RAIN DRAGON HORIMONO

[Ron STL]

This horimono with red lacquer was examined this week on a koto era mumei katana recently acquired by a friend. I would call it a rain dragon and ken. I don't recall every seeing this horimono on a sword before. It looks original to the sword and has been polished quite a number of times. I wonder if there is a specific name for this dragon. More important, does this design if horimono point to any specific group of swordsmiths? Any information would be important. 

Thanks 

Ron STL

[Nihonto student]

On 9/21/2024 at 11:48 PM, Ron STL said:

This horimono with red lacquer was examined this week on a koto era mumei katana recently acquired by a friend. I would call it a rain dragon and ken. I don't recall every seeing this horimono on a sword before. It looks original to the sword and has been polished quite a number of times. I wonder if there is a specific name for this dragon. More important, does this design if horimono point to any specific group of swordsmiths? Any information would be important. 

Thanks 

Ron STL

Dear Ron,

 

this is from Sesko kantei, check also the pdf at the end for comparison.

 

kurikara (倶梨伽羅) – According to legend, the guardian deity Fudô-Myôô (不動明王) once had to fight a deity from another religion, the dragon king Kurikara, written with the same characters as stated above. He changed himself into a flaming sword but Kurikara did the same and the fighting went on without a winner. But then Fudô-Myôô transformed into the dragon Kurikara, wound himself around the opponent’s sword, and ate it from the top. Also referred to as kenmaki-ryû (剣巻龍, lit. “dragon winding around a sword”). There are quite many kurikara interpretations but basically we differentiate between three approaches that follow the shin-gyô-sô mentioned at the beginning, i.t. shin no kurikara (真の倶梨伽羅, “full” or “realistic kurikara”), gyô no kurikara (行の倶梨伽羅, “more or less abbreviated kurikara”), and sô no kurikara (草の倶梨伽羅, “abbreviated,” “stylized,” or “abstrac kurikara”). A shin no kurikara is often seen on blades of Nobukuni, Heianjô Nagayoshi, of the Sue-Bizen school, at Awataguchi Ikkanshi Tadatsuna, Hizen Tadayoshi, Echizen Yasutsugu, Higo no Daijô Sadakuni, Suishinshi Masamune, Hosokawa Masayoshi, Taikei Naotane, and at the shinshintô and gendai Gassan school. A gyô no kurikara can be found on Nobukuni and Heianjô Nagayoshi blades, at Kagemitsu, the Sue-Bizen and Sue-Sôshû schools, Echizen Yasutsugu, Kotetsu, Hizen Tadayoshi, Taikei Naotane, and Tairyûsai Sôkan (泰龍斎宗寛). And a stylized sô no kurikara is typical for the Hasebe school, Nobukuni, Heianjô Nagayoshi, the Kanabô school, the Sue-Sôshû and Sue-Bizen school, the smiths around Osafune Kanemitsu, Awataguchi Ikkanshi Tadatsuna, Echizen Yatsuugu, Hizen Tadayoshi, the shintô Hôjôji school, Ômi no Kami Tsuguhira (近江守継平), Harima no Daijô Shigetaka (播磨大掾重高), Yamashiro no Kami Kunikiyo (山城守国清), and Taikei Naotane. And please note that Heianjô Nagayoshi often combined a gyô no kurikara and a sô no kurikara or two differently stylized sô no kurikara distributed on the two sides of one blade. The same peculiarity is seen at the Kanabô school. But it has to be pointed out that sometimes it is hard to say if a kurikara is shin or already gyô or gyô tending to sô. A variant or certain characteristic interpretation of a kurikara is the so-called harami-ryû (孕龍, lit. “pregnant dragon”). Here, the body of the dragon is somewhat at distance from the sword and with a curve of the thigh which makes it look like as if the dragon is pregnant. Such a harami-ryū is often found on swords by Nagamitsu and his Osafune main line successors

 

https://markussesko....mparisonkurikara.pdf

 

 

 

[Ron STL]

Thanks Markus, for the thorough explanation. 

Ron STL

[Kanenaga]

I think Ron's question is about the depiction of what we call a "rain dragon." All the illustrations in the Sesko article show the kurikara with a "normal" dragon.