Opinions please

[Rodenbacher]

When I bought this tsuba it was described as dating from the "18th century". It is made of bronce, the measurements are: height 68 mm and thickness 3,4 mm at the Nakago-Ana. You can clearly see traces of black lacquer on the mimi. It has been in the collection of the Belgium collector Paul de Coninck before.

 

What do you think about that Tsuba?

[Marius]

It is a Momoyama period tsuba.

[sabi]

It is a Momoyama period tsuba.

 

Very nice tsuba.

 

Marius, what makes you place it so early? I know very little about dating soft metal pieces and I'd love to hear what clues you see in this one.

[Rodenbacher]

bump

[Soshin]

Hi Rodenbacher,

 

Marius is the Irogane mac-daddy and possessor of the blingest of bling-bling of Ko-Kinko. I am but the humblest of servants needless to say I agree with his analysis.

[Rodenbacher]

it really made my day: "the blingest of bling-bling of Ko-Kinko"! Soshin, you are really amazing!

[Soshin]

Hi Rodenbacher,

 

Putting jokes aside. The base soft metal is yamagane a common early soft metal used in Ko-Kinko tosogu. The turned up rim and the shape of kozuka hitsu-ana is also of a early shape common to pre Edo Period tsuba. I think these are a few major points used by Marius's in his analysis and conclusion.

[Rodenbacher]

Thank you very much, Mariusz and Soshin! Vielen Dank!

[Marius]

You are welcome :-) Bitte schön, gern geschehen :-)

 

As David has outlined, the base material, yamagane nails this to (roughly) pre-Edo, as does the rather "rustic" hari-ishime punching.

I have to add that traces of black lacquer are also an indication of age (in general), although sometimes what we take for urushi is just grime.

 

Rich Turner has once posted an interesting tsuba covered in "poor man's urushi". Well worth reading, as is everything in this excellent blog:

 

http://kodogunosekai.com/2009/12/05/ume ... shi-tsuba/