Nishigaki ?

[Spartancrest]

I bought this guard in Tokyo back in 2014 at an antique market, and lost the translation of the mei. Any help would be appreciated, I have seen similar designs assigned as Nishigaki would this be a good bet?

[Shugyosha]

Hi Dale,

 

The problem with trying to kantei tsuba by design or theme is that many schools used similar motifs so looking at this alone can throw up a number of plausible options.

 

I think the key to this is to look at the date and signature. 

 

The date (right hand photo) says that it was made on a lucky day in February in the fifth year of Bunsei (1822). I can't do much with the signature on the other side: there is a place name on the right and I think the artist's name is Satoyoshi (里吉) but I can't tell you much more than there wasn't an artist with this name in the mainline Nishigaki/ Kanshiro group, so it probably isn't this school.

 

I think the key to working out which school it is will be found in the place name but unfortunately the inscription is a bit worn. If there's anything you can do to highlight the kanji that might help - a sprinkling of talc or chalk dust might reveal them more clearly.

 

Nice tsuba by the way!

[Spartancrest]

John 

Thank you for that, I found a photo of the guard with the name SATOYOSHI-saku. Saku is the name of a town near Nagano but I don't know what schools made this place home.

[Shugyosha]

Hi Dale,

 

I think the place name is contained in the first four characters on the right in the first photograph:

 

?左大?

 

The last kanji (住) indicates "residing at" so what precedes it should be the place name. Unfortunately I can't read the first and fourth kanji. The first one might be 二  (pronounced ni, futa or shi) or those two strokes might just be part of a kanji.

 

If you can do anything to make the strokes in those kanji stand out more clearly it might be possible to read them.

[ROKUJURO]

Dale,

SAKU means 'made' (it). Often, names of makers are accompanied by SAKU.

[Ford Hallam]

In my opinion this is not Edo period but the work of a 20th century amateur, albeit a fairly skilful one.

 

Main give-aways to my eyes would be the unconvincing kogai-hitsu. Very odd 'sombrero/flying saucer' shape and no apparent awareness of how the inner edge aligns with the saya opening for the kogai itself.

 

The inscriptions are really very poorly written and lack any sort of evident coherence. The overall feeling is of a mei on a lower end gendai-to. If memory serves I've seen a few by this hand in recent years.

 

The nakago-ana is also unconvincing as are the punch marks. It certainly doesn't look like a blade was ever mounted in it, so why are they there? other than to suggest use and fool us into thinking it is a real antique.