Bugyotsuji

Five-year jump!

Parallel to the top of the jabara purse top right is a needle. This one is made of shinchu (brass), presumably because it will not strike a spark when cleaning out a blocked pan/vent. I'll keep an eye out for a cup, John, but you never know if you will come across one. You could ask the guys in Tokyo running that antiques fair search.(?)

Colin, several NMB members are in Japan or about to be, for the DTI. I imagine they will be trawling around for goodies! Often I strike out and come away empty-handed, but you well know the pleasure of heading out with high hopes of spotting something interesting. Max R once told me that you have to make the effort to get out, and meet people, and travel around. Tomorrow I'm headed to Kyoto to visit two antiques fairs this weekend... wish me luck!

Well, it's been 24 hours. Most of the above hang from the obi with a netsuke as a stopper. Almost everything dates from the Edo period. Eight of the 'kinchaku' purses are leather, and two are cloth. Five are Jabara (accordion style). There are six iron Hi-uchigane 火打ち金 strikers, 4 Japanese and 2 Continental. Five haizara ashtray netsuke, two of which are shinchu brass. Four tinder purses, and three tinder cylinders. (Some purses have an attached striker, and also contain tinder and flint.) There is one kiseru, and one rice tester. Did anyone spot the vent pricker?

Unusual to see a tag in such good condition!

Thanks! Jan would like to see that, I can guess.

Regarding the way the Mei is cut, I see several problems. 住 for example would surely never be written like that.

Dale, I live in Japan where creation of a gun barrel would be heavily frowned upon. In that respect I would suggest that the USA is the best place to do it, but I have little connection with your gunsmith community there. Thanks for the vote of confidence though! I would be very interested to see the results!!!

The tsuba looks like: 正阿弥家重 Shōami Ieshige

Polishing a Japanese sword is easy, if you have about 10 years of training first, but even then it doesn’t look easy!

“Translation: 鐔 - Tsuba 七宝紋所之図 – Shippo, mondokoro no zu (figure of family crests)“ Jake, this part of the translation must be from a different part of the box, not shown in your photograph above. On top of the lid?

Just to rephrase Grey above. To have anyone do a single aspect of work on this will cost you more than you paid for it. At that point you are already not likely to recoup your investment, and there are still other things to fix. Caveat. If money means nothing, and you desire to right history’s wrongs at any cost, well then, you could restore it for your own personal satisfaction. Otherwise, any work you do on it should be your own (free!) but with the real danger that you will damage it further if you do not know exactly what you are doing. Light application of the above oil, and gentle wiping off of oil (hopefully with some red rust) with a clean cotton cloth will cause least damage.

The Kamon looks like Oda Mokko. https://www.google.com/search?q=織田木瓜&client=safari&sca_esv=4acce884baa46368&hl=en-gb&udm=2&biw=390&bih=663&ei=fYz5aKX5CpHm2roPhrqTmQo&oq=織田木瓜&gs_lp=EhJtb2JpbGUtZ3dzLXdpei1pbWciDOe5lOeUsOacqOeTnDIGEAAYBxgeMgYQABgHGB4yBhAAGAcYHjIGEAAYBxgeMgYQABgHGB5I-VpQ0hJY3lVwAXgAkAECmAF7oAG5B6oBAzguM7gBA8gBAPgBAZgCCqACkAbCAggQABiABBiiBMICCBAAGKIEGIkFwgIFEAAYgATCAggQABgEGAcYHpgDAIgGAZIHAzkuMaAHgxKyBwM4LjG4B40GwgcHMC4zLjYuMcgHJQ&sclient=mobile-gws-wiz-img

Hmmm…. Fire, a possibility I hadn’t considered. The proportions do look right.

And… several objects here which may prove puzzling. Most of these are connected somehow to my matchlock, armour and blackpowder displays, but not all. Can you see for example a rice quality tester, a fire starting kit, a pricker, a tinder container, a priming flask, some bear bells, etc.? Most of these were not expensive, or I swapped them for something, i.e. nothing to break the bank.

This little lacquered carrying cup may be made from the same material as the ashtray haizara netsuke above. The concentric rings and little pinpricks look similar. Could be hazé 櫨の木, wax tree.(?) Upright cup

Hmm… I wonder what that is, if it is not bamboo…(?) My own collection, culled mostly from antiques markets in Japan, generally tends toward the functional and everyday rather than top-end Netsuké and Sagemono, so I have several smokers’ sets of that same ilk, although they are handmade, so no two are really alike. Good honest artefacts. Just occasionally I do spot a real treasure though!

The pitting on the kerakubi neck flange raised a warning flag for me. Blade and kerakubi should both be mirror smooth, at least in places. A pre-polishing Yari? Someone has messed around with the mekugi hole and dremel markings…(?) unless that is 山 and an attempt to erase it? I’ve seen modern Chinese ‘rusted’ arrowheads, so I’m reserving final judgement for the time being.

Hmmm… I tend to agree with your final thoughts above.

大元少将 Major General Omoto, these kanji, I wonder?

Well, we know what it is but I haven't been able to find an exact match just yet. (It is possible that it was created after the Edo period was over, missing out on being listed.) It is three 'dark' crossed 'uchiwa' or 'gunbai' fans, so in Japanese it has to be something like 三つ団扇　三つ違い陰軍配 Mitsu uchiwa or mitsu chigai kage gunbai, etc. Also look for 唐団扇, ‘China fan’ motif. E.g. and

Yes Dale, roughly 9.5 x 9.5 x 0.5 cm. The Metropolitan example has a smooth rim, more like a wheel. Here are a couple more:

Would it be true Robert to say that most museums are closed on Mondays?

PS Since we use the name of Katchūshi (along with Tōshō) as one of the two foundations of tsuba evolution, fashions in the manufacture of armo(u)r, especially kabuto, which continued down through the ages alongside sword manufacturing, could well provide us with some useful reference materials. One BIG problem is that these two fields of study are like oil and water, ne’er the twain shall meet. It’s like the ancient word ‘mujun’ 矛盾 (blade and shield) meaning contradiction or paradox, is still expressing their anti-magnetic properties. Are you a blade being, or an armo(u)r being?

Remember that this thread is focussed on the evolutions in iron tsuba, if I have understood it correctly. Beautiful elaborate sukashi work in copper brass, gold, silver and gilt was evident in armor fittings from very early on. The artistic techniques were certainly there for soft metals. Returning to iron, holes were drilled in the iron of kabuto plates and shapes were applied to the edges of iron haraidate-dai, upright holders for maedate. There were fashions for Kabuto bowls such as for the famous bulbous Akoda shape, indeed I sense fashions in Kiku chrysanthemum tsuba could have followed these as the triangular iron bowl plates curved outwards, following numbers such as 12, 16, 24, 32 or 62 etc. Kuruma ‘wheel’ tsuba (not Guruma, except inside compound words) also favoured set numbers of spokes, as did kiku chrysanthemum tsuba. There may have been corresponding fashion changes in armor outfits that included kabuto and tsuba on swords. But in iron? Did they have the files for fine work? Am I alone in seeing numbered spoke consistencies between kabuto plates and tsuba spokes? Here is a tsuba for age consideration. What do we think? An evolution from older yamagane tsuba? The hitsu ana are contemporary with the tsuba.