Bugyotsuji

Bizen Yaki yes, but the flask could be either Edo or Satsuma Kiriko. (?) It’s the wife’s, and she just plonked it there, and I never asked because she always says she doesn’t know. *Apologies for thread drift away from Tsuba themes!

Or as the original photo above, you can put them on a stand.

埋、梅 are different characters though. A known evolution, so... inscribed later?

Agreed with all of the above. Some will have a Mei on them, but these are taken out of the bundle first by interested people who may want an example of a particular Mei, or want to keep the Mei on a refashioned knife.

Reading a paper some time ago on various kabuto related to the Hei family of the Tōhoku region, they also discussed one that had been unearthed from under a shrine back in early Meiji, a strangely irregular, unprofessional work. It might have been a practice piece from a workshop, that was never able to fulfill its basic function of protecting a wearer. The kabuto bowl under discussion above however, probably was able to protect the wearer, even if of rather rough workmanship. Not a great work of art, not a masterpiece, but the work of a rustic armorer or an apprentice perhaps which may have been through the wars before another upgrading with later mabisashi (as many were). Just idle thoughts after a good night’s sleep!

It looks somehow like an old-style marui (round) hoshi kabuto-bachi. Very slight oval???

Probably not urushi, Lewis. I asked a Japanese friend not too long ago why some tsuba appear black and he said casually, "Oh, many people use XYZ". I made a note at the time as it was an unfamiliar word, (which I now cannot find) but it could be something similar to that. Sorry to be of little help!

But why go to the trouble of creating something not quite perfect? 32 plates. Imagine the time-consuming effort involved! The very unevenness suggests something early, pre-Edo, though I am not talking about 'value' per se, just age. By the same token, I too am ready to be swung by the inside details, especially the rivets. If it's a newer creation, I will be surprised, not for the first time in life!

It looks genuinely old from those photos, pre 1600.

Both nice finds John. Thank you. Will need to study these for a while. (As far as I know they did not yet use or even have large Ozutsu guns like that first one at the time of Kawanakajima, but never say never! The second gun does give the correct impression of a larger-bore battlefield samurai gun, say 10 Monme, unusual accuracy for a woodblock print.) PS Usually the names and/or titles of the historical figures on these Bakumatsu prints have been altered slightly to avoid giving offence to anyone or falling fowl of some arcane Tokugawa law. Yesterday I was looking at print of Ranmaru, a famous 森Mori family figure whose name was written 保里Bori Ranmaru, changed, but instantly recognizable.

It is giving me flashes of Nagoya-mono.

分福茶釜　bunbuku chagama a propos of nothing, apart from Dale's story above! Oh, and I had a cider or two with lunch...

Yoshitoshi was a bit of a handful I believe. Rebels add colour to the world This may be the same subject as the one above holding the gun the wrong way round…(?)

Well none of mine listed there but the closest has this description: ”Hunter Kanpei with a rifle on his shoulder from the Chushingura at the scene of the night hunting accident. The background shows the Tokaido between Sakanoshita and Tsuchiyama.” This is good info. It cuts deep, but not to the quick. (These are not rifles, by the way, if you’ll tell Artelino, and permit me to be a card-carrying grammar nazi.) As for theme-hunting, good shot! A typical hunter in the Edo Period (and around the time of the Ako 47 Ronin incident) would carry a smoothbore long-gun of less than 1.3 cm bore. Use of straw for mino, ajiro-gasa and waraji, as for the match cord also noted, also for the Sumo Rikishi’s skirt or loin decorations.

But then I found another single print, a partly equivalent scene by Ichiyosai Toyokuni, different border pattern, 32 x 21 cm roughly. Notice the netsuke and firestarter kit sagemono. Starting to notice some common themes? Detail

The second is from a Kanadehon Chushingura set of 12 scenes by Kochoro Kunisada. (Well 13, because the 12th scene is A前and B後 ) Normally these are 22.5x35cm (?) but several prints in this ‘shozuri’ set were worm-eaten or ripped, so I spent many happy hours ‘rescuing’ them. Warning. Heavily doctored. Not really for public consumption. The right side of the page was largely missing. The character with the gun was hanging off by a thread, so I snipped him off straightened him out and pasted him on!

With this sharp reminder of the evanescence of life, (for which thank you, good sir) we must update this thread with something, anything, so starting right from the bottom up, here are some Ukiyoe hanga woodblock prints in bad condition but linked by a couple of themes. The first I bought at a flea market simply because it showed a hunter’s smoothbore long gun, not for the quality of the print. I have not even spent time working out whose work it is. Is he doing something dreadful? Unframed. Roughly 26 x 18 cm.

Nobody San, you are very 敏腕! (binwan) to find that 'Toshi' Kanji!

Now you see it, now you don't. Cloudflare has to be better than this. (I even wonder whether they are sending out the bot armies themselves!!!) The JAS armo(u)r site uses it.

Xxxてですか　 That is part of a question in modern Japanese Hiragana writing, something that you would never find on a legit blade.

Wonderful example. Very small objection though with 袖 Sode, which meant upper arm shoulder guards (shields) for a set of armo(u)r. This would suit the battlefield scene better, surely. Sleeves were 籠手 kote. (Sode 袖 are sleeves on kimono.) The partly covered-over explanation above seems to say that just as snow falls off (your shoulder guards) at a touch, (... your enemy will fall with the lightest touch of this blade, or his body will fall into two halves?). I know this goes against the theory of the meaning given by the NBTHK, but the above is just my private feeling.

This was a bad one for me today. Cloudflare? On two other sites now that I use regularly, so I hate the damn thing with a vengeance, with the extra silly jiggle to log in, but maybe Cloudflare just starts to make sense here too, unfortunately.

Hoping that someone will come along to further clarify the above for you Luca!

XX　一　（殿） Respectful name of the owner, 'Something Hajime(?) Dono' but sadly I can't be sure of the reading. P.S. Nothing to do with the price of fish, but 座頭市 is Zatoichi, and they called him Ichi-Sama!

By the way Howard, notice how the detailed design on front has been added (at some personal effort) to cover the crack, i.e. to follow the belly line.