it isn't all that informative. The Royal Armouries in Leeds has a few suits, by far the best being a red lacquered lamellar one with its helmet and shoulder guards. Its origins are obscure in that it was collected in the 19th century but was probably a century or more old by then. The others are the more familiar plates riveted inside fabric and a magnificent court costume worn by a general that is pure Nanki-Poo and has no plates - only rivet heads. Ian Bottomley

Ford, At last the recognition you so justly deserve. Well done Ian Bottomley

Please note the comment above was not made by me but by a member with the same Christian name and same initial of the family name. Ian Bottomley

Adam, The f / k set you illustrate sets my heart racing. The utter precision of the nanako and the brilliant way the artist has only implied the two kamon on the fuchi is fantastic. I marvel at fact that he has been able to execute the minute mitsutomoe kamon on the fan in gold. I would guess he cut out or punched in the depressions and then filled them with gold amalgam. What a tour de force! When I see work like this I am humbled and realise how ham-fisted I am. Ian Bottomley

Carl, This looks like a fairly typical Edo period jingasa but with one rather odd characteristic. The plain gold disc is positioned on the front, which has a slightly wider brim and is turned up - this is because they were worn rather tipped up at the back because of the queue. What is the kamon doing on the side and is their another on the opposite side? Ian bottomley

Roy, As someone who has spent a considerable part of my life in a National Museum, I know what you are up against when it comes to museum staff. Local museums are frequently staffed by people with little or no knowledge of many the items under their care, and in some case a total lack of interest in them. In fairness I must say that many do try and learn, but often the contents of the collections are so diverse, nobody could become knowledgeable about the entirety. There is also a tendency to be over security-concious and hence suspicious of 'outsiders' wanting to get their hands on items. Sadly this attitude is occasionally fully justified. An example I know off involved a very valuable collection of classical coinage that a local collector had bequeathed to his local museum. The collection came to the attention of a coin collector who spent a considerable time over the course of a year or two, always in the presence of the curator, examining and cataloguing the collection. Years later it was examined by another enthusiast who discovered that many of the most desirable items had been replaced by electrotype copies. Despite all of this, one reason for the donation of objects to a museum's collection is for it to be come available for study by others. It is the curator's duty to make it available and excuses like 'lack of time' and so forth are not good enough. Some of these officials become very possessive about the objects in their care - tending to regard the collection as being as 'theirs'. I always took the attitude that if someone wanted to see something that was not on display, it was my primary duty to allow them to do so, after all, it is their collection. Might I suggest a gentle hint to the staff concerned along these lines. If that fails, try a local councillorand really put the wind up them. Ian Bottomley

Ford, I like the way Toshimasa has used abalone shell to give those little touches of blue/green. I remember seeing a fuchi / gashira by Iwamoto Konkan decorated with perch that was done with abalone eyes. Delicious. Ian Bottomley

Pablo, I flew from London Heathrow to JFK years ago with a blade. I wrote to the airline in advance describing the fact that it was an antique blade and in the luggage going in the hold. I was met at check-in by an airline representative who examined the blade in my baggage and sealed it with a security sticker. At JFK I was transferring to another airline on to San Fransisco so I decided I had better explain everything to US Customs. After collecting my bags I said to a staff member I needed to see a Customs official and was told to 'go through that door buddy'. On the other side I found my self in the general airport so I simply boarded the next plane and flew onwards. Nobody seemed to bother much in those days. Ian Bottomley

Denis, As a fellow country man from further north, welcome to the Board. Do try and get to the next Birmingham Arms Fair where members of the Northern ToKen Society, and hopefully myself, will welcome you personally. Ian Bottomley

Ron, Further to your excellent article, you might be interested to know that Captain John Saris, who travelled to Japan to negotiate a trading treaty for the English, records in his diary that in 1613 he gave Matsura Hoin, daimyo of Hirado, a gold damascened gun that was described as 'double locked'. This was a mistake on his part since he thought he was meeting the 'King of Japan'. He later travelled to Sumpu and Edo with Will adams and gave Tokugawa Ieyasu a gold damascened gun as well. At this period these would have been snaphaunces, but sadly he gives no other details. I made a few enquiries at Toshogu shrines but there seems to be no trace of what happened to these guns. I did however once encounter a three barrelled Japanese snaphaunce that was first recorded in the Army Museum in Mexico City and ended up in California where I saw it. The three barrels rotated so each used the same cock and flint but had individual pans and steels. The barrels had been decorated at a later date with deities, but at the base of each was a faint Tokugawa kamon. The snaphaunce mechanism was weird - each pan had an L shaped cover with the vertical face of steel grooved like those of a Spanish miquelet lock. Each steel was held by a spiral brass spring whose outer end was fastened to the rear of the steel and the centre behind the pan. At the bottom of the steel face was a short peg that engaged in a hole in a small fence at the front edge of the pan. In use, the steel was pulled down and the peg engaged in the hole, holding it in place and covering the pan. As the flint struck, the steel was pushed back, releasing the peg, the spring then lifting the steel off the pan and scraped it upwards against the flint which was moving downwards. Sadly I had no camera and didn't think to take proper sketches but I'm sure there was a second spiral spring in front of the first that helped lift the steel. Two of the steels were actually of bronze and had been cast from an original steel one - a repair that suggests it had not been robust enough to be practical and had been relegated to a display piece. That it was originally in Mexico City might be important. In 1614 The Keicho mission to Europe by Hasekura Tsunenaga went there first on their way to Europe in 1614. A letter from Date Masamune makes it clear that the gifts of arms and armour for European monarchs was supplied by Tokugawa Ieyasu. Almost certainly the Japanese had seen snaphaunce guns carried by the Dutch years before Saris arrived and this gun may well have been a Japanese attempt to copy the mechanism that had failed and had been sent as a gift with Hasekura. Ian Bottomley

I was once told a tale, second or third hand and probably highly embellished, but what the heck. It concerned an old collector with a wicked sense of humour attending a meeting of the Japan Society during the early 1960's or thereabouts. Said collector had a wakizashi having all the mounts with a similar theme to the menuki that started this thread. Sadly I never saw the offending sword, but I was told the fuchi / gashira depicted a magnificent set of hairy male equipment in gold, red copper whilst the tsuba and other mounts had similar decoration. (Gives a whole new meaning to the term kin tama I suppose ). Imagine the scene, a roomful of old China hands who had served in the Empire with their ladies in flowered hats, earnest bespectacled scholars and 'Society types' who attend these events. After the formalities, various prints, paintings, inro, netsuke, pieces of lacquerware and the like were exhibited by those attendees who collected Japanese art, each object being suitably coo-ed over. At this point the collector pulled the wakizashi out of its brocade bag and handed it round. Absolutely no reaction whatsoever - nobody noticed. Ian Bottomley

Christian, I take your point about coinage, but I did not mean it was for coins. There are plenty of swords out there with long drawers fitted into the scabbard for that purpose. I have a fake tanto that has no blade but a big drawer for carrying coins. What I meant was a small piece of gold or silver - like a small ingot. This was not my idea but that of a colleague. The more I think of this, the more I am inclined to the idea of the slot being for a prayer or charm. I was once shown an armour in Japan with a small bag fastened to the sashimono bracket on the back. The bag was fabric covered in mail and inside was a folded prayer paper and a tiny carving of Buddha. Ian

Adam, I cannot see the problem with the defaced signature. Whatever the reason for the holes, they were not the norm and were presumably added at the owner's wishes to an existing tsuba. Ian

Gents, All suggestions about a locking device of some form suffer from the fact that the position of these slots would necessitate it lie slap up against the habaki. In that position it could only engage with the inside of the saya. Goodness knows how such a device might be operated. No, that is one use that is just not feasible. We have now determined it is not to alter the shape of the nakago ana so we must look at the obvious. It is a small concealed cavity sandwiched between the seppa. What for? One possibility, and this is not my suggestion but a colleague's, for carrying a small amount of gold or silver for emergency use. Another suggestion, of mine, is a small rolled up prayer or charm on paper. Ian Bottomley

Brian, Yes I have has some more info passed to me that I think will move things in a new direction but I agree we should let things ride for a day or two. Ian Bottomley