Beginners' tsuba kantai

[Aloof Pegasus]

Dear fellow forumites

 

I think it's fair to say that many of us would like to shop on the auction sites but are afraid to take the risk.

 

Tsuba seem more approachable in some ways than swords because by and large they are not that expensive. But there do seem to be many pitfalls:things like if a tsuba is cast or not, if it is Japanese or not, has it been repatinated, is it modern and made to look older, and so on.

 

I wonder if it might be fun to run a beginners' tsuba kantei to address these issues and try to educate ourselves in a practical way?

 

The object would be to have members- beginners or otherwise- post tsuba they have bought and wish they hadn't. After some sort of time limit, the reason for their case of buyer's remorse would be posted. In the meantime those of us who know little or nothing about tsuba would try to find the fault that made the buy a mistake.

 

We really need a variety of duff choices if you'll excuse the word, but since the object is reinforcement it wouldn't matter if there was some repetition.

 

Posters would be exposing their mistakes in the interest of furthering members knowledge, surely a laudable thing to do.

 

This is just off the top of my head and needs to be improved on. What do you think?

 

Philip

[Marius]

 

The object would be to have members- beginners or otherwise- post tsuba they have bought and wish they hadn't.

Posters would be exposing their mistakes in the interest of furthering members knowledge, surely a laudable thing to do.

 

 

Good idea, Philip!

 

Let us start then, here is one tsuba I have bought and regretted having done so. I have a couple more,so if your idea catches on, I am going to post them :-)

[Aloof Pegasus]

Hi Mariusz

 

Thanks a lot for such a fast response and generously going first like that. Now I have to hit the books.

 

Cheers

Philip

[Marius]

Hi Mariusz

 

Thanks a lot for such a fast response and generously going first like that. Now I have to hit the books.

 

 

Philip,

 

this one is extremely tricky, I wonder if anyone sees what is wrong with this tsuba. Photisgraphs are a very imperfect medium. No wonder that experts on this forum always point out how difficult it is to make an assessement wothout holding the item in your hands...

 

 

Just for fun, here is an easy one

[Aloof Pegasus]

Ok here goes;

It looks like a Tosho tsuba with negative sukashi of sakura and ume flowers.

I'm wondering if you were disappointed by the quality of the plate which would make it a later piece, hence the breakage of the sukashi.

 

The design seems a bit crowded, the flowers close to the rim. Could the sukashi have been a later addition? Is this mutton dressed as lamb and rather than Tosho it is another homogenous iron plate?

 

Anyway these are my guesses for this tsuba.

 

Philip

[Rich S]

The first one, the only thing that jumps out is that some of the sukashi has rusted out in the flowers.

 

The second I think is cast.

 

Rich S

[Richmond]

Learn me, I have no idea about tsuba's, the second one shown looks very busy to me.

[Aloof Pegasus]

I agree the 2nd one looks cast.

 

Philip

[Basho12]

Another beginner here, and no points for going third, but I also think the second one is cast. From the picture it looks like the filework didn't clean up quite all the flashing from the mold (said one who bought a cast tsuba on his very first attempt). I'd love to hear a definitive explanation of what's wrong with the first one.

[Marius]

Thanks for the answers, you have hit the nail on the head with the second tsuba. It was indeed cast, and my purchase is insofar a cautionary tale for beginners, as I was sloppy when looking at the pictures. I have ignored the signs of casting and the lack of decent color. I was buying form a seller who was usually selling decent and genuine kodogu.

 

The first one is tricky, I agree, and perhaps it is not so easy (OK, it is almost impossible) to see the flaw in the pictures. The tsuba had firescale and the luster you can see in the pics resulted from this flaw rather than from a rich patina. You can see that this tsuba is shining, and that the shine is greyish? Well, that's it - that's the fire scale. It must have been in a fire for a short time, as the scale was thin and hard. This was definitely not yakite shitate (fire treatment at the end of the manufacturing process to give the tsuba a rich, molten look) as the color was really ugly - greyish, blueish, nothing like the deep, moist look of good patina.

 

I think it really wasn't fair of me to post it, but at least it shows us all the perils of buying tsuba on eBay, judging its quality by pictures only (even if the photographs are in high-res).

 

There are many honest sellers on eBay, and among them many people seling out of Japan. They have tonnes of low-grade or medium-quality items that find no buyers in the Japanese market. Some of this stuff has been in a fire like the first tsuba, some is rusted, pitted, stripped of patina, etc. It is almost a wholesale business and these sellers pay no attention to details. This was such a case.

 

Now you can draw your conclusions.

 

Philip, thanks again for your nice idea :-)

[Aloof Pegasus]

Thanks Mariusz for kindly posting your 2 interesting tsuba and the great pictures.

 

I wonder if anybody else has got a tsuba which would help us identify another fault to watch out for?

 

Philip

[Basho12]

Thanks for the explanation on the first tsuba! That's the sort of thing I'd never have spotted, at this stage.

[Ford Hallam]

I'm a bit perturbed that the patina on the first tsuba is seen as fire scale. It looks perfectly fine to my eyes.

[Aloof Pegasus]

Hi Ford

 

Is there any chance that you could post pics of 4 different tsuba- one with firescale and let us try to determine which one has this problem?

 

Philip

[Marius]

I'm a bit perturbed that the patina on the first tsuba is seen as fire scale. It looks perfectly fine to my eyes.

 

I agree it is not easy to recognise fire scale on that tsuba and as a matter of fact, I begin to doubt it was fire scale at all having read Ford's opinion.

 

Fire scale is usually brittle and little flakes are discernible - nothing of that sort was present in this tsuba. It was the strange color which made me think it had fire scale. Besides, the tsuba had parts (mostly left side of the omote) which were very very hard - I couldn't even clean off the rust with a piece of bone there...

 

Of course I may be wrong, maybe it was just heat-treated without the "molten surface" effect, hence the surface hardness... But it was so different form other late Edo Katchushi tsuba... the colour, the hardness...

 

But if Ford says it has no fire scale, then it surely doesn't.

 

Thank you Ford

[Marius]

OK, here is another one that I regret to have bought. This one is easy, so you should identify what was wrong on right away :-) Still, an interesting case...

[steeve]

Thanks a lot for teaching us!!

As a beginner i's really difficult to identify tsuba .I just buy with "feeling" and the 1 one could be one ot it!!!

With the 2 one it's different and my eyes don't stop on it .

On the third tsuba is it a problem with the nakago ana?

thanks again

[Aloof Pegasus]

The only thing I can spot on this one is the possibility of it having been reduced in size.

 

Philip

[SwordGuyJoe]

Was the flower added after the original production? This is a great exercise - thank you for the idea!

[Marius]

Thanks a lot for teaching us!!

As a beginner i's really difficult to identify tsuba .I just buy with "feeling" and the 1 one could be one ot it!!!

With the 2 one it's different and my eyes don't stop on it .

On the third tsuba is it a problem with the nakago ana?

thanks again

 

I am not teaching, just sharing :-) Ford and others here can be teachers, I am just a student.

 

As to the third tsuba - the nakago ana is OK, if you mean that the yose-tangane are deep, that is not a problem at all...

[Aloof Pegasus]

Mariusz

 

I want to retract my original post. I thought that the lip on the upper/lower section of the mimi meant it had been reduced in size since the lip did not circle the mimi. Was there a fukurin that came off? (my new guess)

 

Philip

[Ford Hallam]

Sorry chaps, I can't claim absolute authority in these matters but fire damage may range from hugely obvious flakes of scale peeling off, as Mariuszk described, to a situation that would possibly overlap with some of the processes that were actually used to create the original patinae.

 

Hi Ford

 

Is there any chance that you could post pics of 4 different tsuba- one with firescale and let us try to determine which one has this problem?

 

Philip

 

Hi Phillip,

 

sorry again, no chance. I'd never buy a tsuba that was fire damaged ...he he, and if I did make that mistake I wouldn't tell anyone

 

A further complication is the recent proliferation of fakes on the market, all with very confusing finishes to confuse the inexperienced.

 

I suppose a blue/grey cast to the patina, very red, almost purplish rust in the sukashi and a certain dryness would be the first things to hint at possible fire damage. But these aspects can also be obscured by oil or wax.

[Marius]

Here is an interesting picture of a tsuba affected with fire scale (courtesy of the JSSUS):

 

http://www.jssus.org/nkp/fire_scale.html

 

just look at the colour - it is greyish or blueish. The scale peels off.

[Thierry BERNARD]

here a sample of firescale tsuba

 

 

http://www.jssus.org/nkp/fire_scale.html

[Aloof Pegasus]

Thanks to both posters for the example of firescale.

 

Maybe a bit later someone who's got one could post it in this beginners kantai and then we can see if we have learnt from what we've been shown.

 

Philip

[Marius]

OK, here is the solution to tsuba 3.

 

Yes, it has been cut down to its current size - you can see that parts of the mimi have been removed and the tsuba has been reshaped into mokko-gata (it used to be maru-gata).

 

Then, look at the ko-sukashi - it is damaged on one side. It used to have the form of a pentagonal cherry blossom (a ka-mon), which is still visible in its middle section. My guess is that this tsuba has received a strong blow which has caused a contraction of the sukashi - you can see that some of the outlines are bent. Subsequently, a part of the damaged tsuba has been filed down, but the damaged ko-sukashi has remained unrepaired.

 

Yes, the damaged sukashi is something one should see immediately. Well, I have not :-)

[yogoro]

This rusty tsuba has suffered fire damage or not ?

This damage has greyish colour .

Mikolaj

[Aloof Pegasus]

Hi Mikolaj

 

Not at all sure but don't really see any diff between the rust colour in the green box and outside it so... have to say imho, not firescale.

 

Philip

[yogoro]

In the green box and also outside this area is fire scale , I think so ...

Mikolaj

[Aloof Pegasus]

Thanks a lot Mikolaj for this lesson. Do you have any other tsuba which would be suitable?

 

Or anybody else care to post a problem tsuba?

 

Philip