New tsuba in my collection: Tomoyuki from Chōshū

[SalaMarcos]

Today I present to you the last tsuba of my collection, a tetsu tsuba signed by Tomoyuki from the Yazu/Yaji school of Chōshū. 

A wonderful work of bori carving with tagane to leave in high relief the figure of some ships that testify to the permanence of a naval culture in Japan even during the Edo period. The omote side represents a brave sea full of large boats, something that contrasts with the peaceful side of the ura, which shows a calm sea and a small ship. The mimi is richly decorated with a border that depicts lightning and sparks, called kaminari raimon, an indisputable hallmark of this artist.
Murakami Kosuke identifies him as the possible seventh generation of the Yaji/Yazu school of Chōshū, while Fukushi Shigeo maintains this premise, based in Ogura studies, but also provides the hypothesis, with which I agree and I think is very correct, that It is the sixth generation, and it is also a clear heir to the techniques and style of Tomohisa, whom Shigeo considers the true founder of the Yazu/Yaji school. A clear example is this tsuba, which was made practically identically by Tomohisa as this type of border decoration or mimi kaminari raimon was usually done by both tsubakō. It has a Hozon certificate from the NBTHK.

Now my family anecdote of this tsuba.
Last May, on our last trip to Japan, my wife surprised me with a fabulous gift. And although the gift was given to me, it is actually a gift for the whole family, the reason is as follows: it is a tsuba signed by Tomoyuki 友之 the tsubakō that gave name to our second son, Tomoyuki Martín. As in the case of our first son, Naoyuki 直之 Jorge, I told my wife that she could choose the name from a list of about 3,000 names that belonged to tsuba artists. In the case of Tomoyuki, we liked that name with those kanji for him to share with his brother, as well as the meaning that is something like "the parents' wish that he live surrounded by friends", and also the number of strokes of his name plus surname was a number of good omens, so we finally decided on this one.