Tsuba casting molds ?

[Dan tsuba]

Hello all,

 

I just happened to "drift" into this website.  https://tsubakansho.com/tag/cast/   .  It talks about copper tsuba that could have been cast before 1600 (scroll down under the heading on the left under "San Diego Tsuba").  I have no idea if this could be an actual occurrence.  Thoughts or opinions on the article would be welcome.

 

With respect,

Dan

[rkg]

Dan,

FWIW, that's Jim Gilbert's blog.

 

As he notes, there's a whole class of cast tsuba that are generally thought to be pretty old - just google kagamishi tsuba (鏡師 鍔) to find more to study.  A lot of them have the coarse figures on them as shown, but... some of them can be pretty well done - here's an old one that you have to look at a little before you realize it was cast:

 

Best,

rkg

(Richard George)

[christianmalterre]

A very good example Richard!

Thank you for sharing it.

 

I would even like to claim that very many tsuba ( whether they have been worked from iron or from a soft metal  like Copper or Shakudo or else)
are cast pieces!
We had this discussion already for very many years.
The forum here is full of more information about it.

Only just finally, this discussion came up again in another thread where a collector wrote ( which is Correct! ) that for example the NBTHK even certifies cast pieces!

Cast tsuba are not necessarily always modern fakes! This is to ben considered when collecting or owning Tsuba absolutely!
A good cast and genuine antique piece can therefore and was already certified in the past and recognized as a genuine!
Much discussion topic!  And I am very aware that very many collectors now get scared.

 

Christian

[christianmalterre]

and yes, to come back to the former question...

There were casting moulds definitely!

The Kagami ( Mirror makers ) were specialised also in producing Tsuba and other Tosogu.

Which they unquestionable did.

[Iekatsu]

Cast Tsuba are relatively common pre-Edo, most will paper either as Ko-kinko or Kagami-shi. There is no credable link between mirror makers and cast fittings, Kagami-shi being a misnomer. Cast Tsuba in this period are almost always bronze and later brass (early Edo) , I would be suspicious of anything in any other material.

[Brian]

Yes...but what about cast iron tsuba?

[Iekatsu]

Not really my area of research, but I have seen no credible evidence to support cast iron Tsuba.

[GRC]

Brian: that is the eternal question isn't it?

 

Thomas: that there is "no definitive evidence that there were cast iron tsuba" seems to be the general consensus among those who have tin the most experience with tsuba. And there are often references to the lack of large industrial smelting furnaces used in the West to produce cast iron and pour it into moulds for mass production.

 

However, the fact that the NBTHK acknowledges and issues Hozon papers for cast tsuba made in the Edo period, certainly opens the door to the possibility. Although, technically, I suppose we don't know if that includes IRON tsuba. 

 

Now don't all jump on me at once! But let me share some info from "Namban - A Reappraisal" by Lissenden.

 

Lissenden describes in detail, how the typical Japanese smelting furnace was built, what types of smelted iron it could produce, and provides evidence of the chemical composition of different iron tsuba in the 1600s, 1700s, and 1800s.

Here is an excerpt from page 123.  

 

"In modern technology, the addition of silicon to the smelt reduces the evolution of gases and the formation o f gas holes in the mouldings. The resulting casts are soft and can be easily filed or chiseled, but grey cast iron is only suitable for coarse mouldings.

However, for many hundreds of years the carburisation of grey cast iron, enabling its conversion into malleable cast iron, (ref 230) had been well known and such a process was described in 1734 by Emanuel Swedenborg as being familiar to Chinese and Japanese metalworkers. (ref 231) While unsuited to the mass production of larger articles because o f the amount o f time the process demands, decarburisation would have been easily applied to the production of a limited number of smaller articles such as moulded tsuba.

The moulding of artefacts such as tsuba was thus a readily attainable process long before the popularity of the Namban group o f tsuba became established. Conversely, the degree of commercialisation of the iron-producing process by this time leads one to presume that the tsuba makers would have obtained their iron from industrial manufacturers in ingot form. This would probably have already been decarburised commercially by a 'fining' process in order to convert the cast iron into its malleable cast iron form — a form well capable of being wrought into tsuba."

 

Lissenden goes on to show an analysis of Nanban tsuba, revealing that many were initially cast, then worked by hand afterward.

He also suggests that similar evidence could be seen in many other tsuba in his personal collection that were not of the Nanban type, and were of a wide range in quality (ie. not just the crappy ones).

 

Anyway, I am by NO MEANS claiming to have a "YES or NO" to this question. I WISH I had a definitive, conclusive answer...

I am merely passing along some of the info that is available, where someone specifically went looking for the evidence.

Lissenden concludes that it was definitely "possible" to produce cast iron tsuba, and believes that it was also "probable" that they were produced in this way.

 

I apologize for the realllllllly long post!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Brian]

When it comes to cast iron tsuba, I guess this is worth rereading:
https://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/7939-the-last-word-on-cast-iron-tsuba/
 

 

[JohnTo]

Hi guys,

Markus Sesko has a small reference to cast iron tsuba in his book the Japanese toso-kinko Schools (p 129) which states that the kinko artist Daininchi Fucho (active around Horeki, 1751-1764) learned his skills ‘from Ugai Gorozaemon who belonged to an Osaka-based family of kettle casters who produced cast-iron tsuba as a sideline.’

 We tend to think that the material used in iron kettles is too brittle for tsuba, or for swords, but look on Youtube (www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7z9pkQnz_0) and you will see a video of Miyairi Shohei breaking up iron kettles to make swords just after WWII when tamahagane was scarce.

 

best regards, John

[GRC]

Brian, it's exactly that thread from 2011 that I was referencing with the statement: "no cast iron tsuba" was the general consensus among those who have the most experience with tsuba... without naming any names.

But then there was the whole discovery of the casting artifacts in Nara Japan (in 2015 I think), as discussed by Sesko, who was alerted to a Japanese news video of the findings posted by Ford Hallam.

 

In the link posted by Dan, Sesko wrote his "initial thoughts" on the matter as:

"Well, tsuba and sword fittings were of course reused and handed down in the peaceful Edo period but still, there must had been a production line for the cheaper swords and therefore it is in my opinion only logical to accept that there were many more of such cast workshops like the one discovered in Nara. I also think that the majority of these relative cheap fittings just did not survive or was melted down for casting metal fittings. Thus we are hardly talking about them today."

 

Thanks for that reference and quote John!

"Daininchi Fucho (active around Horeki, 1751-1764) learned his skills ‘from Ugai Gorozaemon who belonged to an Osaka-based family of kettle casters who produced cast-iron tsuba as a sideline."

 

And then there's the NBTHK Juyo-papered Nanban tsuba that clearly has a great many clones in existence, suggesting that it was also likely cast iron that was then worked by hand:

 

Plus the findings from Lissenden that the production of malleable "grey" cast iron (as he refers to it) was producible by traditional Japanese furnaces, and that a great number of Nanban-style tsuba were initially cast then worked with hand tools.

 

So that sure seems to be a "fair" bit of evidence to suggest that it was both possible AND probable...

 

What I would love to see is a cast iron tsuba made in a more Japanese style (rather than Nanban-style), that is identified as being cast in the Edo period by the NBTHK.

As we have all seen recently, there are a number of high quality cast iron tsuba that appear to have an Edo-period look to them, but are making it difficult to distinguish just how much of the tsuba's design was done by hand vs casting... 

 

I guess the real question becomes: WHEN were they made?

And even if it was declared by the NBTHK to be an Edo-period cast iron piece, how does anyone really know if that specific tsuba was made at the suggested date? 

And as many others have pointed out in the past... even experts make mistakes sometimes.

 

So the evidence is mounting, but do we have definitive proof? 

Ughhhh 

 

[roger dundas]

Quite amazing and fascinating that after all of this time, this question/conundrum is still not resolved, still being debated.

And then we have the newcomers on the scene, the tsuba being made tomorrow that help muddy the waters.

I for one am enjoying the above but must admit my brain is still finding it difficult to know just what is what, what is the reality and how do we recognize it ?

Roger j

[ROKUJURO]

Roger,

the reality is that cast iron TSUBA do not work as intended. They are brittle and do not protect from an impact (= a hard blow). Another reality is that it is much easier to forge a simple and plain TSUBA than to make a comparable cast one with the known technique of "lost wax mold". The Japanese did not have die cast molds to make big numbers of 'cheap' TSUBA.

[Dan tsuba]

Wow !!  Thanks all.  My initial post about the "San Diego Tsuba" and the replies to it started quite an educational journey for me!  As a result of some "light" research I have found that cast iron tsuba are brittle and can break when struck and because of that they do not work as intended (as stated by Rokujuro in he above post - thank you Rokujuro for the insight).  However, could it be that iron tsuba during the (let us say) middle Edo period (maybe about 1700) did not have to endure "hard blows" ??  I have read where the Edo period was a "peaceful" (more or less) era in Japanese history.  So could it be that if tsuba were cast from iron, that they were more or less for decorative purposes only ???

 

Again, thanks all !

With respect,

Dan

[Spartancrest]

Dan:

Not all cast iron is brittle it can be annealed.  https://www.technologystudent.com/equip1/heat3.htm

Also as you say there was a long period where the tsuba was purely decorative and as has been discussed before, the tsuba is not solely for defense against an opponents blade but more importantly as a counterweight and to stop the user's hand sliding upwards. The theory that cast iron guards would not stand up under a blow would also apply to most kinko, leather and maki-e guards so from my view point the question is irrelevant. You might also notice in a few cases that though the guard may be obviously a casting [and in iron] that tagane-ato have been punched in after it was made and were not, as in most cases, part of the casting pattern - you can't put punch marks in 'brittle' cast iron so it seems reasonable that they were annealed and more often than we may think. Don't get me wrong there are a huge number of cast iron guards that were made as export ware and most were never fitted to a blade and are intended to deceive a novice buyer, but not all of them by a long shot.

[roger dundas]

Again I am sliding away from the initial question re 'cast tsuba' and hope you are ok with that- especially Dan ?

But I just wanted to remark on something everyone would be well aware of -the fact that those wielding Japanese swords (and for over many hundreds of years -the Samurai particularly), did so without any protection for their knuckles. No cross guards, no shell-guards, no elaborate ribbons of steel, no basket hilts.

No doubt their fighting techniques were well practiced, thrusting and slicing (can I crudely put it) and maybe unique to the Japanese- as against the various fencing, sometimes hacking, slicing, draw cuts or straight out piercing sword practices of some other nations.

Those training in the art of 'Iaido' will know how they were able to get away with it ?

Roger j

[Iekatsu]

15 hours ago, GRC said:

But then there was the whole discovery of the casting artifacts in Nara Japan (in 2015 I think)

This was a soft metal casting site, it is well documented and there was no evidence of iron casting. Fittings produced from such workshops still exist in significant numbers, they are just not really interesting to most collectors.

 

On 1/26/2022 at 9:08 PM, JohnTo said:

you will see a video of Miyairi Shohei breaking up iron kettles to make swords just after WWII when tamahagane was scarce.

Interesting to see how little effort is required to break up the cast kettles.

[christianmalterre]

To clear up the "legend" that has been repeated time and again.

Cast iron can definitely be just as durable and malleable as forged iron.
It is a pure nonsense to claim that cast iron is brittle and rough to break.
It only depends purely on the material used (composition) and the degree of temperature during processing.
So if the "blacksmith" " swordsmith", "gunsmith", " tsubashi" , or kettle caster knows exactly his material and also the appropriate temperature so to treat his material properly, nothing speaks against in the way of a professional elaboration.
The degree of subsequent hardening and resulting decarbonization of the finnished metal is maybe the most essential keypoint!
Otherwise (to name just a few...) the rifled gun barrels of Sauer & Son ( Hunting guns ) in the German area of Suhl, or the gun barrels of the Paris Frenchman Lefauchex ( Hunting guns) would not have been created and further developed in beginning early 19th century.

 

Christian

 

 

[ROKUJURO]

Christian,

I think you are not correct in some points. The durability of cast iron may vary to a degree after different treatments, but if you compare identical dimensions, you will find superior data of steel in all cases. Please read about gun barrels ( https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauf_(Schusswaffe)).

Cast cannon barrels are known to have been made from bronze and iron in early times, but these materials have been replaced by steel as soon as it was available.

But probably you have different information material that I do not know of?

[GRC]

Here's an article about the family of of different cast iron types, and the heat treating methods to change a variety of properties in the final product, including fluidity, hardness, impact resistance, and malleability just to name a few of the relevant ones:

https://www.industrialheating.com/articles/94644-heat-treatment-of-cast-irons

 

So to sum it up: cast iron can be hard and brittle or soft and workable... it all depends on the starting material and the process of heating, cooling, annealing, normalizing etc. 

 

Thomas, you're totally right about that casting find. It was set up for shinchu (brass) casting, so I shouldn't have lumped it in with the evidence for iron casting...

However, I guess what struck me most about it was this:

That single discovery in 2015 showed that casting goes back much farther in time than was previously thought, and the production of brass goes back much further than previously thought. 

So to me, it still represents a situation where it's important to keep an "open mind". 

And, for me, it begs the question: "If soft metal casting of tsuba and other sword fittings goes back 400+ years in Japan, then why wouldn't they also have made cast iron tsuba and fittings?" 

[C0D]

4 minutes ago, GRC said:

"If soft metal casting of tsuba and other sword fittings goes back 400+ years in Japan, then why wouldn't they also have made cast iron tsuba and fittings?" 

Cast iron has a melting point of 1250+ °C (which was hard to achieve with ancient bellows) while copper have 1085°C and brass 900-950°C (depending on the composition of the alloy), moreover as said previously cast iron needs to be heat treated after pouring to ensure workability and toughness. Charcoal wasn't cheap even in those times, so would have been a double waste, the work of a person to make a tsuba from scratch was probably cheaper.

[ROKUJURO]

Glen,

simply because iron has a melting point of 1.538°C while brass (depending on alloy components) melts within a range of ca. 900°C to 1.065°C. Casting iron will still require a considerably higher temperature.

In times when iron production was limited to the TATARA process with an upper temperature of ca. 1.300°C, it was not possible to produce cast iron in Japan. But it may have been possible elsewhere, perhaps in China.

Ford Hallam has provided all information about this subject on NMB. 

[GRC]

With regards to the defensive function of tsuba for parrying blows, I'm starting to think it has less and less merit compared to its other functions (as already pointed out by Dale and Roger).

Out of thousands of tsuba, I can only really recall seeing evidence of a sword nick on one or two of them, and that even includes the Tanko tsuba (Katchushi and Tosho styles) from the warring pre-Edo era. 

A direct hit on a tsuba is clearly a rare occurrence.

 

Here's are two images posted by Sesko that shows a grouping of pre-Momoyama period, pre-katana swords that were mounted aikuchi-style with no tsuba at all.

https://markussesko.com/2016/01/20/cast-sword-fittings/

 

And just for something fun to ponder, here's a Yagyu quote from Sasano (Early Japanese Sword Guards: Sukashi Tsuba):

"In the early 1600s, Yagyu Jubei Mitsutoshi, the most famous of all the Yagyu warriors, defended his choice of a 'soft' copper tsuba by stating that he had "never yet relied on a sword guard for protection".

Edited January 27, 2022 by GRC
added Yagyu quote from Sasano

[C0D]

btw here's a beautiful documentary on how kettles are made traditionally (you can also see how complicated is to get a good one that way) 

 

[GRC]

Manuel and jean,

thanks for that temperature discrepancy information.

I don't know how to reconcile that with what Lissenden wrote (pg 133 of Nanban a Reappraisal) :

 

"However, for many hundreds of years the carburisation of grey cast iron, enabling its conversion into malleable cast iron, (ref 230) had been well known and such a process was described in 1734 by Emanuel Swedenborg as being familiar to Chinese and Japanese metalworkers. (ref 231) While unsuited to the mass production of larger articles because of the amount o f time the process demands, decarburisation would have been easily applied to the production of a limited number of smaller articles such as moulded tsuba. The moulding of artefacts such as tsuba was thus a readily attainable process long before the popularity of the Namban group of tsuba became established. Conversely, the degree of commercialisation o f the iron-producing process by this time leads one to presume that the tsuba makers would have obtained their iron from industrial manufacturers in ingot form. This would probably have already been decarburised commercially by a 'fining' process in order to convert the cast iron into its malleable cast iron form — a form well capable of being wrought into tsuba."

 

And, the melting point of malleable cast iron is much lower:

https://material-properties.org/what-are-thermal-properties-of-malleable-cast-iron-definition/

 

 

[Dan tsuba]

Again, thanks to all for the great information.  I really learned a lot from the websites that Spartancrest and GRC included and the video link from COD,  Way too cool and thanks !!  I checked on the web and found that annealing was in practice about 900 years ago!  So it seems like a distint possibility that iron tsuba could have been cast and the iron could be made less brittle.

 

Thanks all !

With respect,

Dan

[ROKUJURO]

5 hours ago, GRC said:

....And, the melting point of malleable cast iron is much lower:

 

That is correct, but to make malleable cast iron, you have to make iron from iron ore first! This process requires a higher temperature. The reason for the lower melting point of cast iron is the fact that it takes on so much carbon (4 - 5 %) in the process!

[GRC]

OK Jean, I hear what you're saying.

 

I really am trying to wrap my head around all the info...

Quick summary of what we know so far:

 

1- Certain types of cast iron, along with the correct heat treatment, can produce soft malleable cast iron that can be worked by hand after casting. 

2- We know that the Japanese had the knowledge of the necessary technical processes for producing malleable cast iron, dating back to at least the early 1700s.

3- Tatara furnaces can reach the necessary temperatures to melt the malleable cast iron.

4- Lissenden has described the Tatara's production output in detail, which includes wrought iron.

     He then also outlines (with some suppositions - see quote below) the processes required to convert the wrought iron portion of the Tatara's product into malleable cast iron ingots.

Here's the quote:

"...leads one to presume that the tsuba makers would have obtained their iron from industrial manufacturers in ingot form. This would probably have already been decarburised commercially by a 'fining' process in order to convert the cast iron into its malleable cast iron form"

 

So is it this supposition by Lissenden where the whole idea has its weakest link?

...specifically the "industrilazed decarburization" to produce the ingots in the first place?

[ROKUJURO]

Glen,

I cannot comment on Dr. Lissenden's text as I do not know his sources. But I know that until Japan's switch to modernism after 1876, TATARA furnaces were the only means to produce iron. 

The output of a TATARA was (and still is) iron (low carbon), a major part is steel of differing carbon content, and in the hottest places of the furnace (near the vents) a varying portion of cast iron. As this was not usable for forging, I read that it was used to upgrade low carbon steel in a special process. Perhaps it was used for casting iron water kettles as well, but that I don't know.

A TATARA was a means to produce steel by direct reduction of black iron ore (SATETSU). You could not use it like a 'high power kitchen stove' for melting cast iron!

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleable_iron

[Dan tsuba]

So all, I found a wikipedia site that deals with ferrous metallurgy development in China.  It talks about ancient cast iron weapons being found and the development of cast iron in China.  I also found were China and Japan have had continuous contact since about 100 A.D.  Maybe the Japanese craftsman learned their cast metal technology from the Chinese ??  Anyway the website is   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrous_metallurgy     If you scroll down to "China" it tells about it and has some illustrations.

I found it very interesting.

 

With respect,

Dan