Metal Work Technique

[kyushukairu]

Does anyone know the name of the metal work technique employed on this tsuba? It almost reminds me of a kind of wabi sabi technique seen on chawan (such as koge or yohen)

[kissakai]

Is it sahari?

Can't see the images very well

Sahari shows 'bubbles' on the surface

[kyushukairu]

Thanks Grev. I think you may be right. I found a similar styled tsuba on Grey's while searching for 'sahari', though he refers to this particular technique as 'sahari overlay'

http://www.japaneseswordbooksandtsuba.com/store/holbrook-tsuba/h317-ko-shoami-daisho-tsuba

​I also have a tachi with 'sahari overlay' fuchigashira, though I had initially just thought they had suffered corrosion ha

[Geraint]

Dear both.

 

The sahari tsuba I have seen are all distinguished by the sahari being inlayd into the plate and a silvery grey in colour.  While looking at the photograph that you posted Kyle I was reminded of something I had recently seen and have at last found it again, not sure if it relates but here it is,  http://www.shibuiswords.com/ELharusada.html  The smoothness of the plate in your example is at odds with the ones illustrated but....?

 

All the best.

[Ford Hallam]

The first example is a variety of silver 'solder' simply melted and fused to the iron ground.

 

The second is heavily corroded silver sheet nunome-zogan.

 

Sahari, or sawari, is a champlevé type of decoration where a powdered metal composition is melted to fill a prepared cavity. Most of these alloys are basically 66% copper and 33% tin. The Hazama school were, of course, the most notable exponents.

[MauroP]

A similar technique of melted incrustations is presented as sahari (possibly misleadingly) here below:

http://www.japaneseswordbooksandtsuba.com/store/holbrook-tsuba/h317-ko-shoami-daisho-tsuba#
My question now is: sahari refers to a particular kind of alloy or just to the tecnique of getting the inlay by melting powder?

Bye, Mauro

[Geraint]

Dear Mauro.

 

I have always understood sahari to refer to the metal, a view supported here, http://www.nihontocraft.com/Hazama_Tsuba.html

 

 

As Ford points out it is not inlayed in the usual manner, rather the powdered metal is fused into previously prepared recesses in the plate.

 

The tsuba on Grey's site are unusual and not at all what is us normally encountered with sahari.

 

 

All the best.

[TETSUGENDO]

I always equate sahari/sawari with niello, where both name and technique are closely bound together.

 

-S-