Curran

John, Live auction. I will post it when it is over. Within recent memory I posted a live auction that others on NMB were bidding. After that one and some joking/well meant words of caution to me, I will try and refrain unless it is something I think of general education or interest. This particular auction, the artist is a relatively lesser or unknown artist of a late Edo school that sort of got lost as side stage relative to the Natsuo, Ichijo, and other biggies of late Edo. A 3rd chair underling in a 3rd chair school.... yet darn darn skilled. Maybe the Muses got into him for a bit. I think Pete's ID is excellent, as the style is very in keeping with Uchikoshi designs popular at the time, but the base material is different and the execution a bit different.

Fittings: Is the tsuba signed? Fuchi is signed Mitsuyasu with a 'kao' mark after it. Tsuba is of same design and I will hazard the guess that it is by the same artist. Haynes Index of Fittings makers has 8 possible matches. 'Sekibun' Mitsuyasu, 4 Goto students, and 3 others. It is not the Sekibun school Mitsuyasu, nor is it the most well known Goto student, and I can rule out one of the 3 others. If the tsuba is signed with more of a signature, I can probably determine which fittings artist.

Multi bow to Pete. :bowdown: Haynes entry doesn't give much onthis guy, nor do other texts I have. Only Markus' all too useful 'Japanese Toso-Kinko Schools' has some information on the school. Founder of the school [Yasunori] was formerly a student beside [ichijosai Hirotoshi]- the founder of the Uchikoshi school. It fits well, so think Pete nailed it. Exceptional work by a relatively unknown [barely listed] artist

Gentleman: thank you. I do these exercises with Japanese auctions and found a few tough ones this week. The Herculean Haynes Index is sort of the answer key, but sometimes I find NBTHK or NTHK papered matches where Haynes uses a different kanji. Other times, on some of the papered ones either it can be a name with many Haynes entries and the preceding 天長斎 = Tenchōsai isn't listed amongst any of the Hoju or Yasutoshi enteries [possible I missed it in first two tries] In this instance there is a "Yasutoshi" where the style of his wormanship and the period match this tsuba, but Haynes has him listed under a different Yasu and 天長斎 [Tenchosai] is not listed among those alternatives he used. Fun exercise, but this one has me beat and the work is too skilled for the artist not to be one listed in Haynes. Just none stand out head and shoulders as a clean match.

天長斎保寿 How to correctly read 保寿 for this artists. Is this artist "Yasutoshi" [Amanagabun Yasutoshi" or are we dealing with "Ho____" Arggh......

Ko-Mino kogai. Awesome. Thanks for the link Pete. Currency issue too. We are basing in US$ here, and have seen a 50% pop in that. The $600 kogai of 1 to 2 years ago is currently $400. Last time the yen was this cheap was 2002? That has a phenomenal impact. I was tempted selling off 6 to 8 pieces and taking a shot at a Juyo Hirata tsuba for my next birthday. That is only $40k, but much cheaper than the $60k of 2 years ago. Still, more than the price of a car or 1 year of some higher level educations [feel for Guido here, congratulations on his daughter's graduation. May he buy himself a Toku Juyo as reward next year]. Topic should be "Average Price of a Generic Late Edo kogai" ?

George, Boy, that Yasuchika one snapped my head back a bit. Humbling to imagine making that one. Or many of the others, but man... ....break your brushes, toss them in the bin, and ask yourself what you want to do with the rest of your life.

We need to buy Markus S. a Superman shirt.

Update: The replies netted about 33 sets of 2014 'Higo' papers, 3 sets of 2014 'Jingo' papers, and 0 Nishigaki, 1 Hayashi, 0 Hirata, and 0 Kamiyoshi. Someone today shared with me June 2014 papers to Hayashi. The particular design is distinctly Hayashi thought later taken over by the Kamiyoshi school after they basically replaced the Hayashi. Still, a minor bit of anti-proof meaning that there are or were some papers other than 'Higo' at the Hozon and Tokubetsu Hozon level last year.

an example of Edo Mino f/k http://page14.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/s442687991

Any of you that can bid on things in Japan, here is the 3 Vol Wakayama signature reference set. http://page6.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/f146368502 If into kodogu, this is invaluable to have. Currently super cheap-cheap. Expect this to go for $500 + fees and $100 shipping. Someone might get lucky and grab it for less than 40,000 yen? I'm never selling my copy unless blind or dead.

John, yep. Quite a range with the Edo examples. Cut the gold content even a little bit from 4.6% or whatever the magic number is [not going to bother looking it up right now] and you go away from that beautiful darkside of the moon black.

Edo Mino. Looks like someone might have cleaned it. Should be darker.

The point of bringing it to NMB was to acquire data. Many people from Japan to Europe have been kind to contact me through either NMB, my personal email, or my part small site Juyo-Bi.com My bringing it to NMB was done with serious hesitation, as there are some NBTHK dogmatists that will remind me I am not Japanese and to not question authority. I got a lecture on this from one of our American NBTHK members at the DTI, and it did not endear or educate me. James expressed perfectly several of my sentiments. I am not an NBTHK-AB member any more. With true-true respect to several of the NBTHK-AB senior members and all they do, I do not believe involving them would have that much benefit. I could be wrong. If I am to bring this to the NBTHK, it will be as politely as possible with numbers to back it up. If I do it, I will do it myself and by myself. Let me bear any 'Black Mark', if it exists. That is a big 'If'. Many years ago Tanobe-san wanted me to interact and work with the fittings team on a Norisuke publication for the NBTHK journal. I thought that out of my league and well beyond my Japanese. That was to be a very positive endeavor which had interested the NBTHK as something new learned from something I own. This 'Higo, Higo, Higo, Higo, Higo' that Chris gently called "incomplete attributions" is decidedly not a positive or pleasant topic. Speaking only for myself, I am disappointed in the 2014 NBTHK kodogu shinsa. I say this even as I've had some overly favorable papers for non Higo mumei pieces getting much better attributions than I would give them. For me it has been the Non Higo (good) vs the Higo (bad). But definitely some 'oddballs' coming onto websites and back to people that are a bit of a head scratcher. In the past atypical calls meant something to learn, like the first time I got a 'Kozenji' attribution. It was on me to go learn what the NBTHK was teaching. For the moment, it is wisest to hold off and see what 2015 brings other people. I will not be submitting anything 'Higo' to the NBTHK until then, and the non Higo mumei items seem to be a bit of an 'oddball' crap shoot. The inconsistency of the oddball papers is not appealing to me, even if they sometimes generate a high value.

James: I'd seen some too, and saw another oddball one yesterday. A check of the papers, and they turned out to be from June 2014. ____________________________________________________________ I've corresponded privately with a number of people from NMB and elsewhere. When I launched my question, I EXCLUDED 'Jingo' since that is the easiest of the Higo schools. The replies netted about 30 sets of 2014 'Higo' papers, 3 sets of 2014 'Jingo' papers, and 0 Nishigaki, 0 Hayashi, 0 Hirata, and 0 Kamiyoshi. Someone may still produce a set, but these sort of numbers discourage me from sending any Higo to the NBTHK at present. As James said, also seen some very oddball results on some non Higo tsuba. Hoping this situation improves in 2015, as I've spend near two decades regarding NBTHK papers as the definitive opinion- 2014 fittings papers-

Hi David, I thank you for your reply. Initially I thought you'd found something to pop my theory. There isn't a kodogu shinsa in January 2014. The closest one would have been October 2013 or December 2013. So I am not sure how it works with the dates on the paper, but I think either way the January 2014 issued papers came from a 2013 shinsa. I'm still looking for something to pop my theory about the Higo "dumb down" of the NBTHK kodogu panel in 2014. Various people have emailed me their 2014 shinsa experiences. Most are at the Hozon level with some interesting attributions. Some opinion that condition is more important now for Tokubetsu Hozon than rarity. Ie. that shodai Yamakichibei with some rust damage might pass H but fail at TH.

Chris, with regards to Higo- that might be true of a particularly *junior* team at the Hozon level to not able to identify individual generations, but to not be able to tell Nishigaki tsuba from a Jingo is particularly unforgivable. While sometimes it can be difficult with a particular Higo tsuba to decide whether it belongs in one school or another- this DOES NOT MEAN you absolutely give up and ignore significant amounts study to just call everything "Higo". What next? Do we get to the point where we pay the NBTHK to give us an opinion as to whether something or not is a Tsuba? It is a tsuba, that will be $250 please.... It is one thing to take a step back from being able give generation attributions at the Hozon level, it is another to just give up and go 'Higo' on everything. ________________________________________________________________________ Pete, I'm sure the NBTHK ninjas will be here tomorrow, jumping out of the mangroves and startling the pelicans to decapitate all of us 2 legged here and the dog out of sheer spite.... maybe they will give me time for one last cigar. It was options expiration work that got me today, but I did start then go looking for any more examples since dealers often the papers. Sure enough, fresh on a dealer's site was a very nice tsuba that looks to me to be a classic example of 3rd gen Hayashi's work. Price is too good to be true, especially for the particular dealer. Closer inspection.... .... papers say 'Higo'. Seems a bit simpleton. ....date says 2014. Ah..... Will things get better in 2015, or has the NBTHK kodogu shinsa that I found to be so reliable and insightful for decades had a debilitating stroke?

Privately we covered the topic of Ito-san. His opinion was asked on a few of the tsuba. I have only significantly corresponded with him once, and was impressed by his insight into a non Higo tsuba. Supposedly Ito-san disagreed with the NBTHK on a regular basis. It goes both ways. One of the tsuba he regards as 5th gen, the NBTHK gave to 3rd gen a few years ago. After studying works of both 3rd and 5th, I felt Ito-san opinion was the smarter call. Another where Ito-san said 'shodai Kanshiro', but NBTHK just went 'Nishigaki'. I could never make up my mind on that one. That was years ago. As you know, quite a number of the tsuba from Ito-san's books have hit the market. As Pete pointed out.... no, they aren't papered. After years of them coming to market with papers, ... ....seems a wave of them have come to market without papers. Could be just one person selling out his collection without papers, or could be they've been to shinsa and the results were 'Higo' or otherwise unsatisfactory for the prices listed. Rather than what Brian wrote, I chose to wonder if it is more of a staffing issue or something else with retirements? l am looking for something to help eliminate interpretations. Looking for 2014 proof they are still Hozon attributing to Higo schools. Ie. 2014 shinsa Hozon to Hayashi, Hirata, Nishigaki, or even Kamiyoshi. Outside of Higo, there have been a few odd Hozon calls in 2014- but I thought the problem mostly limited to Higo until Pete mentioned Goto. Pete is much more knowledgeable about Goto than I am. Very difficult topic. I felt the NBTHK opinion was nigh infallable unt

Pete- you are joking with me (?), as I'm the one who had that mumei kozuka come back TH to Tokujo last summer. I confess that was a bit of a start, as it had previous papers to waki-goto that I thought were 'not great'. I just expected papers to 'Goto' and put it through TH because "what the hell!" since the design had special significance to me. The results I had from that shinsa were very odd. One of the dealers I know in Japan claimed they failed everything he put in that shinsa. You'd think they had shot his favorite puppy. We were discussing about 12 or 13 papers on a variety of Higo items from published shodai works to a rather well known Kamiyoshi work. In there was a tsuba we all agreed was nidai Hayashi, including opinion of two dealers in Japan. I enjoy collecting Higo, but the other two people in the discussion are much more advanced than me. All Higo items have come back 'Higo'. There *might* have been one 'Jingo', but haven't seen the paper and date yet to see if if was actually from a late 2013 shinsa. As of 2013, we were still getting school attributions and even generation attributions on mumei pieces. Noting the price drop in the TH costs, one theory is that we need 'pay up' for educated opinion now, vs the Captain Obvious 'Higo' at the Hozon level. Personally I doubt that idea, but it is to be tested soon by someone else. Hopefully they will share the results in 4 months or so, but that is theirs to decide.

Following on recent discussion with a Higo tsuba collector and a dealer in Japan- Since about this time last year (March 2014) has anyone had any tsuba NBTHK paper Hozon or Tokubetsu Hozon specifically to: Hayashi, Nishigaki, Hirata, or even Kamiyoshi ? (1) If so from a February 2014 or later NBTHK shinsa, could you please provide a scan of the papers including the date? I appreciate any help in this matter.

Mark, Thank you for sharing. Nice family of 5 or 6 generations from Mito to Edo work. This is a nice example to save down to file, if okay with you.

Cool. Love dated tsuba and f/k. Any pictures to share? Usually those with dates pre-Meiji are good workmanship. I have a nishigaki f/k signed and dated July 1776. Nice waveform work very typical of the style of the maker, but it was the date that toppled me into buying it.

Yes. See The Tokugawa Museum (Nagoya) book. At least 1 Muramasa katana in there.

The 2014 D-T-I Greetings noted, "Recently, the even has had a growing number of foreign enthusiasts attending it." A side conversation with a dealer had him exclaim it was the most (foreigners) he'd seen at a DTI. The weather was very nice last year, with a cold snap a few days before. Moving it back even 1 week would have -> 0% the typhoon season. Between a work related constraint on Nov 20 and Thanksgiving [travel=ugh], guess I won't make it. Had enough fun last year, that was seriously considering it. Maybe 2017 then. Between an impending USA Central Bank move and Abe's plan, yen will probably go to 125 to 130 in later 2016 year. After that [2017], don't know. Election years usually aren't good for the US$.

Not Otsuki either.