Grandfather's sword - Tsuba

[Stephen]

Following on from a previous thread on the sword itself at viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3259

 

..Not to cause head sctraching.... Anne the tsuba mei is upside down i tride to copy to do a 180 but you have good photo copy protection.

 

Tsuba pix are taken with the mune side down. Sorry i cant read it.

[Ford Hallam]

and I fell off my desk while doing a handstand trying to read it upside down :? ...you must make more effort, Stephen

[anne_brewer]

All, thank you for the great feedback and the images for comparison. :D

 

Stephen, I was worried I had the images upside down. Any others I need to fix? You can PM me if you like - or, I believe the website pages allow for comments. Never done it myself so ...

 

Am in the process of fixing it now - so should be available for you by the time you get around to looking at it again. I'm also posting the over-exposed tsuba image with the mei here as well to simplify matters.

 

Will work on getting sword blade images this weekend. Am on a mission today to make my new nanake tagane courtesy of Ford's wisdom and generosity.

 

Thank you all. Will post more detailed responses as I get the chance to absorb all this post-tagane creation. :D

 

Best regards, Anne or Antelope or whatever brightens your day

[docliss]

Anne’s tsuba is, as I am sure we will all agree, an example of HeianjÅ ZÅgan work. The rather naive brass, hon-zÅgan, vegetation design; the maru-gata and maru mimi; and the rounded hitsu-ana all tend to support this attribution. But, sadly, some of the inlay has become detached, and in these areas can be seen shallow incisions around the missing inlay. Also, the pine-needle design is verging on one of a karakusa-moyÅ, and both of these are features that are more commonly associated with YoshirÅ work.

 

Since YoshirÅ tsuba have their origins in the HeianjÅ ZÅgan school, is it acceptable to suggest that Anne’s tsuba represents an early transition between these two groups?

 

The majority of both of these groups of tsuba are mumei, and it will be interesting to see if either more photographs of the seppa-dai from Anne, or an experienced Japanese eye, can help in identifying the inscription.

 

John L.

[anne_brewer]

John,

 

A couple of thoughts. First, thank you for your thoughtful assessment of the tsuba. I so enjoyed reading it and will look up the Japanese word with which I am unfamiliar to get a more complete understanding of your assessment and the additional images you requested. Have you been to the website I set up with all the current images?

 

Regarding the inlay channels, they are actually rather deep but unfortunately filled with red rust. I tried to remove some with a ivory tooth pick. However, there was so much that I was concerned about hurting the piece. Also, prior to taking pictures, I gently removed the black-red rust from the inlay surface using Japanese charcoal and water. I worked at avoiding the patina on the tsuba except where the rust had piled into big hard globs. As I use Japanese patina in my work I understand that rust is the foundation of many of the patina, so I was as careful as I could be for a bull in a china shop.

 

An additional piece of information, until I removed the sword from its sack, the sword has only been looked at a few times and not touched since my father inherited it in the 50's. Prior to that, I believe, my grandfather had it sitting in the back of a closet. So it is original, with the exception of my work, to the form my grandfather got it in which was in the 1920-s to early 1930's time frame. My grandfather worked in Japan for 15 years building hydro-electric dams - I believe he was the project manager.

 

Hope this helps. The Antelope

[Ford Hallam]

I think John's description of the tsuba is spot on, all I can add it that the "mei" appears to be written in hiragana and reads; "su hi". I have no idea what this might signify but looking at the close up of the "mei" I get the impression that it was made some time after it was made, perhaps quite a long time later.

[anne_brewer]

All,

 

After much googling, I found the following link to a tsuba which is quite similar to grandfather's tsuba:

http://tsuba.jyuluck-do.com/HeianjyoShi ... Tsuba.html

 

Also, I've uploaded the image from the page. The caption says: "[ Heianjo-Shiki Shinchu-Zogan Tsuba ] The Momoyama period (1573 - 1603), Estimate"

 

 

Here is an image of grandfather's tsuba:

 

John and Ford, thank you so much for giving me enough information so I could narrow my search.

What do you think about the reliability of the information found?

[Ford Hallam]

Hi Anne, I think the description of the type of tsuba is sound...it just it's actual age that may be open to discussion. My feeling is that your example is not quite as old.

 

regards, Ford

[docliss]

Dear Anne

 

I agree that the tsuba you have posted is, indeed, very like your own. While it is difficult to be sure with the small image provided, this does seem to lack the YoshirŠfeature of incised lines around the brass inlay, which your tsuba demonstrates. Interestingly, though, its hitsu-ana is inlaid with a brass border — another feature of YoshirŠwork.

 

I also agree with Ford about the dating of your tsuba, but personally feel that this discrepancy is due to the fact that the posted tsuba is more likely to be early Edo, rather than Momoyama period, as stated.

 

Regards, John L.

[anne_brewer]

John and Ford,

 

Your insight has been helpful. I am curious, was it common to sign a piece later? Given the Ford's translation, I wonder what the mei means as well as the purpose served if adding it later.

 

I like the use of the word "naive" to describe the feeling the tsuba inlay evokes. GF's tsuba seems to be much less sophisticated than the one above. Also, I found 2 tsuba on Nihonto.us with the inlaid "branch" pattern that seem closer in the level of sophistication to the one I posted than 2 GF's tsuba's inlay. The ones on nihonto.us are kaga yoshiro dougle mon sukashi tsuba and kaga yoshiro multi mon sukashi tsuba.

 

So I guess my real question what does the "primitiveness"/"naivety" of GF's tsuba tell us about it, if anything.

 

Also, any ideas about resources I could use to further research the tsuba?

 

Thank you. Anne