Jesta

Not necessarily, the Great Kanto Flood of 1742 was caused by massive amounts of rain falling from a pair of typhoons. This overloaded the rivers and caused their banks to break, flooding the area.

Mist would make sense, now that you suggest it. There is a different depiction of water under the bridge, so the softer lines could well be mist. I remain unsure about the Torii depiction, but the shrine roof is also at an angle, so it may be a stylistic choice for perspective…? Mist would also make sense where the sails of the boats can be seen, but not the boats themselves, implying a kind of dreamy atmosphere where taller items like Torii, shrines, trees, and masts all poke their heads above the clouds. The signature is Gotō Etsujō (1642 - 1708) so it can’t be the 1742 flood, although there were certainly floods before that one…

I recently acquired this daisho set. I love the look, and the execution is excellent, but I am a bit stumped by the theme. It appears to show a flood (?) with the tori gate on the shoto, and the shrine on the daito submerged, while the bridges and trees remain above water. There are boats sailing by in the distance. My best guess is that this is the Great Kanto Flood of 1742, although I am not sure why a natural disaster would be a suitable theme for tsuba… Can anyone shed any light on this? Are there other examples of flood motifs?

I was just thinking about this, and wondering if it would be a good plan to get rid of them. I am not a fan of the stickers, but you raise an excellent point about provenance. I will keep them on…

I believe Quixotic might be a good term Something that is done from time to time on the board might be valuable if it was collated is to provide a list of red flags, with examples, for people to look out for. This is something that you do here for individual pieces (and in your books). Rather than try to find all the examples of all the fakes it might be better to find examples of the all the typical features that fakes tend to have. With the understanding that not all fakes will have all, or even any of them, and some real tsuba might have one or two. But… if a piece has too many red flags then probably better to walk away…

Thank you. I find your work in this area incredibly useful because I get so much education from reading the descriptions, and looking at the pictures. For my own collecting, I am back to exploring the concept of “fake”. I can certainly say agree something can be old, and yet be judged to be without much merit in terms of its rarity, craftsmanship, etc, but then it is down to an informed judgement about what appeals or not. So, when an Edo period tsuba is mass-produced I would tend to say that it is not a “fake” but it might not be considered as desirable as something that was handmade and largely unique (although the concept of “unique” is a hard one to nail down since themes and styles were much copied during the Edo period…). This makes starting a collection pretty hard, especially when pieces are sometimes described as “fake” with little real clarity on how they are labelled like that. Which is why I appreciate your detailed work so much… (this is off the top of my head, so take it for what it is worth) I wonder if a possible way would be to create a taxonomy to help new/existing collectors understand how things might be perceived by the wider community. Something like this: Main families Edo period Meiji period Modern Sub-categories Deliberate attempt to deceive (gimei, modern copies, etc) Handmade Mass-produced Created for use Created for art Created for sale to “tourists" Artistic merit, perceived craftsmanship quality would have to be a personal judgement, I think, with value determined by a willingness to buy it at the price offered. On a personal note, I have started to record the provenance of items that I buy, if there is any. This is (much like in the fine art world) to help provide a paper trail for the items to help future collectors know at the very least how long this piece has been in the hands of other collectors, or passed through auction houses etc.

Given that some tsuba were mass-produced in the Edo or early Meiji periods, is there a consensus on what qualifies as a “fake”? Is there a cutoff date that is generally agreed up as the point at which authentic becomes fake? I know that some modern tsuba are still being made, and may be collectible in their own right, but I am referring to purported antiques.

I am always worried by antiques being advertised as “authentic” and “genuine”. It screams “honest, guv, no word of a lie…” to me. That, and the extremely low quality pictures, makes me very wary of this one. I can’t bid on something that I can’t see.

I don’t like to talk about expense… Personally, while I haven’t really fixed on a preferred style I am increasingly in love with good nanako, and I love wave patterns, so this set hit all my weak points.

This set is beautiful. The detail is amazing, and I love how the creator has fitted the action into such a confined space.

Thanks, and a great painting too. I hadn’t considered that holding the string in your mouth might be an extra-safe way to hold onto it. I had the vision of the bow bouncing up and down smacking him in the chin over and over again, but if he’s clinching it tight to the body and just controlling it with his mouth it makes a certain amount of sense…

Dale: those are literally a one-horse race I’m still fascinated by the bowstring in the mouth. Seems like such a bad idea.

I recently picked up this set, and went down a bit of a rabbit hole trying to get a full picture of the details depicted. I thought that I would share what I have found. There are other posts referencing this motif, but I didn’t find one that gave details… Happy to have any other details that I have missed, and shares from anyone else who has tosogu on the same theme. The set The tsuba is almost circular. It is shakudō, with a nanako ground, and chiseled in relief with details in gold. The tsuba shows the race across the Uji River. The fuchi-kashira show samurai at a Shinto shrine. The Race Across the Uji River (1180) This set has the depiction of a scene from the 14th-century military epic “The Tale of the Heike” (Heike monogatari). In the telling of this part of the story the Taira army were chasing a rebel army that had been raised by Prince Mochihito. The two armies met at the site of a bridge across the Uji river. The following confrontation became known as the First Battle of Uji (1180). The rebels stripped the bridge back to its bare bones (see the top left of the tsuba) forcing the armies to confront each other in an archery duel, which tended to favour the rebels as they had warrior monks on their side who used powerful bows that could penetrate the wooden shields used at the time. The battle wore on until sunset with the broken bridge as a chokepoint leading to stalemate. As the sun set, a retainer on the Taira side suggested that they should try to ford the river or go around to find another route. The river was swollen by heavy rains, but Sasaki Takatsuna and Kajiwara Kagesue decided to lead a contingent of 300 samurai across the river to engage with the enemy on land. The two of them rushed to get across the river first with Sasaki Takatsuna cheating a little by calling out to his rival that his mount’s saddle girth was loose, allowing him to ride ahead while Kajiwara Kagesue checked to see if his saddle was secure. On the tsuba we can see Sasaki Takatsuna and Kajiwara Kagesue, racing to get across the river. The position and depiction of Kajiwara Kagesue on the right is very closely mirrored by this diptych held by the Walters Art Museum. We can see Kajiwara Kagesue holding his bowstring in his mouth in the same way, and his horse is twisting to his left too. Holding the bowstring in his mouth seems to be a common trait in depictions of Kajiwara Kagesue as he crosses the river. The reverse of the tsuba has a group of three samurai on the opposite bank of the river, with the bridge in the upper right. They are presumably the opposing army, and seem to be gesturing to their enemies across the river. It’s hard to say exactly what action from the story is being depicted on the fuchi-kashira. The kashira shows a samurai at a shrine which could be related to the fact that Prince Mochihito had stayed at the Mii-dera temple before moving his forces to Uji. The fuchi shows samurai (possibly the main characters) preparing or resting next to a tied up horse. This battle seems to have been a popular moment of the story for depiction on tosogu and other art forms, with examples such as those above (and many others that have been shared on this board in the past), and this kozuka in the MFA Boston also showing the beginning of the race across the river. This screen held at the Met shows another view of the start of the race to cross the river, with the broken bridge in the background. Sources: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/78537 https://art.thewalters.org/object/95.181/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Uji_(1180)

I would agree. There is nothing I can see to indicate that it was cast rather than hand forged. It is unusual, but that’s a good thing…

Yes, could well be tarnishing instead. I like the feature, it makes the ana really stand out.