Tsuba Pointers

[Dejima]

So, i'm a complete greenhorn at these things, to be honest i've never even held one in my hands so to make a judgment call from afar is always a tricky thing, especially if you have no experience to rely on. I want to start out small, so i figured Tsuba's are proper. Before i buy anything i thought a forum like this is the best place to be. Since this is my first post, it's a pleasure to be here! Since i suck with nicknames, I've picked this one as an homage to our old VOC trading post in Edo period Nagasaki. With my nationality it seems fitting.

 

Now before you scream bloody murder, i don't have any pointers yet and the spots people usually go to for reliability, there isn't much to look for in the Netherlands as far as antiques go. That means... Yes, i explored Ebay first (nonono i didn't buy anything yet!). I did have the common sense to search only for those with NBTHK papers, especially modern Hozon. Some of them have old green ones, which from my understanding raise a few eyebrows if they were issued during the late 70's. To be frank, i don't even have a clue how easy it is to fake even the modern ones, though i am aware of their increased measures to make it very difficult.

 

While i can perfectly understand the site to be seen as something you can best stay away from, i'm not fully convinced that everything out there is bad from the getgo. And some of them do look nice to my untrained eye, whether they are truly authentic is another thing entirely. So i grabbed a couple, and i was wondering if anyone out there could take the effort and time to point out if they are authentic or not, and for what particular reasons.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Antique-Japanese-Katana-tsuba-iron-edo-era-Sansui-Doku-Aizu-Shoami-School-NBTHK-/321829517648?hash=item4aee88b950(Even though it's an Aizu Shoami)

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Antique-Japanese-Katana-Sign-tsuba-iron-edo-Shigehiro-Akita-Shoami-School-NBTHK-/321790037422?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4aec2e4dae(Akita School, It's Tokubetsu Kicho was issued in 1973, you don't see that many with seashells)

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Antique-Japanese-Katana-tsuba-iron-edo-Myogu-Sukashi-Zogan-Onin-School-NBTHK-/221808411339?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item33a4cfc2cb(Onin School, it's Tokubetsu was issued in 1962. For it's age it looks very... Extravagant)

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Japanese-tsuba-Momoyama-Period-signed-Kaneiye-/331628831483?hash=item4d369e62fb(Okay, just for the hell of it, a Momoyama/Early Edo Kaneiye school for $312. No NBTHK... I guess there's no doubt it's a fake and the very reason why it hasn't sold yet after 2/3 new listings)

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Antique-Japanese-Katana-tsuba-Sakura-Kuku-Marugata-Saru-Tanko-Tosho-School-NBTHK-/221808410863?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item33a4cfc0ef(Tosho school, Kamakura period. It's certificate is there... But the actual item looks entirely different than the one in the photograph, chipped off iron, Hitsu Ana missing/plugged)

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Antique-Japanese-Katana-Edo-Tsuba-Motohiro-Shokatei-Nakagami-Shakudo-NBTHK-/321829519175?hash=item4aee88bf47(Has both a Shokatei club/NBTHK certificate)

 

So... Are any of these worthy of attention and their pricetags? Just look at them first before "NO! EBAAAY!", You have my thanks.

[Brian]

Thomas,

They are all real, and imho, all suffer from either condition issues, or a "blah" factor meaning they are just what they are..tsuba. Nothing special or unusual. Nothing standing out. The type that you will get 5 minutes of enjoyment from and then spend the rest of your collecting days wondering what you saw in it. There are tons out there. On this forum, for between $500 and $1500 you can find any number of better examples. Even on member websites such as this one: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/17395-huge-discounts-prices-lowered-up-to-50/

Even the one you show that is going for $2500 is just blah in my opinions. Shows signs of artificial patina, and I wouldn't grab it at half that money. The Kaneiye is a typical Edo Saga Kaneiye, nothing special there. The seashells one is cute. I kinda like it, but at that money is all in.

Not hard to find genuine tsuba. Finding ones that stand out and are quality, for decent money....is where the trick lies.

Welcome. We have a few NL members.

 

Brian

[Stephen]

Brian beat me to it

 

Two other places to look

 

Grays

http://www.japaneseswordbooksandtsuba.com/store/Tsuba-&-Kodogu

 

aoi art

http://www.aoijapan.com/fittings/tsuba

[Thierry BERNARD]

Hi Thomas (and Stephen beat me too)

 

yes all these tsuba are authentic but for the price of each of them i think you can have better ones

[Dejima]

Thanks for your fast replies. Well, as far as appreciation for the tsubas themselves go, it's hard to decide what to like and what not to like, that still has to develop. Since i have to begin any sort of collection, i guess i might say that it's nice that i seem to recognize fakes from the real ones. Though there are many that are just too obvious or tryhard or have such over-the-top detail in them that it screams chinese. Are there any other obvious pitfalls i should watch out for?

 

I'm somewhat surprised the Onin/Tosho ones are authentic, i was under the impression that early works from the Muromachi period to Momoyama were fairly simple in design due to wartime tsubas being made to be practical, not to catch someones eyes. The second being clearly different than what was displayed in the photograph, or was that just used as a general reference since these Tosho designs are fairly common?

[Stephen]

After you study and know what you like want buy from known sellers/dealers.

 

many in the links section

Hageyama always has a nice selection. 

 

http://www.nihonto.com/itemsaletsuba.html

[rkg]

Hi,

 

I'm not sure we're supposed to comment on ongoing auctions here, but I guess its OK to say these are all real if not very interesting examples (though, as with all art, beauty is in the eye of the beholder), with a few of the descriptions being a stretch.  FWIW, if you don't know what you are looking at/looking for, ebay is NOT the place to look for tsuba - most pieces there are dross + they are often either not photographed well or are photographed too well( to cleverly hide/de-emphasize problems the pieces have).  And then there are the pieces with "optimistic" asking price - some have the offer button (though if you don't know what to offer...), while others seem to be put there waiting for a bunny to come along...

 

As with swords, you might be better off going and finding a way to look at some real pieces in hand to at least get an idea of what you like in hand before doing much else.  You might see if some of the European members have clubs/set up exhibitions/will take pity on you and show you some pieces, see if any museums you can get to have some out on display/you can con the curator into looking at a few pieces that are in the back room, go to a sword show (do they do these in Europe?), etc. 

 

Good Luck,

 

rkg

(Richard George)

[Pete Klein]

Why not check out the NBTHK EB for their next meeting?  See if they are going to anything on tsuba/fittings.  It would be a good way to start especially because they are all serious collectors.

 

http://www.nbthk.net/NBTHKe/Membership.html

[Jamie]

Grey has many nice tsuba and is a very fair person to deal with. After educating yourself a bit you might check his site.

I didn't link it because Stephen did above.

[Dejima]

Was curious if some of the tsuba on ebay could be authentic, it seems to have a really bad rep (for understandable reasons), but i guess if you look around long enough you can find some interesting ones, so i was looking for opinions on these from those in the know. From the perspective of people who barely have started collecting, they are for sure more easily impressed (and i realize that can be a trap by itself) by something another person with many years of experience may find boring/ordinary. If you have dozens or more, you may just start looking for items that top the ones you've gotten before that. Until you've reached the pricetag ceiling (i've seen one for almost 21k, yikes) and some remain out of your reach.

 

I get the worth of educating yourself on these matters, i've only just started to go into the basics and familiarize myself with the different schools, what has quality and what doesn't. But you don't get very far if you don't atleast get a few tips here and there. So thanks for that. I think there's enough to be explored in the link section for now.

 

But like i said, i'm starting small. And slow, it's not a world you want to rush yourself into anyway.

[seattle1]

Hello:

 The tsuba identified as Onin isn't Onin at least in contemporary usage. Tsuba of that type are sometimes referred as displaying "dust inlay" suggestive of floor sweepings and would fall into the "Yokohama dock work school" in the eyes of most, though they are also called gomoku zogan. While the term "Onin" is entered in parentheses below mu mei, I cannot imagine where they got that, as anything called Onin would be either have shinchu suemon zogan or shinchu ten (taka) zogan and they represent an early and important group. Perhaps the small mon were interpred as suemon zogan, but the dominant feature is the scattered "dust inlay". Dr.Torigoye in his Tsuba Kanshoki (Revised), 1976, on p. 385 adds a small helpful section headed "I will show some poor samples as follows lest you should get such ones" and sure enough there is a photograph of a tsuba similar to the above, it showing several ko sukashi, much scattered brass slivers and a few tiny mon. These sort of tsuba date to pre-Meiji times too, but they are avoided by most collectors.

 Arnold F.

[Thierry BERNARD]

  On 8/17/2015 at 1:24 PM, seattle1 said:

Hello:

 The tsuba identified as Onin isn't Onin. Tsuba of that type are sometimes referred as displaying "dust inlay" suggestive of floor sweepings and would fall into the "Yokohama dock work school". I can't read all of the paper but I don't think the term "Onin" is used on it.

 Arnold F.

(応仁) Onin

[seattle1]

Bernard:

 Please see my revised post above yours.

 Arnold F.

[rkg]

Again, I thought we weren't supposed to comment on active auctions, but yeah, I believe Arnold is correct and this attribution has issues WRT what is currently considered to be an Onin tsuba....

 

rkg

(Richard George)

  On 8/17/2015 at 4:18 PM, seattle1 said:

Bernard:

 Please see my revised post above yours.

 Arnold F.

[Brian]

I don't prohibit discussion of live items, as long as the discussion is educational and not about pricing. Posts may be removed if they cause unwarranted influence on the auction though, and the rules on this are fluid and tentative depending on the circumstances. In other words, we tread lightly...

 

Brian

[rkg]

You know, you shouldn't forget to look at some of the sites of sellers who are members....

 

This guy is having a pretty good sale on a number of pieces that would make fair starter pieces - I can't tell you how the service is yet (since the piece I ordered isn't here yet), but his images are better than damned near all of what is on fleabay, and...

 

http://tanto.dk/shop/

 

Best,

 

rkg

(Richard George)

[kaigunair]

  On 8/18/2015 at 4:52 PM, rkg said:

You know, you shouldn't forget to look at some of the sites of sellers who are members....

 

 

I'd actually refine that comment to members who have been around for a long long time in the larger sword collecting community not just on this forum;  collectors and sellers who are known and have established themselves and their reputation in the larger sword collecting community and not just online.  Just because a person gives out lots of free advice, doesn't mean he won't take advantage of new collectors given the chance.

 

Buy books first!  Lots of good lists of which ones to chose from.  The good books show you the best pieces - then you can compare what you're finding online to the good stuff and decide if you like it yourself, and formulate better questions regarding what you're seeing.