Bugyotsuji

Don't have the details with me right now but I read part of a travelogue of a young Japanese who travelled to India around 1625 and reported having seen the Southern Cross. By the way, for those who haven't yet noticed it, stars in Japan were represented as round (white) polka dots, not the pointed star twinkly things that we subconsciously draw when requested.

PS The alphabetic ク 'Ku' mark at the bottom left of the barrel would be the smith's private internal message mark indicating a part, lot or batch number, etc. Maybe repeated inside the 'shinchu' brass lock. The two characters on the facet to the right of the long signature state that the barrel is of steel-banded helix construction, 巻張, 'makibari'. (winding/binding)

Hi Kyran, You have come to the right place. Congratulations on finding this gun. It is a typical smoothbore matchlock (Tanegashima-style) long gun from the Choshu Han in southwest Honshu, Yamaguchi Prefecture today. There are several striking stylistic features which tell us this at once, particularly those you have highlighted in your photography. The signature is Kagoya (gunsmith House of Kagoya) Daisanzaemon/ Daisozaemon/Daizaemon/Daisanemon(?) (Just double-checking the possible reading of these personal name characters). Kagoya Dai Sanzaemon...（best？） 籠谷台三左衛門 a smith from Sakai (Osaka today), where most of the Choshu Han guns were made to order. Although not dated, we can assume mid- to late-Edo, before the advent of percussion locks when most of these original Choshu locks were adapted and updated. In fact in my experience it is not so easy to find an original example. There are however a couple of temporary fixes that someone has thought necessary to perform on your gun. By the way, did you take the breech plug out, or was it missing anyway? That is the main body of information, while I try and double check how the smith would have said his name.

From memory I think 17k is about right.

There are many gold substitutes out there. Gold does not tarnish. Solid gold is expensive so they would be very rare, examples are more often gilded onto copper, or sometimes lead for the realistic lead weight. The first rule of thumb is to weight them in your hand.

This thread is dreaming of better photography. I think we should be allowed to dream.

Totally different construction but your swirling ‘ran’ orchid design reminds me somewhat of a Chōshū Tomonobu guard. The leaves run over the Mimi.

That bottom one above says Hokuto Shichisei.(The dragon’s tail probably indicating Polaris the Pole star.) Long lusted over this Sendai matchlock in Sawada Taira’s collection. Close-up

Whoah! I just took it as a seasonal symbol of the New Year. (The surface does look like glutinous rice though…)

There are so many ways you can look at this, and there may never be a convincing answer. You could even say for example that the Shippō pattern itself developed from people looking at the stars, and maybe seeing random patterns. In Japan of course they would not have seen the same Mediterranean mythical figures or creature shapes up there, though you do find allusions to the Hokuto shichisei 北斗七星 One of my netsuke could be a star map, but that is only one interpretation of it and other possibilities remain. I do not feel the need to come down on one side or another. My own feeling is that we are free to look at Shippō patterns and make mental associations, and that such poetic lateral association or subtle allusion is an active feature of Japanese art.

Shippō Mon (Chirashi) Sukashi Tsuba 七宝文散透鐔 (Scattered) Shippō pattern perforations (The rest is Mei and tsuba physical features.)

That is so unusual! Is there no end to the imaginative Tsuba cameo world? (Besides, I have a soft spot for orchids in Tōsōgu.)

I have a Sukekane Tantō blade dated Meiji 2 (1869) in black urushi Inaba Koshiraé with silver chrysanthemum style fittings, plus rings. No proof, but common sense says the Koshiraé has to be contemporary with the blade, i.e. c 1870. NBTHK Hozon

Dan, your post comes up in weird typeset format. It looked as though you were quoting from somewhere…(?) See:

Whose words are those Dan, yours, AI’s or someone else’s?