GRC

Most attributions are based on a gut feeling... most papers are not judged by jury but by a single member, then the paper gets signed off at the end. Most of these judgements seem to be done in minutes, without any sort of diligence or consultation to databases of any kind (which is why the NBTHK frequently contradicts itself when the same tsuba gets re-submitted for shinsa) Proofs?! There are hardly any at all for anything that is unsigned from the pre-Edo and early Edo periods. Old books, and papers are just a loose guideline... and because of the author's own lack of certainty, they deliver plenty of opportunity to muddy the waters for current collectors who want to "know what they have". Some of these attributions have done more harm than good over time. It's exactly what @FlorianB proceeded to do, that we need more of... That's precisely the the type of thing we all need to be doing (and posting ) if "we" as a collective hope to get to something "better" than the vapid system we have now. ...or we can just keep flouting the papers people buy rather than the tsuba themselves. Not that I'm saying you are doing that Florian, but there are a ton of people who do... it is a money making machine after all, if you are lucky enough to get the "more valuable" school attribution in the lottery that is the current papering system).

Oh and back to schools issue...pertaining to these specific tsuba. There was a significant amount of overlap and cross-pollination, including direct contact between smiths among the Akasaka, Tosa Myochin and a strong stylistic pull for both of those groups toward the Higo Kanshiro, so it's no wonder all these tsuba have very similar characteristics, but are getting all these different labels. Even some late Edo period Tosa smiths were known to work in an earlier ko-Akasaka style (but usually with their own twist, rather than just doing rote utsushi copies). There's a really interesting and informative article that describes the detailed nature of this stylistic "entanglement": A Story of the Tosa - Myôchin 土佐 明珍 By Mark Ceskavich JSSUS Newsletter Volume 50, no.3, 2018

Back to direction of the wings... ughhh I give up LOL Sometimes they appear to have their wings arcing forward, especially when they seem to be taking a power stroke to get going: But then most of time they appear to have their wings arced backward, especially when they seem to be coasting/gliding: And there is also viewing angle and perspective to factor into it, which could alter the viewer's perception... so, um

Mauro, your sentiment basically captures one of the principal driving forces in posting this thread in the first place. It's a thought that can't be ignored the more you go down the rabbit hole of trying to sort out the mess of attributions and sometimes outlandish papers that exist (yes, even the new ones... not just the old green ones). Another point that really needs consideration is that the classification system itself is inadequate when it comes to assigning attributions. That's exactly why attributions seems to be subject to whims and fads and "cultism" of sorts. As the system stands at the moment, it's far far away from being a "science". It's only by gathering more evidence and really gathering up a strong database that we'll be able to do enough comparative analysis to really break things down into proper groupings and many more "sub-groupings" than currently exist. Some of these sub-groupings may never get a genuine name to hang on them, but I genuinely feel that could slowly tease out some more specific attributions that could even point to a specific smith's work (regardless of whether they fall under a larger category's umbrella or just shows an "influence" from one or more groups). But hopefully we can put together enough visual resources to point to see to say, "yup this is one of that guy's pieces". One day... but I sincerely hope we can all start slowly chipping away at it, one grouping at a time.

Well, now that you've brought the chidori/karigane issue into question, it's seems like an interesting question that I personally had never considered in this way before. I just always assumed the arc of the wings was the only factor that I ever considered in terms of "flight direction". But maybe your naturalistic goose tsuba might suggest the possibility of a forward facing arc for the wings of geese in flight? Also the head and body of some of these tsuba are relative short and stumpy while on others they are longer and more tapered. Is it just differences in craftmanship or actually supposed to be a different kind of bird? By the way, you weren't the only one to think "chidori" because some of the attributions I posted above did mention chidori rather than geese. I just outright discounted those statements as false and went with my gut that was telling me "geese".

Ok, I suppose there aren't any more people willing to offer a hypothesis, or everyone else is somewhat in agreement with what has already been stated, or just don't know... #1 Apparently made by Higo's Hayashi Matashichi (It's published in the Gustav Jacoby Collection... and if I am reading this google translation correctly, it was once in the possession of the Hosokawa and Nishigaki lineages up until the late 19th century. #2 NBTHK papers to ko-Akasaka (lacking in any sort of useful detail, as usual...) Google translation: No. 4015180 Certificate of authenticity 1. Tsuba (sword guard) with openwork design of ginger and wild goose motifs, unsigned, Old Akasaka. Chrysanthemum-shaped iron base with openwork, rounded rim. The item on the right has been authenticated as a preserved sword fitting by our association as a result of our examination, and this is certified. May 28, 2019 Japanese Art Sword Preservation Association #3 Nishigaki Kanshiro (according to a hakogaki by Sasano. This one is posted on tsuba.info and is listed as 2nd generation Kanshiro in the section on Higo tsuba. I was given the info through messaging with the owner of the tsuba, but I don't have any images to post of the hakogaki. I was also informed that this one has some signs of slight layer separation, opening the door to a possible Akasaka connection And just to muddy the waters.. here's yet another, actually closest to # 2 in that it has the larger proportioned hitsu-ana. #4 It's in the Owari section of Tsuba Shusei (the elephant book), and it describes it as: 65. Myoga and Chidori – A tsuba with a nice texture in a central recess. In an older style. Seppa-dai 3mm, kakumiri 6mm. And just to blur things even more... here's one from illustrations of ancient tsuba on uchigatana, by Keichiro Yokota #5 attributed to Myochin it's back to the smaller sized hitsu-ana but it has some alternate motifs at the top and bottom of the seppa-dai (instead of myoga/ginger), and a few other small embellishments in the way the sukashi elements were chiseled. So to sum up... a mish mash of attributions due to some overlapping physical features between schools and smiths. So we have published attributions and hakogaki to Higo's Matashichi and Kanshiro, ko-Akasaka, as well as Owari and Myochin. Then I also got some suggestions elsewhere for Kariganeya Hikobe as well. So the answer is ... still to be determined I suppose

@MauroP I'm with you on the attribution... it is one family's recounting of an item that was apparently passed down through multiple generations, so who knows what kind of embellishments were added onto the lore surrounding this piece as the years went by... like grandpa's fishing story where both the fish and the waves keep getting bigger ever time he retells the story But the claim does line up with that smith's plate texture, so maybe a grain of truth? I also agree that the first one is likely the oldest, and everyone so far seems to be picking up on it as well. The third one does appear to have a much smoother surface, and looks to be more black compared to the first two.

Hard to really know if there is a verifiable "correct" on any of these anyway... so who knows Well one has a stronger "most likely correct" than the others... I'll explain later. Solid guesses though Jean (not that I'm saying they are "correct" or not...yet)

Ok I posted this somewhere else, but the membership in both locations is probably different even though there will be some obvious overlap. We'll see... it's my first time trying it. Up for a challenge? Does anyone want to hazard a guess as to the attributions for each of these three tsuba? They each got a specific attribution from different sources (and one of the members here is the source for one of them), but I'm curious to see what you might suggest for each. This isn't an attempt to pass judgement on anyone's "knowledge", it's an attempt to open a discussion and have some fun with it. Feel free to hazard a guess on any or all of them #1,2,3.

1000% ! I can't begin to tell you how much of an influence he was on me. I'm trying to piece back together some of the groupings of tsuba he had collected to showcase how each group of tsuba represents the body of work of a single unidentified smith. This is one of those missing pieces that really should get back together with the others, so that all of Bruce's insights and discoveries don't just fade into the mist and get cast about across the world, maybe never to come back together again... I'd also like to present those groupings on a forum such as this to showcase how the limited number of "schools" that tsuba get attributed to, are insufficient and need expansion.

This is sort of a strange request... but I'm trying to solve a bit of a mystery. Bruce passed away almost a year ago now. He had acquired and sold off many tsuba over the decades he spent devoted to the study of tsuba and Japanese pottery. Anyway, he probably had this tsuba in his possession at some point, or it may even have been just an image from an online site that he saw it on, but I'd like to know if any of you have seen it or know who has it. Thanks in advance

Nice surface activity on that one, better than a lot of the other smaller pieces

Congratulations Markus, your contributions to the field are immeasurable really. @Markus would you be able to post the indexes for volumes 1-3 as well? I'm wondering which ones would be most suitable to my specific areas of interest Thanks.

Thanks Jean and Koichi It confirms my suspicions and keeps the lid open on the pandora’s box of the NBTHK assigning “school” attributions to old, unsigned iron tsuba. The NBTHK papered this tsuba to Ko-shoami, while Sato Kanzan assigned it to Owari. I love this tsuba even more now because of the blatant discrepancy in attributions.

Any help would be much appreciated... kanji done by hand, don't do well in google translate It's for an iron sukashi tsuba with clouds and water drops. Thanks!

Thanks Mauro! The compiled version is certainly going to be a valuable resource for everyone. It may also serve as a window into how certain types of mumei tsuba were being classified by Sato Kanzan (and by association, the NBTHK) during that time period. It could be a useful benchmark to see how similar tsuba are being papered today and note the shifts in attributions in recent times. Not to mention, seeing some great tsuba examples along the way

Nanban or Hizen... not Jakushi (although there's a similar look to the nunome, Jakushi never did this tsuba shape or did this type of design theme). It's probably a Chinese craftsman working in one of the ports in Japan (therefore should get a hybrid combined attribution of both Nanban and Hizen... which never happens in the papering world, because they are fixated on sticking to the narrow set of categories that were agreed upon in the past. Both categories of Nanban and Hizen are loosely defined at best and have lots of issues... so the exact attribution under those two labels is kind of arbitrary anyway. Either way, it's an unusual tsuba so congrats on your first purchase.

Here’s a nice example of a ko-akasaka seppa-dai that shows the four layers on the outside edge of the sepa-dai. It even has a split along the middle layers like the tsuba that started this thread… but nowhere near the same level of separation. Regardless, the whole notion of a “three layered construction” needs to be tossed aside. i’m still leaning toward a few freeze thaw cycles affecting the “tokkei” one, but who knows.

Good to know Jean. I never would have imagined creeping rust to create such a huge gap between layers. That's pretty amazing actually. Oh and what is this tsuba forging seminar you mentioned? Are you presenting it virtually or in person or both?

nice. I missed the gourd kanji on the papers... my fault. My sincere apologies go to the NBTHK on this one but here's a later more curvy gourd shape that this early one evolved into:

@MauroP... the first tsuba you posted has a really lazy description in the NBTHK papers. The first one is definitely a gourd, not "water droplets/水玉 (mizutama)". That rigidly geometric version of the gourd motif was used a lot in the late Muromachi and early Azuchi-Momoyama period... then it got more curvy and organic looking. The second one, has the classic vertical yasuri line "rain motif" on the plate, so I assume the NBTHK just went with the easy way out by calling the two holes "water droplets"... which is certainly plausible. But, I would also lean toward a sun & moon description due to the unequal sizes of the holes. But, it's also equally likely, that it was just a clever tsubako who was playing around with all of those references at the same time by purposefully making one hole larger than the other, while having the rain motif background. But complexity and nuance is not something we can expect to see in NBTHK papers...

Wow, someone's still in a bad mood I see... ...and still showing a penchant for dogmatic conservatism in the sense of "don't change anything", "accept everything as is". Stagnation or progress...to each their own.

you can also see the four layers on the mimi at the bottom of the second picture that Steve posted.

Found another example, also with the kozuka-hitsu-ana broken. That's the best image I could get, sorry.