Easter Kantei

[DoTanuki yokai]

Hi

Just for our entertainment and inspired by others, i will also try to make a Kantei thread.

The blade is Unokubi-zukuri and the Shinogi is high.

 

Nagasa: 55,2cm

Kasane: 0,58cm

Sori: 1.05cm

Moto-Haba: 2,9cm

Saki-Haba: 2,6cm

Weight: 520g

I Hope everything else can be seen in the pictures.

The Nakago is hidden but i can later add it when it is too hard, its only by pictures after all.

I hope for many participants and i will let it run for a week or some days more.

Please forgive the dust on my camera lens.

Have fun and Happy easter.

 

[DoTanuki yokai]

I needed some photo sessions to capture enought useable pictures and i hope i got some good ones.

Thanks.

 

[Rivkin]

Ugh! I wanted to say right away a Nambokucho Yamato off-shoot Tegai/Mihara type but the hamon is a bit too intricate... Sue Sa?

[Jussi Ekholm]

Thanks for posting this one. These are always great experiences.

 

Spoiler

My guess would be naginata-naoshi from Nanbokuchō period. I am also thinking it has Yamato feeling but with bit roughness (not maybe good word to use). I think I would go for Ko-Uda.

 

[RichardP]

Chogi?

[Rivkin]

Looking at it once again I feel the nie is a bit too ill defined for Yamato... Echizen Rai?

[Sutraken]

Although the sugata appears to be typical for a nanbokucho period sword, I would guess the wakizashi was made by  the shinshinto master Sa Yukihide. 

[DoTanuki yokai]

Thanks for participating so far, here is the Nakago for the undecided. 
If someone want to change his opinion it’s alright  but I don’t want to influence anyone. 

[Sutraken]

Well, after seeing this nakago I have to change my guess to the nanbokucho sa school. This grade of patina makes shinshinto very unlikely. 

[Toryu2020]

Do we have better photos of the boshi?

[SteveM]

Looking forward to the reveal. Too hard for me. I can't even say with confidence what this is; Nambokuchō naginata-naoshi or shintō revival?

I'll throw my hat in with Sue Sa, but not through any brain-work of my own.

[DoTanuki yokai]

This is the best I can do at the moment, i have tried to have the whole kissaki on my pictures but it’s hard to get the light right for it. I will try a better close up of the Boshi later.

[DoTanuki yokai]

I hope this is good enough. 
I have to add that the tip geometry is not 100% perfect, the last few millimeters change angle a little.

[Toryu2020]

have we tried the old trick of closing yourself up in a completely black room and then using the flash on your phone to capture a photo?

 

-t

[DoTanuki yokai]

Found one more.

 

EDIT: I will try the flash next

[Jussi Ekholm]

I must admit that nakago is different than I thought it would be but I still think it would be a greatly shortened Nanbokuchō sword. It is very interesting.

[Sutraken]

In my opinion, this sword was originally made as a regular size nanbokucho tachi, which was later shortened to its actual length as a wakizashi. Perhaps there were some battle damages making a shortage to this length below katana standards necessary. 

[DoTanuki yokai]

Sorry I’m late first the pictures with flash didn’t worked as good as I have wanted and then my Computer stopped working. 
Here is the best I got with my phone but i will show the attribution soon. 
 

[David Flynn]

Enju.

 

[DoTanuki yokai]

Thanks for participating and watching everyone. 
Im not sure if someone was right or wrong because it is only an attribution , but Jussi was of the same opinion as the NBTHK „Ko Uda“ so he wins I think. 
Good work i don’t know if I would be able to guess it right but I don’t want to say the NBTHK is wrong here 

 

 Maybe this could have been useful for this  (Usagiya website)

 

And the NBTHK paper 

 

 

[SteveM]

Wow, hats off to Jussi!

[Jussi Ekholm]

Wish I could claim just hitting it by confidence but in reality lot of it was luck and I do think it could have been multiple of similarish options. I think the snippet from Usagiya is good one as I thought that way although I am not sure if rough etc. is best way to describe. I know the feature was present in some schools and I felt Ko-Uda is a quite common "bucket" attribution for such feature along with other characteristics it has around this time period.

 

I was quite sure it would have been shortened naginata but as it is classified as wakizashi I'd think it to be possibly a shortened tachi or ōdachi (I'd see that as logical but I am not yet 100% sure how NBTHK sees things).

[Ooitame]

The long boshi threw me off from uda. Good one. Again Jussi, with instinct lead towards the right path, way to go!

[DoTanuki yokai]

Im also not sure how this blade start  life but from the feel I can imagine that the shape was altered because of the weight. Compared to other swords of this size and with a short nakago the blade feels still heavy. 
I prefer to say what it is now unokubi zukuri, because I think there won’t be a reliable answer how it started.

the blade seems to be in this size for long time, for me it looks like it was shortened around mid Muromachi but this is just speculation from what I see in the Nakago.

 

For the Boshi I have read somewhere that sometimes they have a very long kaeri that turn into muneyaki sometimes.

EDIT:  Ohh Maybe you talk about the overall size of the Kissaki, i think it is the longest i have seen with this attribution but i can imagine that this could be from some form of reshaping from naginata or nagamaki and the small kaeri is only a repurposed bigger Hamon element.

 

Some years ago the founder Uda kunimitsu was just on papers but now there a 2 signed works existing.  I think there is more research necessary too understand Uda school better. (Alternatively i dont have the right books)

Also how reliable are sources that claim that some Uda smiths learned from Norishige, I can understand how someone can come to such conclusion but the similarities are not that much and also different.

[Rivkin]

thanks a lot and congrats to Jussi!

[Jussi Ekholm]

I know there is at least one book in Japanese focused solely on Etchū smiths so Uda school should be majorly focused on there, unfortunately I do not have it.

 

So far I have found 5 signed tachi by possibly various Uda Kunimitsu and 1 tanto (there is 1 only dated to 1321 but I do not count it here). These signed works according to the sources vary from late Kamakura to early Muromachi depending on the item. For Uda Kunifusa I have 10 signed tachi and 16 other signed blades from Nanbokuchō to Muromachi. Then I do have signed items from various Uda smiths from Nanbokuchō to early Muromachi. However the lack of dated items makes accurate dating of smiths tricky.

 

I know some sources list some dated items for Uda smiths that I have not yet been able to locate. So far I only have the 1321 dated blade with shumei to Kunimitsu, 1405 dated Kunifusa and 1400 dated Kunihisa (there are more dated ones later in Muromachi but those are not that relevant to me). That is extremely few dated works for the early school and I think like you that there is lot to research on this school.

[DoTanuki yokai]

Thanks for your input, what do you think about this piece ?

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/26571 

I would love to see better pictures of it but alone the condition of the Mei is great. (Too good? )

[Ooitame]

On 4/27/2022 at 4:32 AM, DoTanuki yokai said:

For the Boshi I have read somewhere that sometimes they have a very long kaeri that turn into muneyaki sometimes.

EDIT:  Ohh Maybe you talk about the overall size of the Kissaki, i think it is the longest i have seen with this attribution but i can imagine that this could be from some form of reshaping from naginata or nagamaki and the small kaeri is only a repurposed bigger Hamon element.

 

Some years ago the founder Uda kunimitsu was just on papers but now there a 2 signed works existing.  I think there is more research necessary too understand Uda school better. (Alternatively i dont have the right books)

Also how reliable are sources that claim that some Uda smiths learned from Norishige, I can understand how someone can come to such conclusion but the similarities are not that much and also different.

My apologies yes the kissaki size and boshi, was what I was referring.

[Jussi Ekholm]

I was not aware of that tantō at MET. I was looking it and then at various signatures of Kunimitsu and I thought it would be gimei. However when looking at all of the Uda Kunimitsu signatures I have in books, it seems to me they are all maybe bit different from each other...

 

Then I thought I had Jon Snow moment when I found out that Tanobe-sensei talked about this tanto in his Gokaden book. I will attach the Japanese text I typed from book and my rough translation.

 

Quote

十六年前に米国の美術館より修理のために寸延びの短刀で元弘三年紀 (1333) のある宇多国光が一時日本に里帰りしたことがありました.

これぞ古入道の基準銘になるのではと期待したのですが, 表は正真銘ではありましたが時代の降るもので, 裏年紀は古入道に装うために後に切り加えた偽銘でした.

 

16 years ago sunnobi tantō came to repair to Japan from a museum in USA, it was signed Uda Kunimitsu and dated to 1333. I expected it to be signature of Konyūdō. Omote signature is genuine but it is timeless? (I can't read it well but I suppose he means it is difficult to date but it is not that old as it pretends to be). Ura date is gimei and added to disguise the blade as Konyūdō.

 

Hopefully I got at least the basic idea correctly, and better translation would be of assistance. So to me it seems that Tanobe thought that tanto is genuine Uda work by some Uda Kunimitsu later in line but the date was added to fool people.

[DoTanuki yokai]

Looks like the Museum had a more positive Interpretation. 
Sad for the Tanto but its awesome that you remembered it and thanks for the efforts and Jon Snow moment. (is this related to game of thrones? I have not  seen all seasons and don’t get it ?  )