new (ko) kinko tsuba from fleabay

[rkg]

Hey guys,

 

I decided to take a flier on this piece on fleabay as I've been on an old soft metal tsuba kick lately:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/291157649147?ss ... 1497.l2649

 

I found it curious that the seller only had one picture of the front of the tsuba + they blew out the front surfaces -see below for what it actually looks like (you gotta love how ebay "fuzzifes" images as well...).

 

In hand its a bit of a stumper. I'm leaning towards it being an old tsuba that was gussied up at some point a while ago with the addition of gold mon, and I'm thinking maybe the lacquer was added/refreshed at that time too (maybe done in the early edo from the gunk around the mons?). Or its a late fak-er,uh, utushi, which I kind of doubt as it wouldn't be worth the trouble to to make a piece like this look old (gunk around mons, etc).

 

I'm thinking the mons are adhered to the surface, rather than being some kind of uttori. In the high res pictures, you can see some "flashing" around some of them, so were these formed by pressing into a mold? Also, you can see one at the lower right hand corner mon on the back has been replaced. The gold/shape doesn't match the others, and it looks like it was stuck on with lacquer or pine pitch or something (I think its the former as its still shiny - I haven't tried probing it or anything to verify this).

 

The adjustments to the nakago ana are unusual as well.

 

Its kind of interesting because it seems to point to the piece spending some part its life on the wrong side of the tracks (maybe was owned by somebody who couldn't afford to have a top grade piece made?).

 

The tsuba showed up just when I am setting up a VR image set station (again) (I've got a bunch of stuff to clear out/put up on ebay), so I have lots of pictures of it. My apologies for the first images below - Since I have a lot of items to shoot, I am trying to actually use the software that came with the turntable to do the shooting/produce the VR image sets rather than do them the way I normally do - the software sucks, and I'm still trying to figure out what to tweak to force it to grunt out some decent images.

 

A small front/back image (using the turntable software - my apologies):

 

http://www.rkgphotos.com/sale_stuff/sal ... _front.jpg

http://www.rkgphotos.com/sale_stuff/sal ... o_back.jpg

 

And a couple of VR image sets:

 

http://www.rkgphotos.com/sale_stuff/sal ... front.html

http://www.rkgphotos.com/sale_stuff/sal ... _back.html

 

And finally, I broke down and shot a couple of it with the good camera - sorry that the focus is a little off and I didn't take the time to optimize the lighting so the detail could be seen at less than 100% magnification, but still...:

 

http://www.rkgphotos.com/sale_stuff/sal ... _large.jpg

http://www.rkgphotos.com/sale_stuff/sal ... _large.jpg

 

Anyway, observations appreciated.

 

Best,

 

rkg

(Richard George)

[Barrie B]

Is that traces of black lacquer (left on the Tsuba) or has the Shakudo finish been worn off?

 

Barrie B

[rkg]

lacquer

 

rkg

(Richard George)

[Soshin]

Hi RKG,

 

Good eBay fine. I purchased a nice vintage kozuka box from this seller recently. I love the rim edge on this tsuba it does a good job of contrasting with darkness of the plate surface. It can be clearly seen on the VR images when you turn them. Thank for sharing.

[MauroP]

Hi Richard,

I bought several tsuba from Takahashi-san and I consider him a gentleman. Unfortunately it's hard to judge the quality of items he is selling on eBay from his pics. This seems a very interesting ko-kinko tsuba, and you got it at a bargain price. Bye, Mauro

[raven2]

Gee, I wish I had as good luck on Fleabay. Very nice piece. When I saw the picture on the the website it looked very washed out, but now seeing your pictures, I am quite impressed with it. Good job and the the price was certainly right.

[Baka Gaijin]

Good morning Richard,

 

Please excuse a few ramblings.

 

I think the Kamon is known as Gosankiri.

 

They look to be pressed metal.

 

I've seen a similar sort of kanamono, often applied in profusion to low end export Laquered boxes and small Chests.

 

My call would be, and I say this with Sunday morning irony as a case of "Post - Edo Pimp my Tsuba".

 

Nonetheless an interesting and intriguing Tsuba (Possibly pre - Edo) and well worth the money.

 

Cjeers

[rkg]

Back again from the five week stint trying to help the kid pass her summer school math class, getting/setting up another studio camera (just replaced my last canon with a Nikon D5200), the brother's wedding, etc.

 

Erazer,

 

Thanks for the info on what the mon pressed metal "bits" are called!

 

Looking at the pics again, the way the old patina has been polished down around the mon is a too regular due to wear, so yeah, I'd buy these weren't added that long ago. the thing is that most of the gosankiri bits have a fair amount of crud on/around them that actually goes up from the surface onto them so I still think they were added earlier than later/the piece was actually used with these affixed at some point - because of that, I'd buy that it was pimped bakamatsu/Meiji period - while people were actually still using the pieces rather than it being simply pimped with shiny things so it would sell better to the tourists. The replaced one was clearly added later - I wonder if it was by the seller...

 

Best,

 

rkg

(Richard George)