As you might know, there are many Muramasa blades where one of the two character for “Muramasa” (村正) was removed or altered. In most cases the character for “Mura” was removed and, for example, the character “hiro” or “mune” was added underneath “Masa” to obtain “Masahiro” (正広) or “Masamune” (正宗) respectively. This practice is called kaisan/kaizan (改鏨, lit. “change of chiselling´s”) or kaizan (改竄, lit. “to altger, to falsify, to fake”) and I want to demonstrate it with the help of concrete examples. But beforehand, let me introduce the reasons for this practice, namely as described in my Legends and Stories around the Japanese Sword 2. What is well known in the sword world is that blades by Muramasa were considered to be cursed or unlucky by the Tokugawa family. So in the following and before we come to the kaisan examples I would like to shed a little more light on the circumstances and introduce the various cases which were the basis for this superstition.

It all started with Tokugawa Ieyasu´s grandfather, Matsudaira Kiyoyasu (松平清康, 1511-1535), the 7^th generation of the Mikawa-Matsudaira line (三河松平) and lord of Okazaki Castle (岡崎城). The arch rivals of the Matsudaira were the Oda (織田) of neighbouring Owari province and so, in Tenbun four (天文, 1535), Kiyoyasu decided to attack Moriyama Castle (守山城) which was held by Oda Nobumitsu (織田信光, 1516-1556). When the Matsudaira army of about 10.000 men set off, a rumour started to circulate that Abe Sadayoshi (阿部定吉, 1505-1549) – a retainer of the Matsudaira – was secretly communicating with the enemy. Kiyoyasu did not listen to these rumours but Sadayoshi tried to prove his loyalty and called for his son Yashichirô Masatoyo (弥七郎正豊, ?-1535). It was also assumed that Sadayoshi feared that Kiyoyasu had already sent a squad to execute him and so he gave his son the order: “As a sign of my loyalty it would be best if you kill me to dispose of this matter once and for all!” Masatoyo was not able to get a wink of sleep after receiving even the written order from his father. When morning finally broke he heard neighing horses and thought the bailiffs were faster than him and that the execution was already in progress. He jumped out of his bed, grabbed his sword lying next to his cushion and started running so that he was even able to somehow fulfil his father’s wishes and to protect the honour of the family. On his way to Sadayoshi´s room he came across Kiyoyasu and drew his sword as in trance: “If you had trusted my father, then he would have stayed alive!” Instantly he delivered a blow towards Kiyoyasu and the latter yelled: “Masatoyo, have you turned completely mad?!” The strike severed his earlobe. When Kiyoyasu turned around to escape the situation he was fatally hit by Masatoyo´s second blow. With a smooth and clean cut his blade entered Kiyoyasu´s right shoulder and left the body at the left hip. Upon this Masatoyo was killed by Kiyoyasu´s companion Uemura Ujiaki (植村氏明, 1520-1552). In the course of the investigations on this case it was found out that Masatoyo’s blade was a work of Muramasa. It was an oversized ô-katana with a nagasa of 81,8 cm. This incident is one of the earliest known written accounts which mentions the supreme sharpness of Muramasa´s blades. Extant works from the 1^st generation Muramasa date from about the Bunmei (文明, 1469-1487) to the Eishô era (永正, 1504-1521). His year of birth and death is unknown but the 1535 incident took place either shortly after his death or even during his lifetime.Incidentally, the oldest extant dating of a Muramasa blade is from the first year of Bunki (文亀, 1501).

Well, the misfortunes of the Matsudaira family connected to Muramasa blades continued with Kiyoyasu´s son Hirotada (松平広忠, 1526-1549). On a balmy spring night he was woken up by the vibrations of the steps in the hall that he felt on his cushion. He opened his eyes and was able to catch a glimpse of a shadow. Immediately he grabbed his sword and shouted: “Scoundrel, stop!” When he heard more steps and tried to run in that direction he noticed that he had no more control of his legs. He looked down and recognized in fear that his clothes were blood-soaked. Hirotada was able to follow the figure into the garden. At that time, the aforementioned Uemura Ujiaki was on guard duty on the veranda. “Stop that man!”, was Hirotada´s order. After a moment of shock realising that his lord was in danger he drew his sword and chased after the man and killed him. The dead body was examined and they saw that he had only one eye, which was actually a good starting point for further investigations. It turned out that the man was a certain Iwamatsu Yasuke (岩松八弥) and that he was obviously completely drunk that evening. These were so to speak mitigating circumstances but some of Hirotada´s retainers said that he was an assassin sent by the enemy and that the intoxication was part of the plan to obscure the backgrounds. But the high level of alcohol had probably saved Hirotada´s life. However, Iwamatsu was a retainer of the Matsudaira who had lost an eye in battle and who was known for his ferocity. He also had a remarkable list of taken heads. When they removed the handle from his sword – it was a wakizashi – the signature “Muramasa” was revealed.

The misfortunes with the Muramasa blades also passed on to Hirotada´s son Tokugawa Ieyasu. After his father’s death, the seven years old Ieyasu – his name then was Matsudaira Takechiyo (松平竹千代) – was sent as a hostage to the Imagawa family (今川), who were military governors of Suruga province and the arch rivals of the Matsudaira in terms of supremacy in that area. One day, using the kozuka of his katana, he injured himself. The cut was not that deep but unnaturally painful. He cleaned the blood from the blade and could not believe his eyes: It was signed “Muramasa.” So his grandfather was killed by a Muramasa sword, his father almost, and now it was his turn. Ieyasu strongly believed that this was no coincidence and this became firmly fixed in his mind.

Years later Ieyasu married Tsukiyama-dono (築山殿, 1542-1579) to strengthen the bond between the Matsudaira and the Iwamoto. Tsukiyama-dono was the daughter of the Iwagawa-retainer Sekiguchi Chikanaga (関口親永, 1518-1562) and the younger sister of Imagawa Yoshimoto (今川義元, 1519-1560). But when Ieyasu engaged in an alliance with the Imagawa’s arch rivals, the Oda, the family of his wife was not particularly happy. By the way, Ieyasu needed the Oda to fight against the Takeda (武田). In the chaos of the war back then, Oda Nobunaga raised the suspicion that Tsukiyama-dono and her first son with Ieyasu, Matsudaira Nobuyasu (松平信康, 1559-1579), were in cat hoods with the Takeda. As a “logical” consequence and in order not to endanger the alliance with Nobunaga, Ieyasu ordered the execution of Tsukiyama-dono and the ritual suicide (seppuku, 切腹) of his son Nobuyasu. Tsukiyama-dono was executed by Ieyasu´s retainer Nakano Shigemasa (野中重政) on the 29^th day of the eighth month of Tenshô seven. The time for Nobuyasu came somewhat later, on the 15^th day of the ninth month of that year. His second (kaishaku, 介錯) was his close friend Hanzô Moritsuna (服部半蔵守綱), but when he raised his sword he burst into tears. So the Imagawa-samurai Amagata Michioki (天方通興), who was actually the official witness of the ceremony, stood in. In this function, he was only armed with a wakizashi at that moment and, have a guess, the blade was a Muramasa!

This strengthened Ieyasu’s paranoia: His grandfather, his father, himself and his son were either killed or injured by Muramasa blades. So he called for his chamberlain and, according to transmission, ordered that works of this smith should disappear from the face of earth once and for all. After Sekigahara, the victorious side of the Tokugawa made a full investigation of the battle in order to carry out the correct rewards and punishments. In one of these investigations, the deeds of Oda Nagataka (織田長孝, ?-1606) were assessed. Nagataka was the son of Nobunaga´s brother, the famous tea master Oda Urakusai Nagamasu (織田有楽斎 長益, 1548-1622). In a battle Nagataka had killed the enemy commander Toda Shigemasa (戸田重政), namely in close combat by entirely piercing his helmet with a yari. The yari remained completely intact and was shown upon request to Ieyasu. “A truly masterly spear”, he said, but he dropped it and cut his hand. “Ha! Must be a Muramasa”, Ieyasu said jokingly and the present Urakusai replied with a serious face: “Yes, it is indeed a work of Muramasa.” “You know that blades by that smith are unlucky for the Tokugawa, don’t you!” “If so, I will never ever wear a sword from Muramasa again”, promised Urakusai, broke the shaft of the spear into two halves and threw it aside. Incidentally, another transmission says that Nagataka cut through the shaft of the yari with his wakizashi.

But the misfortunes with Muramasa blades continued even after Ieyasu´s death. Tokugawa Tadanaga (徳川忠長, 1606-1633) for example, the younger brother of the third Tokugawa-shôgun Iemitsu (徳川家光, 1604-1651), committed suicide with a Muramasa-tantô. But not out of mysterious or unexplainable reasons. Already in the eighth year of Kan´ei (寛永, 1631) he was placed under house arrest because of improper behaviour – he had killed a (according to other transmissions several) vassal(s). One year later he spread unfounded rumours concerning the then punishment of Katô Tadahiro (加藤忠広, 1601-1651) by the bakufu. For this, all his land was confiscated and the Tokugawa government suggested that he should commit seppuku. On the evening of the sixth day of the twelfth month of Kan´ei ten (1633) he ordered his page to bring sake and prepare dinner. When the latter returned to the chamber of his lord he saw him sitting completely dressed in white and leaning forward a bit. But when he took a closer look he saw that the white of his dress was mixed with red. He came closer and realised that Tadanaga was dead and that his Muramasa-tantō was stuck halfway in his throat.

As indicated before, Ieyasu placed a quasi “Muramasa ban” but it seems that this was not so strictly monitored by the bakufu. Even in the list of Ieyasu´s estate, the Sunpu-owakemono (駿府御分物), we find a Muramasa blade and in the sword chronicles of the Mito-Tokugawa family we find  two katana and three yari by this smith. Another example. The Kyôto sword polisher Imamura Yukimasa (今村幸政) kept record of all the blades he had inspected and polished. In this Rekikan-kenshi (暦観剣志) protocol we find, for the Bunka era (文化, 1804-1818) alone, ten Muramasa blades given to him for a new polish. That means it was actually not that strictly forbidden to own or carry around Muramasa blades. But we can safely assume that they did not like to see an ally or a close retainer wearing a Muramasa sword because things might turn against them because of their “harmful power.” It is also known that the Tokugawa did not accept a Muramasa as an appropriate sword present.

So if you were owning a signed Muramasa in feudal times and wanted to avoid all potential hassle with the Tokugawa family, you either sold the sword or had the signature removed or altered. And now we are back at the practice of kaisan. At blade No 1, the top character for “Mura” was “brutally” removed by hammering, and at blade No 2, the top character for “Mura” was subtly removed, the area was adjusted to the surrounding patina, and the character for “mune” was added below to get the mei “Masamune.” It is of course easier to remove the upper character and add another one below the lower, second one but we also know of kaisan measures to get “Muratada” (村忠), “Muramune” (村宗), or even “Hiromasa” (広正). Approach number 1, i.e. just removing one character and leave the mei as it is, was the more common one but the question is now, why then not remove the entire signature? Some assume that removing the entire signature was quasi only a last resort, but when we bear in mind how ruthlessly signatures were removed over the centuries, I doubt this approach. That means if you had a signed blade of a smith who was considered let´s say “difficult” by the bakufu authorities and others had removed far more “unspectacular” signatures without any hesitation, it would be odd “to do everything” just to keep a “difficult” signature. Well, Muramasa was and is known for executing his characters in a very peculiar manner (see picture 4). And that means when just one character was left after kaisan, an appraiser, polisher, or person familiar with swords would have had no problems bringing in line the workmanship of the blade and the peculiar character for “Mura” or “masa” and recognize that he is handling a Muramasa. So maybe removing just one character was a kind of compromise, i.e. deleting the “difficult” name on the tang but preserving everything necessary to judge the blade easily as shôshin Muramasa.

Picture 1: tantô, mei “Masa” (正), nagasa 26,0 cm, sori 0,15 cm, hira-zukuri, mitsu-mune

Picture 2: sunnobi-tantô, mei “Mura” (村), nagasa 31,8 cm, sori 0,6 cm, hira-zukuri, mitsu-mune

Picture 3: katana, mei “Masamune” (正宗), nagasa 71,0 cm, sori 1,8 cm, shinogi-zukuri, iori-mune

Picture 4: peculiar shôshin Muramasa mei

But the practice of kaisan did not only concern Muramasa blades. Another example is the signature “Echizen no Kuni Shimosaka Sadatsugu” (越前国下坂貞次). In Japanese, characters of the place “Shimosaka” (下坂) can also be read as kudari-zaka what means “decline, decay, ruin” and so on. That means for a native, the mei (越前国下坂) might read “Echizen province is going down the tubes.” So for example, signatures were changed from “Echizen no Kuni Shimosaka Sadatsugu” (越前国下坂貞次) to “Echizen no Kuni-jû Minamoto Sadatsugu” (越前国住源貞次), i.e. the “Shimosaka” (下坂) part was enlarged with some chisellings to get “jû Minamoto” (住源) (see picture 5). And signatures like “Echizen-jû Shimosaka”, often added by Echizen smiths on the ura side of the tang, were sometimes changed to “Echizen-jû Masasaka” (越前住正坂) or the last two characters were removed to leave only “Echizen-jû”.

Picture 5: mei “Echizen no Kuni Shimosaka Sadatsugu” altered via kaisan to “Echizen no Kuni-jû Minamoto Sadatsugu”.

Picture 6: Here “Echizen-jû Shimosaka” was altered to “Echizen-jû Nakamura” (越前住仲村).

But please note that kaisan are not considered as gimei. Swords with such signatures get papers and the signature does not have to be removed, i.e. kaisan-mei are not considered as wrong but as altered signatures and are explicitly mentioned in the paper (see picture 7). Tanobe sensei says that a good way to detect kaisan is to look lengthwise at a signature, i.e. with the tip of the tang not pointing down but to the right or left. He describes it as altered parts seem so to “hang/float somehow above the tang” and don´t align with the rest of the mei.

Picture 7: The paper says: “Echizen-jû ´Nakamura´ (Shimosaka o Nakamura ni kaisan) [越前住仲村 (下坂を仲村に改鏨) ]

Picture 8: Paper which points out that the date signature “Tenshô” (天正) was altered via kaisan to get “Eishô” (永正) to make the blade seem older.

This time I want to introduce an aspect of signature readings which is probably not widely known. We all agree that the alternative notation (濃州) of Mino province (美濃) is read “Nôshû” but Kondô Hôji (近藤邦治), the president of the Gifu branch of the NBTHK, presented in Tôken-Bijutsu 613 an interesting view on a different reading of this notation which I would like to share with you. By the way, loyal readers of my blog will have noticed that I often come back to Kondô san, and indeed, his articles are of particular interest to me as they very match my own approach, namely providing additional and elsewhere usually not found insights into the world of the Japanese sword. In this sense let me take this opportunity to thank Kondô san for his great work!

First of all let me refer to the use of the suffix shû (州) to refer to provinces. The name goes back to the historical political divisions of China established during the Han Dynasty (漢朝, 206 BC – 220 AD) and were introduced in Japan with the ritsuryô system and its definition of administrative units and geographic regions, i.e. provinces. The ritsuryô was based on the philosophies of Confucianism and Chinese legalism as the Nara-period empire tried to replicate China´s rigorous political system from the then “in charge” Tang Dynasty. In Japan, the provinces were referred to as kuni (国), e.g. Bizen no Kuni (備前国), but with the introduction of the Chinese system, official texts tended to use the Chinese notation which was composed as a rule of the first character of the Japanese naming by adding the suffix shû, e.g. Bizen no Kuni became “Bishû” (備州). Incidentally, this ritsuryô system of the official definition and naming of provinces (ryôseikoku, 令制国) was actually in effect until the Meiji period. There were also exceptions to the aforementioned rule of taking the first character, for example for the Chinese-style notation of Ôsumi province (大隅) the second character sumi/gû (隅) was traken to create “Gûshû” (隅州). Mino province is such an exception as it used the second character for the Chinese style notation too but we know from Heian and Kamakura-era documents that in very olden times, also the notation “Mishû” (美州) existed for Mino.

Kondô now found out that the reading “Nôshû” for Mino province was not common before the late Edo period. A very important factor for us to know how certain names were pronounced in olden times is the practice of furigana, reading aids of smaller kana syllables written next to a kanji character. As for sword-related publications, the Ôseki-shô (往昔抄) from Eishô 16 (永正, 1519) is the oldest one to show furigana for signed Mino blades. Well, the famous Kanchi´n-bon mei-zukushi (観智院本銘尽) from from Ôei 30 (応永, 1423) ist a century older but does not show any Mino-related furigana. On the other hand, Bizen province for example is noted therein with the furigana “Hinsen” (ひんせん) or “Binzen” (びんぜん) what is a further indication of different readings of provinces in olden times. But back to the Ôseki-shô. Therein we find four Mino blades whose signatures start with (濃州), i.e. “Nôshû”, but all four are accompanied by the furigana aids “Jôshû”, noted in the old hentaigana (志やう志う). And in the Shinchô-kôki (信長公記), the chronicle of Oda Nobunaga compiled about a hundred years after the Ôseki-shô, Mino province is also quoted with the furigana “Jôshû”, although noted as (ぢょうしう). And even late Edo period textbooks for the education of children of samurai and commoners still quote the Chinese-style (濃州) notation of Mino province with the furigana “Jôshû” (じやうしう), for example the Tôkun-warai shintai-sei (童訓往来新大成) from Bunkyû two (文久, 1862).

Our reading “Nôshû” used today seems to have appeared around Kaei (嘉永, 1848-1854). For example there exist collections of warrior portraits of Utagawa Kuniyoshi (歌川国芳, 1798-1861) of which some Mino-related titles are furigana-aided “Jôshû” (じょうしゅう), and others “Nôshû” (のうしゅう). And it is now assumed that the quick acceptance of “Nôshû” goes back to the ambiguity of the readings of the Chinese-style notations of the provinces. The reading “Jôshû” in spoken Japanese can namely also refer to Yamashiro province (城州), Kôzuke province (上州), and Hitachi province (常州). This ambiguity of the Japanese language also resulted in colloquial but so-to-speak grammatical incorrect names to refer to certain smiths. For example if one wants to refer to Nagamitsu (永光) and doesn´t want to be confused with the famous Osafune Nagamitsu (長光), he says “Eimitsu” using not the Japanese but the Sino-Japanese reading ei for the character naga (永). The same applies to Norimitsu (法光) who is often referred to as “Hômitsu” or Rai Tomomitsu (来倫光) to as “Rinmitsu.” And the most famous example is probably Chôgi (長義) whose characters are, read Japanese-style “Nagayoshi”, rather ambiguous. So I hope this short discourse on ancient Japanese readings was of interest and if you ever travel back in time, say “Jôshû” and not “Nôshû”. 😉

I dealt with Kotetsu´s career in detail in my Legends and Stories around the Japanese Sword 2 and also presented at the end of this chapter what we know or what is speculated about his scholastic background. Now I wan´t to introduce a blade from his very early years as a swordsmith which can be seen as a strong indication that he was trained by an Echizen-based master. But first and to get familiar with the great Kotetsu, let me quote the essential parts from my aforementioned publication.

Let us begin with the facts or the historic records respectively. The works Ômi-ochiboshi-shû (淡海落穂集), Ômi-kojin-dan (淡海 故事談) and Kobayashi Zui´ô hikki (小林随翁筆記) write that Kotetsu was born in Nagasone (長曽祢) in the vicinity of the castle town Sawayama (佐和山), in Ômi province. This transmission is also followed by the Hikohan narabi Kingô-ôko kikigaki (彦藩並近郷往古聞書) but which goes somewhat more into detail. Therein we read: “According to a transmission, Kotetsu lived until recent years in Nagasone but came originally from the Northern provinces. The time is around the Kanbun era (寛文, 1661-1673).” Interesting is the wording “until recent years” which implies that this work was written not too long after Kotetsu´s death in Enpô six (延宝, 1678). Unfortunately, all those mentioned records are undated. Some sword-related documents were published shortly after Kotetsu’s death. The Arami-mei-zukushi (新身銘尽),for example, was published in the sixth year of Kyôhô (享保, 1721), i.e. 43 years after his death. Therein we find the information: “According to transmission he once lived in Echizen but originally came from the village of Nagasone in Ômi province. Later he moved to Edo.” The author of the Arami-mei-zukushi, which deals exclusively with shintô blades, was Kanda Hakuryûshi Katsuhisa (神田白龍子勝久, 1680-1760). Katsuhisa was a renowned and busy scholar and chronicler who compiled several 20, 30 and 40 volume publications. He was a friend of the 8^th Tokugawa-shôgun Yoshimune, he visited several fiefs for his studies, and talked to many swordsmiths. So it can be safely assumed that his entry in the Arami-mei-zukushi represented the then knowledge on Kotetsu. Kamada Natae (鎌田魚妙) also follows up in his standard work Shintô-bengi (新刀弁疑) from the sixth year of An´ei (安永, 1777) the approach that Kotetsu came originally from Nagasone.

The other, often quoted, approach that Kotetsu came originally from Echizen goes back to extant signatures with the prefix “Hongoku Echizen-jûnin” (本国越前住人). Sword books, like the Honchô-shintô-ichiran (本朝新刀一覧) from the fourth year of Bunsei (文政, 1821) and the Tôken-jitsuyô-ron (刀剣実用論) from Bunsei seven (1824), interpret this prefix wrongly. They confuse namely the term hongoku (本国, “home country/province”) with shōkoku (生国, “country/ province of birth”). In short, hongoku does not necessarily mean that a person was also born in this country but simply that he or she lived or had lived there for a longer period of time. The question is now why Kotetsu signed explicitely with the supplement “Hongoku Echizen,” i.e. “home country/province Echizen”? The most obvious reason would be that Kotetsu considered Echizen as his home country because he had left Nagasone at a very young age. But there might also be another reason. After the Battle of Sekigahara, Ieyasu had entrusted Echizen province to his second son, Yûki Hideyasu (結城秀康, 1574-1607), who made the local Kitanoshô Castle (北ノ庄城) his stronghold and who reverted to the former family name “Matsudaira.” Kitanoshô became Fukui Castle, which also served as a name giver for the surrounding fief. So Fukui was, because of its direct connection with the family of the shôgun, a high ranking fief and smiths like Yasutsugu (康継) were proud to mention in their signatures their relationship with it or their patronage by this Tokugawa branch. And “Echizen” became, for example “Echizen Yasutsugu” (越前康継), an inseparable pseudonym of this master.

The Ômi-kojin-dan writes about the family name “Nagasone”: “The Kotetsu family lived in Nagasone since the time of his great-grandfather and up to Kotetsu all of them used the name of this village ´Nagasone´ as their family name.” The next question which arises is when and why the move to Echizen province took place. A theory says that Kotetsu´s father had supported the troops of Ishida Mitsunari who also came from Ômi. And when he saw that Ishida was going to be defeated at Sekigahara, he fled Nagasone and moved to Echizen to escape eventual punishment by the Tokugawa. Many contemporary swordsmiths shared the same fate. Others assume that Kotetsu´s father had chosen Echizen or rather Kitanoshô Castle because it was, back then, controlled by the Mitsunari-ally Aoki Kazunori (青木一矩, 1541-1600). This means that as he was previously employed by Mitsunari then it would have been easier for him to find a new job with a “sympathiser” of his former lord than trying his luck somewhere else in a hurry. At the same time we can also observe how other Nagasone craftsmen who had made armours, armour parts, swords, tsuba, stirrups (abumi, 鐙) and bridle (kutsuwa, 轡) scattered into the four directions. A metal worker, who signed “Nagasone Masanori Nyûdô Shôsa” (長曽祢当則 入道承佐), for example, made in Kaga´s Daishôji fief (大聖寺藩) tsuba and the swordsmith Nagasone Kawachi no Kami Nagahiro (長曽祢河内守長広) worked in Ôsaka.

Picture 1: wakizashi with the mei “Nagasone Okisato saku” (top) and “Kiyomitsu” (bottom)

Let us return to Kotetsu´s career as a swordsmith. As mentioned in the first volume of the Legends and Stories around the Japanese Sword, the commonly accepted theory says that around the age of 50 he went to Edo to change his profession from that of an armourer to a swordsmith. When we examine all extant blades by Kotetsu we learn that the earliest specimen, i.e. those which are signed with “Okisato” (奥里), have a great deal in common with the tang finish of works by the Kaga smiths like Kiyomitsu (清光) and Yukimitsu (行光). Picture 1 demonstrates this and the peculiar so-called “Kashû-nakago” (加州茎). This gives the impression that he had gained experience as a swordsmith before he moved to Edo and that he maybe was trained by his Kaga relative, the aforementioned Masanori. Well, the exact reasons for Kotetsu´s change of profession are unknown but there exists roughly three approaches. One says that when he faced his 50^th birthday, the demand for newly made armour had drastically dropped. Sekigahara happened 40 years earlier, Ôsaka had fallen more than 30 years ago, and the last great armed conflict – the Shimabara Rebellion from 1637 to 1638 – was at its tenth anniversary. That means there was a generation of active armourers who produced items more or less for parades and celebrations for high-ranking samurai, daimyô and the family of the shôgun or repaired extant pieces. The second approach is that Kotetsu was just looking for a new challenge. And there exists a story which gives another reason for his change of profession.

This story says that he had killed a man from Echizen and was on the run. It is said that the man was a samurai from the Fukui fief who had ordered a sword from Kotetsu. When smith and customer met in the forge to talk about the finishing touches, the samurai examined the amost finished blade and complained: “Do you think I can kill anybody with a piece like this? I don´t like it and it isn´t what I expected!” Kotetsu took back the blade and grumbled: “We will see if my blade can kill anybody …” whilst cutting deeply into the left shoulder of the man. It is said that Kotetsu threw away the bloody blade and hastily abandoned the forge whilst the man died on the ground. He fled to Edo and found a safe shelter with the befriended Inaba family (稲葉). The Inaba eventually arranged for Kotetsu to be able to live and work in the vicinity of the Kan´ei-ji (寛永寺) in Edo´s Ueno district (上野). Whether from remorse or as a disguise, the smith shaved his hair and entered priesthood under the name “Kotetsu.” It is unknown if, or to what extent, this story is true but there exist some blades which do show a local connection. Picture 2 shows a katana which is signed “Jû Tôeizan Shinobigaoka no hotori Nagasone Okisato saku” (住東叡山忍岡辺長曽祢興里作, “made by Nagasone Okisato in the vicinity of Shinobigaoka at the Tôeizan”). “Tôeizan” is another name for the Kan´ei-ji. But the catch is that these blades are dated Kanbun eleven (寛文, 1671) and Enpō two and five (延宝, 1675 and 1677), that means they go back to his late artistic period. The Arami-mei-zukushi mentions “at the Honjo-Warigesui canals” as his place of residence. The Shintô-mondô (新刀問答), published by Wakabayashi Tôsui (若林東水) in Kansei eleven (1799), goes further into detail and writes: “[…] lived at the Honjo-Warigesui canals, later in the vicinity of the Ueno pond Shinobazu no Ike (不忍池) and also in Yushima (湯島).” This means that the story is nice but is probably just an urban legend.

Picture 2: katana, mei “Jû Tôeizan Shinobigaoka no hotori Nagasone Okisato saku – Enpô ninen rokugatsu kichijônichi” (住東叡山忍岡辺長曽祢興里作・延宝二年六月吉祥日, “made by Nagasone Okisato on a lucky day in the sixth month of Enpô two in the vicinity of the Shinobigaoka at the Tôeizan”)

The third approach is about a helmet test which is better known in the sword world. One day Kotetsu, the armourer, competed against the Kaga swordsmith Chôbei Kiyomitsu (長兵衛清光), whose blades were famous for cutting through helmets. The whole competition ended in an official showdown with the presence of lord Maeda Toshitsune. After everything was arranged, Kotetsu stepped forward and put his newly made helmet onto a wooden pedestal. Now it was Kiyomitsu´s turn. Specially for the test he had forged a robust katana measuring 2 shaku 5 sun (~ 75,7 cm) which he brought into the overhead position. As he was at exhaling and cutting down, Kotetsu yelled: “Stop! The helmet is not in its perfect position!” Quickly he approached the pedestal and changed the position of the helmet only marginally. But the intended interruption made an impact. Kiyomitsu´s concentration on the cut was disturbed and so he was “only” able to cut  1 sun (~ 3 cm) into the upper area of the helmet bowl. The swordsmith was perplexed, markedly paler, and feared that his face was lost, even his lord rewarded both of them. Back home in his forge Kotetsu said to his adopted son Okimasa and to his two students Okihisa (興久) and Okinao (興直): “Without this interruption, Kiyomitsu would surely have cut through my helmet. This was a shabby and cowardly action on my behalf! From this day on I will retire as an armourer and devote my future life to the craft of sword forging…” It is said that he left Kanazawa, heading to Edo that very same night. As confirmed later, Kiyomitsu also left Kaga that the same night. This was found out when Okimasa fell in love with a prostitute from Edo´s redlight district Yoshiwara (吉原). This prostitute was namely Kiyomitsu´s daughter who had been sold by her father because the latter was no longer able to work because of fear of failure. Now it was Kotetsu´s turn. He tried everything to make up for his failure and so he went to his then customer, the Ikeda family (池田) from Bizen province, and asked for the unusual high advance payment of 300 ryô. When he informed Mitsumasa (池田光政, 1609-1682), the head of the Ikeda, about the reason of his demand, it is said that the lord was so moved that he granted him the advance. With this money Kotetsu was able to ransom Kiyomitsu´s daughter and marry her to his adopted son Okimasa. As so often, there are several versions of this story going round. In one of them, the competing smith was a certain Shima Hyôe Masatsugu (志摩兵衛正次) but such a name is not found in the records of swordsmiths. Others say it was not Kaga Kiyomitsu but either the 1^st generation Darani Katsukuni (陀羅尼勝国) or the 3^rd generation Kaga Kanemaki (兼巻).

The assumption that Kotetsu changed profession at the age of 50 in Edo goes back to a signature on one of his blades. This mei reads: “Hongoku Echizen-jûnin, hanbyaku ni shitatte Bushû Edo ni kyojū-su, kaji no kôsei o tsukusu nomi” (本国越前住人至半百居住武州之江戸 鍛冶之工精尽爾) which translates as: “After 50 years in my home country Echizen I devote now myself to the craft of sword forging in Edo, Musashi.” Unfortunately, the blade – it is a wakizashi with a nagasa of 45,7 cm and a horimono of the Deva guardians (Niô, 仁王) on both sides – is not dated. But on the basis of comparative studies of other (dated) signatures – especially the interpretations of “Kotetsu” and “Okisato” – we are able to pin down the production date around the second and third year of Kanbun (寛文, 1662~63). If we take the aforementioned first year of Keichō (1596) as his year of birth, we come up with Shôhô three (正保, 1646) for his 50^th birthday. The earliest extant blade by Kotetsu with a date – another wakizashi – is from the second year of Meireki (明暦, 1656). That means now that it took him either eight or nine years until he had finally become a swordsmith in Edo, or that the year Keichô one is not correct for his year of birth. Many experts assume that, as an armourer, he only needed one or two years to start up a new career as a swordsmith. This assumption is also backed by a drawing of a helmet by Kotetsu found in Matsumiya Kanzan´s (松宮観山, 1686-1780) Meikô-zukan zokushû (名甲図鑑続編, see picture 3). According to Kanzan, the helmet bears the following signature: “Meireki-gannen kinoto-mi hachigatsu-hi – Nagasone Okisato – Bushû Edo ni oite kore o saku” (明暦元年乙未八月日・ 長曽祢奥里 ・於武州江戸作之, “made by Nagasone Kotetsu in Edo in Musashi province on a day of the eighth month of Meireki one [1655], year of the sheep”). To summarise we can now say that Kotetsu still made helmets in Edo, in Meireki one, but two years later at the latest he also made swords. Thus, when he left Echizen in 1655 at the age of 50 – i.e. around the time he made the above mentioned helmet – then his year of birth can be calculated as Keichô ten (1605).

Picture 3: Drawing from the Meikô-zukan zokushû.

Anyway, all the extant sources and reference pieces do not allow us more precise statements. But it is highly unlikely that it took him, as fully trained armourer, nine or ten years to forge decent sword blades. On the other hand, the obituary record of the Tôkyô´s Myôkanji (妙観寺) where Kotetsu is buried, which lists Keichō one (1596) as his year of birth, is a circumstancial evidence we can´t brush aside that easily. Maybe the answer lies somewhere in the middle. It is namely possible that he arrived in Edo in the mid 1640´s but continued to work there as an armourer. This is namely backed up by an exact copy of an armour by Kotetsu of which the signature was also copied 1:1. This copy was made by the Edo katchū-shi Asai Katsushige (浅井勝重) and the choice of characters for his name allows us to date the original piece to the first year of Kanbun (1661). That means for at least five years Kotetsu still occasionally made armours while he was already working as a swordsmith.

The next big question is who was his master to become a swordsmith? Let me say straight off: This question too is not entirely solved. Suishinshi Masahide (水心子正秀) assumed that it was the 5^th generation Ise no Daijô Tsunahiro (伊勢大掾綱広, 1616-1683) who also worked in Edo´s Shitaya district (下谷) for a certain time. But, from the point of view of workmanship, we can´t see any connections between the two smiths. The commonly accepted theory is that Kotetsu´s master was the 1^st generation Izumi no Kami Kaneshige (和泉守兼重) who worked in Edo for the Tôdô family (藤堂). Some also say it was Kaneshige´s son, the 2^nd gen. Kazusa no Suke Kaneshige (上総介兼重), but this does not match for chronological reasons because the latter smith was active somewhat later than Kotetsu. The 1^st gen. Kaneshige came originally from Echizen too and his workmanship is quite similar to Kotetsu´s. However, after Kotetsu gained some fame because of the sharpness of his blades, he was employed by the Nukada fief of Hitachi province. Extant records say he worked for this fief from the third year of Manji (万治, 1660) to the second year of Kanbun (1662). After that he was hired by Inaba Masayasu (稲葉正休, 1640-1684), a hatamoto and the daimyô of Mino´s Aono fief (青野藩). He worked for him until Kanbun ten (1670). Masayasu´s uncle Inaba Masafusa (稲葉正房) was, by the way, a retainer of the Fukui fief, so it is possible that this employment was arranged via this connection. But it has to be mentioned that Kotetsu always worked from the Edo residences of his employers.

According to transmission, Kotetsu died on the 24^th day of the sixth month of Enpô six (延宝, 1678), and if Keichō one is correct as his year of birth then he enjoyed a very long life of 82 years. The cause of his death is unclear but some speculate that his exaggregated ambition to forge whenever possible was the result of a psychosis and that he eventually commited suicide by drowning himself in a well in Hirokôji (広小路), in Edo´s Ueno district. But it is possible that the story with the well is a confusion with the swordsmith Inoue Shinkai (井上真改) because, according to transmission, the latter fell completely drunk into a well and died at the young age of 53 in Tenna two (天和, 1682).

Picture 4: wakizashi, mei “Nagasone Okisato – dôsaku kore o horu”

So far the outline of Kotetsu´s career and a brief reference to his possible masters. In terms of interpretation of the jiba, the most obvious similarities can be seen with Izumi no Kami Kaneshige, and early tang finishes suggest a connection to Kaga smiths, but there are many indications pointing towards Fukui, i.e. the capital of Echizen province. And as mentioned at the beginning of this article, I want to present another one, a strong indication that he was trained by an Echizen-based master. This indication is the wakizashi shown in picture 4. It has a nagasa of 55.1 cm and a shallow sori of 0,6 cm, is in shinogi-zukuri with an iori-mune, has a noticeable taper, and a chû-kissaki. It is signed “Nagasone Okisato – dôsaku kore o horu” (長曽祢興里・同作彫之) and from the signature style it can be dated to the Meireki era (明暦, 1655-1658) which means although undated, we have here one of the earliest extant sword blades of Kotetsu. Interesting is on the one hand the very clear jigane and bright habuchi, a feature so typical for him, but far more interesting are on the other hand the horimono. We see on the omote side an engraving of a bamboo and on the ura side of a plum tree. This peculiar combination goes back to Echizen Yasutsugu, or rather to his copy (see picture 5) of the meibutsu Baichiku-Sadamune (梅竹貞宗, lit. “Plum and Bamboo Sadamune”) which was once presented by Tokugawa Ieyasu to Nagasaka Charikurô Nobumasa (長坂茶利九郎信政, ?-1572).

Picture 5: tokubetsu-jûyô, wakizashi, mei “[Aoi-mon] Echizen Yasutsugu” (越前康継) – “Nanban-tetsu o motte Bushû Edo ni oite” (以南蛮鉄於武州江戸, “[forged] in Edo by using nanban-tetsu”) – “Honda Hida no Kami Narishige shoji-nai” (本多飛騨守成重所持内, “owned by Honda Hida no Kami Narishige [1572-1647]”), nagasa 38.6 cm, sori 0.5 cm

Picture 6: Well-known baichiku horimono on an Echizen-mono.

Later on, this utsushimono of master Yasutsugu served his successors and several local, i.e. Echizen-based smiths as model for own but successively more and more similar interpretations of the baichiku horimono sujet with more emphasis on the plum blossoms (see picture 6) which in turn became over time a trademark of Echizen-mono. So in my opinion it is not a coincidence that we find a horimono sujet famous for Echizen blades on a very early blade of Kotetsu It is namely rather unlikely for me that if trained solely by Kaneshige, he added such a horimono just to remind of his Echizen roots and without any scholastic connections to local Echizen smiths. Again, it are mostly such individual pieces which allow us over years and decades to draw bit by bit a clearer picture of the careers of certain smiths.

In my Nihon-shinshinto-shi published least year I also addressed Suishinshi Masahide´s (水心子正秀) acquisition of the Sôshû tradition from the 10^th generation Tsunahiro (綱広). And I also mentioned an extant blade from the eighth month of Kansei three (寛政, 1791) which is signed with the supplement “Kamakura-jûnin Masamune-masson Minamoto Tsunahiro Sôden no kitae” (鎌倉住人正宗末孫源綱広相伝鍛之, “forged in the Sôshû tradition of the Masamune-descendant Tsunahiro from Kamakura”). But there exists even an earlier blade, or to be more precise a blade from the year before, which demonstrates the relationship of Masahide and Tsunahiro. And starting with this blade, I want to go into greater detail of the Tsunahiro connection of Suishinshi Masahide. So let me introduce the blade in question. It is a katana with a nagasa of 70.3 cm and a sori of 1.3 cm. It is in shinogi-zukuri with an iori-mune, shows an ô-itame with plentiful of ji-nie and chikei, and narrow notare-chô along the lower half which turns into a wide and heavily nie-loaden suguha-based mix of ko-notare and gunome with many yubashiri and sunagashi which make the upper half even appearing as kind of sudareba. Also the bôshi is widely tempered, tends almost to ichimai, but shows some roundish kaeri with nie-kuzure. Interesting of course is also the signature which reads on the omote: “Gorô Nyûdô Masamune masson Minamoto Tsunahiro chakuden o motte Masahide kore o saku” (以五郎入道正宗末孫源綱広嫡伝正秀作之, “made by Masahide in the tradition of Gorô Nyûdô Masamune which had been inherited to Minamoto Tsunahiro”). The ura side is dated “Kansei ninen nigatsu hi” (寛政二年二月日, “a day of the second month Kansei two [1790]”) and bears two more names: “Enshû Yokosuka-shin Mitsuhide” (遠州横須賀臣三秀, “Mitsuhide, retainer from Yokosuka of Tôtômi province”), and “Tsunahiro-chaku Ôgitani-jûnin Yamamura Tadasaburô” (綱広嫡扇谷住人山村直三郎, “Yamamura Tadasaburô, heir of Tsunahiro and resident of Ôgitani [in Kamakura]”).

Picture 1: gassaku of Suishinshi Masahide and two of his students

Before we continue, let me introduce the basics of Masahide´s career until he met Tsunahiro (for a detailed biography please refer to my Nihon-shinshinto-shi). Hide was born under the name “Suzuki Saburô” (鈴木三郎)  in the third year of Kan´en (寛延, 1750) in Dewa province and worked there as a village blacksmith. It is said that he had learnt the craft of forging from a certain Yoshizawa Sanjirô (吉沢三次郎) from a village close to his. But Masahide had decided early for himself to become a swordsmith and his first station in this goal was Sendai where he became a student of a later generation Kunikane (国包). His smith name was “Takuei” (宅英) at that time. After this initial training he moved to Hachiôji (八王子), in Musashi province, where he learnt from the local Shitahara master Musashimaru Yoshiteru (武蔵丸吉英) who was in turn a student of Musashi Tarô Yasukuni (武蔵太郎安国). With this master-student relationship he changed his name to “Terukuni” (英国) and was hired by the Akimoto family (秋元), the daimyô of the Yamagata fief (山形藩), in the third year of An´ei (安永, 1774) whereupon he changed his name again, namely from “Terukuni” to “Masahide”, and his entire civilian name to “Kawabe Gihachirô” (川部儀八郎). With his employment at the Yamagata fief he was able in terms of money to travel further and further, to take lessons in the Bizen tradition at the Ishidô school (石堂) and as mentioned in the Sôshû tradition under the 10^th generation Tsunahiro.

Picture 2: seishi of Masahide addressed to Yamamura Uhei

The start of master-student relationship to Tsunahiro can be narrowed down to the first year of Kansei (寛政, 1789) because there is a written oath (seishi, 誓詞) extant (picture 2) within the Yamamura family (i.e. the family of the Tsunahiro lineage) which is dated third day tenth month Kansei one and which contains Masahide´s will to learn the Sôshû tradition from Yamamura Uhei (山村宇兵衛), i.e. from the 10^th generation Tsunahiro. So Masahide was already 39 years old when he visited the forge of Tsunahiro. That means he was already a fully trained smith by then working for the Akimoto family for about 15 years so his turning up at the forge of Tsunahiro has to be understood as a refinement of his craft. When we take a look at the aforementioned blade, we see at a glance that he had mastered the Sôshû tradition within a year because it is truly interpreted in the magnificently “relaxed” but daring style of the great Sôshû masters. And on the basis of the quality of the work and the production time it is safe to assume that Tsunahiro had initiated Masahide to all family secrets just as if he was his son and heir. Interesting are also the other two names appearing on the tang, Mitsuhide and Yamamura Tadasaburô. The 10^th generation Tsunahiro died the very next year, i.e. in Kansei three (1791), and both Mitsuhide and Tsunahiro´s heir Tadasaburô appear later on the list of Masahide´s students. So it is likely that Masahide took care of Tsunahiro´s son and some of his students after the death of the master. Incidentally, Mitsuhide changed his name later to “Kuniyasu” (国安).

Picture 3: gassaku-katana of Masahide and the 11^th generation Tsunahiro

Eight years after this joint work, Masahide worked once again with Tadasaburô on a blade. The latter had already succeeded as 11^th generation Tsunahiro. The blade in question (picture 3) is dated “Kansei jûnen nigatsu hi” (寛政十年二月日, “a day of the second month Kansei ten [1798]”) and is signed “Suishinshi Masahide + kaô” on the ura, and “Tôdaijô no kenkô Minamoto Tsunahiro” (東大城之剣工源綱広) on the omote side. The katana has a nagasa of 72.7 cm and a sori of 1.8 cm. It is in shinogi-zukuri with a mitsu-mune and shows a standing-out itame mixed with mokume, thick chikei, and plentiful of ji-nie. The hamon is based on a heavily nie-loaden shallow notare-chô mixed with ô-gunome along the monouchi and apart from that with nie-kuzure, hotsure, kinsuji, sunagashi, yubashiri, tobiyaki, and muneyaki. The bôshi is a rather narrow and slightly undulating sugu-bôshi. So we can see at a glance a straightforward Sôshû-deki.  Interesting is also the prefix of Tsunahiro´s signature. “Tôdaijô no kenkô” means literally “Swordsmiths from the Great Castle in the East”. The castle refers of course to Edo Castle and from the syntax experts assume that this unique term refers to a bakufu employment. Well, the Tsunahiro lineage does not appear in the bakufu records of employed swordsmiths like Yasutsugu (康継), Korekazu (是一), or Hôjôji Kunimasa (法城寺国正) but the aforementioned present-day Yamamura family is also in the possession of records which proof that their predecessors made during the bakumatsu era swords on orders of the koshimono-bugyô (腰物奉行), the bakufu magistrate responsible for everything sword-related. These documents also show that the family had an Edo-mansion granted by the bakufu so everything points towards an official employment by the Tokugawa shogunate even if the contemporary official records lack their name. So the blade in question is also an important reference for the bakumatsu-era employment conditions of the Tsunahiro lineage. Anyway, it was a great honor for a smith to receive orders by the bakufu and so with some imagination it is possible that the following took place.

After acting as head of the school and family for eight years, the 11^th generation Tsunahiro had finally made himself a name in Edo and was thus informed about the bakufu´s intention to employ him. To celebrate this recognition, he visited once again his former master Suishinshi Masahide who also took care of him after his fathers death to make a special blade which reminds of their connection. And Masahide of course agreed to that because he also owed a lot to the Yamamura family as Tadasaburô Tsunahiro´s father introduced him to the Sôshû tradition, an act which helped him a lot in his professional development of the fukkotô movement. Please note that unlike the Kansei two blade, Masahiro switched here to the ura side of the nakago to place his signature. This shows his respect towards Tsunahiro as being the leading artist of this “project.” And again it is interesting to see what vivid picture of a certain phase of a swordsmith´s career we can draw just on the basis of two swords and their signatures.

By a recent inquiry of a collector I came across a blade´s nickname that had given me a little headache a time ago in another context. This other context was a blade by Kotetsu (虎徹) I introduced in my Kantei volumes (No 237.621, Shinto & Shinshintô-kantei pages 124-125; Shintô & Shinshintô-kantei zenshû pages 198-199) (see picture 1). The mei of the blade reads: “Dôsaku horu kore (同作彫之) – Nagasone Kotetsu Nyûdô Okisato” (長曽祢虎徹入道興里), and the kinzôgan-mei: “Konkaidan (坤皆断) mitsu-dô, futatsu-dô setsudan no sono hoka shosho muichifu tameshi no yue gô Konkaidan” (三ツ胴二ツ胴截断之其外処々無一不試之故号坤皆断, “because of the cutting test where the blade cutted through two, three bodies and also because it never failed, it shall be named ´Konkaidan´”) – “Yamano Ka´emon no Jô Nagahisa + kaô” (山野加右衛門尉永久).

Picture 1: katana by Kotetsu, nagasa 71.2 cm, sori 1.2 cm

Konkaidan is, as mentioned in my Kantei volumes, a term from the divination system of the I-Ching, and after sending an inquiry to Japan, I was told that the konkaidan trigram also stands for the Dainichi-nyorai (大日如来), the Vairocana Buddha. Well, I was not that satisfied with that because of the lack of connection. A reference to the Vairocana Buddha alone would have been ok for me but the wording of the tameshi-mei “because of the cutting test … it shall be named ´Konkaidan´” made me doubt as if there is a better explanation. Now the Kantei volumes had to come to an end but this inscription preyed upon my mind. And some months later, it fell like scales from my eyes when browing through my Kantei volumes on the search for a certain blade by Kotetsu´s successor Okimasa (興正). The nickname of the blade has not so much to do with the Vairocana Buddha and the konkaidan trigram, or to be more precise the kon trigram (坤), has to be taken “literally” as a symbol. As seen in picture 2 it is composed of three broken lines which just look like three severed bodies positioned atop of each other for a cutting test! So the nickname of the blade Konkaidan translates roughly as “cut through three bodies like the kon trigram.”

Picture 2: The kon trigram and three bodies positioned at the dotanbarai.

The second blade I addressed was shortened to a wakizashi. It shows a flamboyant Bizen-style hamon with utsuri and has old tokubetsu-kichô papers to Heki Mitsuhira (日置光平), although the midare-komi bôshi and the workmanship in general made me and the owner of the blade also think that it might be a work of Tatara Nagayuki (多々良長幸). Anyway, the shortened nakago was inlayed with the nickname Konkaidan and interesting is, that this wakizashi comes with a habaki onto which the kon trigram is engraved (partly visible in picture 3).

Picture 3: The nakago of the supposed Mitsuhira wakizashi with the kinzôgan-mei “Konkaidan”

Picture 4: Flamboyant hamon of the supposed Mitsuhira wakizashi, nagasa 54.0 cm, sori 2.0 cm

So much for the supplements to the kinzôgan-mei “Konkaidan.” Now I want to introduce some more nicknames of swords which go more or less back to their cutting abilities, namely such nicknames which do not necessarily refer to the cutting ability of a single special blade but which are more “general” and thus might also be found inlayed on more than one blade.

Asaarashi (朝嵐): Asaarashi means literally “morning storm” and refers to strong storms in the morning which make it impossible for fresh snow to remain on mountain peaks. But it can also refer to a heavy storm which makes you slip and fall from a wintery mountain, so we have here basically the same allusion as the nickname → Sasanoyuki.

Daiyagawa (大谷川) → Taki no mizu (滝之水)

Funabashi (船橋) → Tanahashi (棚橋)

Fusenaikyô (無布施経・布施無経): This term means literally “no offering at Sutra reading” and refers to the practice that monks usually received offerings (fuse, 布施) when paying a visit and reading Sutras. But sometimes the parishioners did not give any offerings and in such a case the monks so to speak showed up without their kesa robe, almost in the sense of “no money, no honey.” In sword terms, fusenaikyô just means to perform a kesa-kiri (袈裟斬り), i.e. a cut diagonally over the chest following theoretically the seam of a monks kesa robe. So, a saying among monks developed from this context, which was: “Take off your kesa when going to read Sutras with no offerings” (fusenai-kyô ni kesa-otosu, 布施ない経に袈裟落す), and with this context, the nickname in the context of swords could also mean: “Here, I take the kesa off for you with my sword!” For example, there is supposedly a blade by the Kan´ei-era (寛永, 1624-1644) Owari smith Ujikumo (氏雲), and one by the Osafune Sanenaga (真長) bearing the nickname Fusenaikyô.

Gibôshi-fusetsu no todomarazu (擬法珠風雪不溜): “Snow does not accumulate on a gibôshi.” A gibôshi is the onion-shaped ornament on a bridges handrail and so this nickname refers to a blade so sharp that it cuts through an object as easily as a snow slides from such a gibôshi.

Hachimonji (八文字): This nickname goes back to a legend which says that Satake Yoshishige (佐竹義重, 1547-1612) cut with his Chôgi blade (長義) in the tenth year of Eiroku (永禄, 1567) in a battle a mounted enemy into halves. Because the blow went through the helmet down to the saddle, both body halves slided down to the left and right of the horse. This “sliding” resembled the character (monji, 文字) for “eight” (hachi, 八) and this is why the blade got its nickname “Hachimonji.”

Picture 5: The meibutsu Hachimonji-Chôgi, nagasa 78.5 cm, sori 2.1 cm

Hatchô-Nenbutsu-dango-zashi (八丁念仏団子刺し): There is the legend about Suzuki Magoichi (鈴木孫一, 1534-1589) who cut with his sword at a monk but who kept reciting the nenbutsu and walked away from the scene as if nothing happened. Magoichi was so perplexed and wondered about the sharpness of his sword so that he stabbed angrily on the ground several times. After he had calmed down he looked down at his sword which had skewered stones (sashi/zashi, 刺し) like dumplings (dango, 団子). Then he followed the tracks of the monk and found him dead, cut intwo two halves, at a distance of eight chô (hatchô, 八丁 ~ 870 m). Thus he nicknamed his blade by Bizen Yukiie (行家) Hatchô-Nenbutsu-dango-zashi, about “if you cut somebody with this blade, the person doesn´t notice it because of the sharpness and can still make eight chô, and apart from that, you can skewer stones with it like dumplings.”

Jigokuzue (地獄杖): This term means literally “hell cane.” It is found for example as kinzôgan-mei on a Bungo-Takada blade and stands for the sword in general, i.e. the sword being a “cane” which sends you to hell.

Kagotsurube (籠釣瓶): This term is found on quite many blades. It means “woven bamboo basket (kago, 籠) as sinking bucket (tsuruba, 釣瓶).” A woven bamboo basket can´t hold water of course and as easy the water leaks out from such a basket, as easy cuts a blade with that nickname. An about identical nickname is Kotsurube (古釣瓶), i.e. a lit. “old basket” which can´t hold water. It is found as kinzôgan-mei on a wakizashi by Osafune Motoshige (元重) which was once a heirloom of the Tsuyama-Matsudaira family (津山松平).

Picture 6: katana by No-Sada with the kinzôgan-mei “Gô Kagotsurube” (号笭釣瓶), nagasa 66.8 cm, sori 1.7 cm. Please note that a different character for “Kago” was used for this inscription.

Kokesa (古袈裟): This name has basically two meanings. One alludes again to the kesa cut and the other one goes back to the symbolism of a very old kesa robe, i.e. a ko-kesa, which tears by itself and without any further force, quasi cutting through something so easily as if doesn´t need any extra force to do so. There is a blade by the Sue-Seki smith Kanemine (兼峯) which bears the ginzôgan-mei “Kokesa” (古けさ). A similar nickname is → Yaregoromo.

Kotsurube (古釣瓶) → Kagotsurube (籠釣瓶)

Kusarinawa (腐り縄・クサリナワ): Kusarinawa means literally “rotten straw rope.” This nickname is found as kinzôgan-mei and in katakana syllables on an Aoe blade and refers like → Kokesa to an easily tearing rope, i.e. in the figurative sense to a very sharp blade which cuts through things easily.

Matsukaze (松風): This nickname is used for a sword which cuts through things as if nothing had happened, just making the sound of the wind soughing through pine trees. The kinzôgan-mei “Matsukaze” is for example found on a blade of the Sue-kotô Sakakura-Seki smith Masatoshi (酒倉正利).

Michishiba no tsuyu (道芝の露) → Sasanoyuki (笹雪・篠雪)

Odoributsu (踊仏): Literally “dancing Buddha”, this term alludes to Buddha or a monk starting to dance and taking off the kesa from the shoulder. So again we have here a reference to the kesa cut. This nickname is found for example on a katana by Etchû no Kami Masatoshi (越中守正俊).

Oni-Hôchô (鬼包丁): A wakizashi in kata-shinogi-zukuri – a shape where one side is in shinogi-zukuri and the other one in hira-zukuri – by Hata Mitsuyo (秦光代) with a nagasa of 42,4 cm was the favourite sword of the famous Shinkage-ryû (新陰流) swordsman Yagyû Ren´ya Yoshikane (柳生連也厳包, 1625-1694). When Ren´ya was surprised one night by an assassin, he drew this short sword and killed his opponent with one single blow. Due to this incident, the blade received the nickname “Oni-Hôchô” (鬼包丁), lit “devil´s kitchen knife.” The peculiar shape was copied later by other smiths too whereas the nickname “Oni-Hôchô” was kept for such blades.

Picture7: Oni-Hôchô-style blade attributed to Hata Mitsuyo, nagasa 62.2 cm, sori 0.7 cm

Sasanoyuki (笹雪・篠雪): Literally “snow on a bamboo leaf,” this term alludes to no force needed to cut with such a blade just like snow slips from a bamboo leaf without further ado when too heavy. A similar nickname is Michishiba no tsuyu (道芝の露). It alludes to the dew (tsuyu, 道露) on roadside grass (michishiba, 道芝) which also slips from the leaves without any further ado. This rather uncommon name was used for a blade of Kimura Shigenari (木村重成, 1593-1615) who fought an all-out battle at the Siege of Ôsaka but was caught and beheaded. And the same allusion is used by the nickname Take no ha no arare (竹葉霰・竹の葉のあられ), lit. “hail slipping from bamboo leaves.”

Sotto-hasamibako (ソット挟箱): This nickname is found for example as inscription on a blade by Kanefusa (兼房). It refers to a certain storage box (hasamibako, 挟箱) for spare clothes worn by a servant via a stick over the shoulder. At this certain form of such a box, clothes were pinched between two bamboo sticks and carried over the shoulder to let them dry. But they sometimes fell down, silently and unnoticed (sotto, ソット) as the weight did not much decrease and not making any noise when hitting the ground. So a sword nicknamed that way is so sharp that the enemy doesn´t even notice that he had been hit.

Take no ha no arare (竹葉霰・竹の葉のあられ) → Sasanoyuki (笹雪・篠雪)

Taki no mizu (滝之水): Nickname for a blade which is so sharp that a severed body part falls off like the water (mizu, 水) of a waterfall (taki, 滝). A blade by the Kan´ei-era (寛永, 1624-1644) Owari smith Bungo no Kami Masamitsu (豊後守正全) is named that way. A nickname with the same meaning is Daiyagawa (大谷川). It refers to Kegon Falls (華厳滝) along the Daiyagawa in the Nikkô National Park.

Tanahashi (棚橋): A tanahashi is a bridge without any railing, i.e. a bridge from which one can fall from easily. The Yamano family used this term to mark a very sharp blade, for example found as kinzôgan-mei on a blade of Yamato no Kami Yasusada (大和守安定). A similar term is Funabashi (船橋), a “bridge” made out of aligned boats. Crossing a river via aligned and moving boats without any railings is of course dangerous and one can slip easily. The nickname Funabashi is for example found on a blade by Tanba no Kami Yoshimichi (丹波守吉道).

Tôrinuke (通抜): This term means as verb torinukeru (通り抜ける) “to cut through, to go through,” i.e. it refers to a sharp sword which cuts through things easily.

Unomi (鵜呑): A sword which cuts through things as easy and fast as a cormorand (u, 鵜) swallows (nomi, 呑) fish. A blade by Hachiya Kanesada (蜂屋兼貞) for example bears this nickname.

Yaregoromo (弊衣・破衣): The term means “worn out clothes”, i.e. so worn out and thin that they tear easily. It is said that Tokugawa Mitsukuni (徳川光圀, 1628-1701) nicknamed his blade by Onizuka Yoshikuni (鬼塚吉国) that way when punishing a dissolute priest with it. That means the sharp blade cut so easily through the poor monk like worn out clothes tear apart. Another nickname with the same meaning is Yareginu (破絹), lit. “worn out silk.” It is found on a blade by Harima no Kami Teruhiro (播磨守輝広).

Yume no aida (夢の間): This term means “as in a dream” or “like dreaming.” It is found for example on a blade by Suishinshi Masahide (水心子正秀) which with a wakige (脇下) test cut through the armpits went through the body as if nothing had happened, i.e. just like everything was a dream.

In the course of my research on the more unknown schools, I want to introduce this time the Kaimoto smiths (甲斐本) of Bungo province. First of all, let´s address the name of the group. It goes back to an area of the same name in Nakao (中尾). Nakao in turn is located about 3 km to the southwest of the city of Bungo-Ôno (豊後大野市) and about 30 km to the south of the city of Ôita (大分市) and at the limits of the village of Nakao, there are still the graves of the Kaimoto smiths extant. The i in “Kaimoto” is usually not pronounced, i.e. with kay like in okay but with a longer “a” and not stressing the “y”. Older topographies transcribe the area also as “Kehinomoto” (ケヒノモト) and write the name with the characters (賀井本), or (賀井ノ本) respectively when the particle no was noted too.

Picture 1: The red dot marks Nakao/Kaimoto (© 2014, Google, ZENRIN)

We don´t know exactly when smiths started to forge swords in the Kaimoto neighborhood but it is assumed that this was at the latest in the Sengoku period. The earliest written reference we have today is on a document with a joint signature of five magistrates (bugyô, 奉行) of the Ôtomo family (大友) from Eiroku five (永禄, 1562). From this document we learn that the Ôtomo provided the Kaimoto smiths from within Bungo´s Mie district (三重郷) with charcoal and iron and paid them a salary of 50 koku. Also we have genealogic informations on the group or rather family compiled by the 6^th Kaimoto-generation Yukihisa (行久). Therein he states that the ancestor of the family was a certain Magoshirô Yukinaga (孫四郎行長) and the actual founder of the school his successor Matazaemon Yukinaga (又左衛門行長). Yukihisa states that the Kaimoto smiths were employed like the Takada smiths (高田) by the Ôtomo family and that they received initially a salary of 50 koku what matches with the bugyô document. But further he writes that when their lord Ôtomo Yoshishige (大友義鎮, 1530-1587), aka Sôrin (宗麟), retired and moved to Usuki Castle (臼杵城) in Tenshô four (1576), the salary was reduced to 10 koku. This is insofar interesting as it shows that the Kaimoto smiths played a more important role for the earlier Ôtomo campaigns, e.g. against the Kikuchi (菊池), Ryûzôji (龍造寺), and Môri (毛利) and until about the time Yoshishige was appointed shugo governor of Buzen and Chikuzen province and Kyûshû-tandai (九州探題) in Eiroku two (1559), compared to the later fightings against the Shimazu family (島津) and their fighting for Hideyoshi in the course of his Kyûshû Campaign in Tenshô 15 (1587). It surely also played a role that Yoshishige´s son Yoshimune (大友義統, 1558-1610) was accused by Hideyoshi in Bunroku two (文禄, 1593) of deserting under enemy fire in Korea and lost so all Bungo domains, a measure which basically sounded the bell for the end of the Ôtomo family.

After Yoshimune was removed by Hideyoshi, the lands of Usuki, i.e. where Kaimoto was located, were given to his retainer Ôta Kazuyoshi (太田一吉, ?-1617). But Ôta sided with Ishida Mitsunari at Sekigahara and so his lands were again confiscated and transferred by Ieyasu to Inaba Sadamichi (稲葉貞通, 1546-1603) as he changed sides in favor of the Eastern Army during the battle. And the Inaba family held the Usuki fief (臼杵藩) until the abolition of the feudal system. Back to the Kaimoto smiths. We know from fief records from Keian four (慶安, 1651) that the Kaimoto smith Matazaemon (又左衛門) received still the salary of 10 koku and that the family was treated like with the same social status as that of a village head, whatever that means. It is assumed that this entry refers to the same sixth Kaimoto-generation Yukihisa who made the aforementioned copy of the families genealogy. So if this is correct than the meikan must be corrected because they date Yukihisa around Tenshô (天正, 1573-1592). Then we find an entry from Kyôhô eleven (享保, 1726) which states that the Kaimoto smith Sôzaemon (惣左衛門) is “doing a good job”, lit. “saiku mo yoroshiku tsukamatsuri-sôrô” (細工も宜く仕り候). But Kyôhô eleven seems too late for Kaimoto Toyoyuki (豊行) who was the one who bore the first name “Sôzaemon.” From another document we learn that the family was granted the status of o-memie (御目見), i.e. qualified to meet with the shôgun, in Hôreki nine (宝暦, 1759) what meant usually samurai status. But then for Kansei eleven (寛政, 1799) we read that the Kaimoto smith Ka´emon (嘉右衛門) couldn´t cope with the fief´s demands in him as a craftsman – lit. “shokubun-fushussei” (職分不出精) – and that so the status of o-memie was again withdrewn. After that time, i.e. entering the late Edo period, we loose track of the Kaimoto smiths. However, a document from the Usuki fief from Bunsei three (文政, 1820) in which several local merchants ask their government for the permission to have a bridge erected on their own costs mentions the name “Kaimoto Gensuke” (甲斐源助) as being as tea dealer (chaya, 茶屋) one of the petitioners.

A nice wakizashi of Toyoyuki with some utsuri can be seen here.

Picture 2: wakizashi, mei: “Toyoyuki” (豊行).

Picture 3: Signature comparison of the two Toyoyuki wakizashi.

So that was basically the history of the Kaimoto smiths and as a reference, I want to present a genealogy which bases largely on the information provided by Yukihisa but which was enlarged by other available data. But it must be mentioned that there is some confusion with the Bungo smiths, especially around the transition from kotô to shintô. For example there are several smiths from the Kaimoto and Takada group using the same name and in the meikan some shinshintô smiths pop up which are supposedly sons or students of the early shintô smiths. Also a question raises the naginata of the supposed 7^th Kaimoto-generation Yukiie which is dated Kan´ei two (寛永, 1625) and which is today an important cultural object of Ôita City. To be more precise, when the 2^nd Kaimoto-generation Yukinaga died in Jôô one (承応, 1652) as a transmission says, that how can the 7^th generation be active at about the same time or even a bit earlier? The information provided by Ôita City says further that Yukiie, the maker of the naginata, was the son of Yukihisa what matches with the genealogy, but also that he was the younger brother of a Yukinaga.

 KaimotoGenealogy

Apart from that, Yamada Masato (山田正任) presents in his 1974 publication Zusetsu Bungo-tô (図説豊後刀, p. 414) a blade signed “Bungo no Kuni Mie-jû Fujiwara Yukinaga” (豊後国三重住藤原行長) dated Keichô 13 (慶長, 1608). So one of the Yukinaga did not only sign with “Kaimoto-jû” but also with “Mie-jû”, i.e. with the district or larger area instead of the local neighborhood. Well, the naginata of Yukinaga which is signed with “Kaimoto” (without “jû”) and which is dated Keichô 16 (1611) presented by Yamada on page 349 seems to go back to a different Yukinaga, at least this is what the noticeable differences in signature style, in particular in the characters for “Yuki” (行), suggest (see pictures 4 and 5).

Picture 4, signature comparison: Yukinaga naginata from 1611 left, Yukinaga katana from 1608 right.

Picture 5: Line-up of the differing characters in question.

My conclusion is that the Kaimoto genealogy provided by Yukihisa is sound as long as it is “enjoyed” by itself. As soon as we add data from outside, like for example extant date signatures and the genealogies of the Takada smiths, problems occur. I think that the Kaimoto smiths were surely working for the Ôtomo in late Muromachi times and that they were still pretty active in the Keichô era, i.e. right after Sekigahara. But with the establishment of the han system, the shifting of all major industries to the castle towns, and the general decreasing demand for swords, there was probably no longer much to do for a family of swordsmiths deep inside rural Bungo province. On the other hand, the chronicles of the Usuki fief still refer much later to certain Kaimoto smiths, so there must had been something going on. But maybe by then the Kaimoto smiths were already working from the fief´s capital, the coastal town of Usuki of the same name.

Let me introduce a kozuka of the great Tsuchiya Yasuchika (土屋安親) which does not look so spectacular at a glance. First the technical terms. It is of suaka and with shibuichi and shakudô hira-zôgan and measures 10 cm in length. It is signed via a kinzôgan seal which reads “Tô´u” (東雨), so we learn that we are facing a work from his later years. The kozuka depicts or rather represents a famous tea scoop container (chashaku-zutsu, 茶杓筒) made by Kobori Enshû (小堀遠州, 1579-1647).

Picture 1: Kobori Enshû (left), Shôkadô Shôjô (right)

You may already be familiar with Kobori Enshû, the famous aristocratic tea master and “allround artist” who developed his own style of the tea ceremony and who taught among others the third Tokugawa-shôgun Iemitsu (徳川家光, 1623-1651) the ways of the sadô (茶道). One day, Enshû received a gift of Shôkadô Shôjô (松花堂昭乗, 1584-1639) in the form of a hanging scroll. The Buddhist monk Shôjô was a master of the tea ceremony too who became also famous as calligrapher as one of the “Three Brushes of the Kan´ei Era” (Kan´ei-sanpitsu, 寛永三筆). As a return gift, Enshû presented him a self-made tea scoop container with the nickname aogoke (青苔, “green moss,” sometimes also quoted as seitai). This nickname is a reference to the 78^th chapter of the Ise-monogatari (伊勢物語) in which the court noble Fujiwara no Tsuneyuki (藤原常行, 836-875) is on his way back from a memorial service and stops at Prince Saneyasu´s (人康親王, 831-782) residence in Yamashina (山科) to the north of Kyôto. The prince entertained Tsuneyuki and so he gave him as a gift a beautiful rock from Chisato Beach (千里の浜) of Kii province which was once intended to be a present for Tsuneyuki´s father but did not arrive in time for the festivities. But although beautiful, just a rock would not be adequate as a present for a prince and so Tsuneyuki scaped away the green moss from the surface until characters in the form of a poem remained. The Ise-monogatari speaks of “scraped away the green moss from the rock until … the words stood out like the raised design of a makie lacquerware.” The poem goes:

あかねども岩にぞかふる色見えぬ心をみせむよしのなければ
Akane domo iwa ni zo kafuru iro mienu kokoro o misemu yoshi no nakareba.
“Inadequate though it be, this rock must represent those feelings that 
by their nature have no color to arrest the eye and thus cannot be made 
visible.”

So this receiving and returning of gifts must had reminded Enshû of Tsuneyuki and the prince and when he made the tea scoop container for Shôjô he added an inscription which is an allusion to the above mentioned poem:

伊勢物語尓ハあをきこけ越き佐三てとありたけをき佐みてお可しくあかねとも竹尓曽可ふる色三えぬ
古々ろをみせむよしのなければ
Ise-monogatari ni wa aoki-koke o kizamite to ari, take o kizamite 
okashiku, akane domo take ni zo kafuru iro mienu kokoro o misemu yoshi 
no nakareba.
“The Ise-monogatari tells of an inscription in the form of green moss 
of which I was thinking carving this bamboo. Inadequate though it be, 
this bamboo must represent those feelings that by their nature have no 
color to arrest the eye and thus cannot be made visible.”

Picture 2: chashaku-zutsu kozuka of Yasuchika, in´mei “Tô´u” (東雨)

Yasuchika now took Enshû´s tea scoop container and turned it – with a certain artistic freedom – into a kozuka. He also added Enshû´s inscriptions via a shakudô hira-zôgan on the back and front and also copied the worm damage of the front. The inscription on the front reads: “Takimotobô, chashaku, Sôhoshi” (瀧本坊・茶杓・宗甫子). The Takimotobô was the temple of which Shôkadô Shôjô was the chief priest and “Sôhoshi” (mostly without “-shi”) was a pseudonym of Kobori Enshû. Please note that the original tea spoon container of Enshû seems to bear a slightly inscription, namely “Takimoto onbô” (瀧本御坊, “monk Takimoto”). The chashaku-zutsu is owned by the Hatakeyama Memorial Museum of Fine Art and a picture can be seen here. Yasuchika´s adaption is very tasteful and has the typical more calm and introverted approach of his later years. There is no other kozuka of him known representing a tea spoon container and so it is possible that it was made on request and/or it was maybe a return gift for somebody?

Picture 3: Bodhidharma kozuka of Yasuchika, mei: “Yasuchika” (安親)

As comparison, I would like to introduce a kozuka from Yasuchika´s earlier years. It is of shakudô with a nanako ground and depicts the Bodhidharma in his form as great teacher. The inscription reads: “Ma iwaku – mu-kudoku” (磨曰・無功徳), “Daruma said: No merits.” This line refers to an encounter of the Chinese Emperor Wû of Líang (梁武帝, 464-549), who was a fervent patron of Buddhism, with Bodhidharma whom he didn´t know yet: Emperor Wû asks Bodhidharma how much karmic merit he has yet earned by doing so much for Buddhism and Bodhidharma replied: “No merits. Good deeds done with wordly intent bring good karma, but no merit.” Upon this Emperor Wû asks: “So what is the highest meaning of noble truth of Buddhist wisdom?” And Bodhidharma replies again: “There is no noble truth, there is only emptiness.” Then Emperor Wû wonders and asks: “Then, who is standing before me?”, and Bodhidharma finally replies: “I don´t know.” This kozuka takes the viewer into the position of Emperor Wû, being confronted with the enlightened teacher Bodhidharma, whose at a glance incomprehensible answers make one to rethink his approach so far. And with quoting explicitly the line “No merits”, the kozuka reminds the viewer of doing good things but in an unselfish manner.

Between two sword club meetings with main focus on the Rai school,  I thought I do some research to provide some background on the origins of the school as I am unfortunately unable to provide some Rai blades for appreciation. We known that the Rai school originated in Kyôto, Yamashiro province, somewhere in the mid-Kamakura period, and that in terms of workmanship it is probably linked to the Awataguchi school. These are the facts we have about the school´s origins, now to the theories. Most old relevant sources quote Kuniyoshi (国吉) as founder of the Rai school and the Kanchin´in-bon mei-zukushi (観智院本銘尽) from Ôei 30 (応永, 1423), the oldest extant sword document, states that Kuniyoshi was a Korean smith who had immigrated, or who had came to Japan, and sees the origins of the school´s name in the term raigoku (来国). Raigoku means namely literally “came to [our] country” and so the first character was adopted as name of the school and the second character, koku/goku or in its Japanese reading kuni, was adopted as tôri-ji (通字), as distinctive character used in the names of all people belonging to a single clan or school. So raigoku extended by another character became “Rai Kuni-X”, e.g. “Rai Kuniyoshi” (来国吉). This theory, i.e. that Kuniyoshi was from Korea and had immigrated to Japan where he founded the Rai school, is also found amongst Fukunaga Suiken´s (福永酔剣) seven theories on the Rai school´s character “Rai” forwarded in his publication Nihontô-daihyakka-jiten (日本刀大百科事典). Two more of these seven theories are pretty similar, namely one says that the Rai school´s ancestor – no concrete name is mentioned, just “ancestor” – came from Korea, and one says that Kuniyoshi´s ancestor was from Táng China (唐, 618-907). So these two theories too go with the assumption that the school´s use of the character “Rai” goes back to an earlier immigration. Another, similar theory from the seven says that Kuniyoshi´s supposed son Kuniyuki (国行) was a copper craftsmen from another country (no specification here) who came to Japan, and because his skills were of use for the country, he was granted with the family name “Rai” by the court. This practice was pretty common and we can confirm from historic sources that several Korean immigrants were naturalized by the court and received family names.

Another theory of the seven says that “Rai” (来) was an abbreviation of the Korean family name “Rae.” This name is written with the left-hand radical (阝) and the old variant of “Rai” (來), but as this character is not available in modern charset, I have to quote it as (阝來). Reading of this theory, I immediately remembered a tantô which had been a confusing jigsaw piece in explaining the origins of the Rai school for now half a century. The tantô in question (see picture 1) was once owned by Mr. Asabuki (朝吹). It is dated “Bunji ninen nigatsu ?-nichi” (文治二年二月？日, “? day of second month Bunji two [1186]”) and its signature is mostly quoted as “Rai Sama no Jô Minamoto Kuniyori” (徠左馬尉源国頼). Already Dr. Honma writes in his Nihon-kotô-shi that it is possible that the Rai connection of this tantô goes back to an erroneous transcription of the character “Chin/Jin” (陳). So according to Honma, “Chin/Jin” (陳) became “Rai” (徠). But with Fukunaga´s forwarding of the theory with the Korean family name “Rae” in mind, maybe the tantô is not signed with “Chin/Jin” but with “Rae” (阝來)? So the chronicler was just wrong with the left radical, i.e. (彳) compared to (阝), instead of getting the entire character wrong, i.e. (徠) compared to (陳). The problem is that the first character of the signature is hardly legible. But who was this Kuniyori? His name does not appear in the old sword documents and it seems that he slipped into the meikan just towards the beginning of the Edo period. The Kokon-mei-zukushi (古今名尽) quotes him as ancestor of the Awataguchi school but says that he was not a swordsmith and that he lived in Yamato province. He is followed in the genealogy in question by his son Kuniie (国家) who in turn is listed with the comment “he was the first who carried out the profession of a swordsmith” and that he was a descendant from Yamato´s Kôfukuji (興福寺), although it doesn´t say in which context this “descent” has to be understood. Anyway, the aforementioned tantô shows typical Awataguchi characteristics, i.e. a nashiji-hada, beautiful ji-nie, a nie-loaden chû-suguha, and an ô-maru-bôshi. And because of this typical Awataguchi deki, the inscription was brushed aside as not showing the characteri “Rai” (徠) but “Chin/Jin” (陳). But with the Korean family name “Rae” (阝來) as a possibility, we might come back to a direct Awataguchi-Rai connection. However, Kuniyoshi and his son Kuniyuki (国行), who are today considered as actual founders of the Rai school, were active about 70 or 80 years later than this tantô was made. Honma also mentions another Kuniyori tantô dated Gennin one (元仁, 1224) but he is doubtful of the authenticity of the signature. I haven´t seen any oshigata or pictures of this tantô yet and he also doesn´t go into detail regarding its workmanship. Incidentally, the Kokon-mei-zukushi says in another context that the Awataguchi-ancestor Kuniyori was active around Kôji (康治, 1142-1144). So all these speculations might lead – with a little phantasy – to a new theory, namely that maybe both the Awataguchi and the Rai school had their origins in Korea or in a smith whose ancestors had immigrated from Korea?

Picture 1: tantô, mei “Rai? Sama no Jô Minamoto Kuniyori – Bunji ninen nigatsu ?-nichi” (徠左馬尉源国頼・文治二年二月？日)

Let us now turn to the fifth theory on how the Rai school came to the character “Rai.” This theory, which goes according to Fukunaga back to the Honchô-kaji-bikô (本朝鍛冶考, 1796) and Kokon-kaji-bikô (古今鍛冶備考, 1830), sees the etymological origins of “Rai” in context with the swordsmiths school in the Yamato period. At the time of the Yamato state, people were basically divided into three social groups, the uji (氏, clans or kin groups), be (部, occupational groups), and yatsuko (奴, servants or slaves). That means each be group was responsible for a specialized task and named that way and this name turned later into a clan, and even later into a real family name. And the theory now quotes the be group of the Kumebe (来目部・久米部) as possible origin of the character “Rai.” The Kumebe were professional warriors under the command of the powerful Ôtomo (大伴) and when it was later “time” to use the be name or parts of the be name as family name, “Kumebe” (来目部) was abbreviated to “Ku” (来), i.e. “Rai.” For example the clan name “Ôtomo” was later abbreviated to “Tomo” (伴) and so on. And as the Kumebe were professional warriors, it is safe to assume that they had certain swordsmiths working for them, and so the theory is not too far-fetched. However, we are speaking of Yamato and maybe Nara times, so a lot of time passed until the emergence of the Rai school of swordsmiths.

And the seventh and last theory has nothing to do with any immigration and also does not base on etymological assumptions. It says that when Rai Kunitoshi (来国俊), Kuniyuki´s supposed son and Kuniyoshi´s supposed grandson, climbed Mt. Hiei (比叡山) northeast of Kyôto and looked down on Lake Biwa, the sailing ships heading towards him reminded him one day of the character “Rai” and this was when he decided to sign with this character. This theory matches at least with the extant works because no blade predating Kunitoshi is signed with the prefix “Rai.” Also true is that the character for “Rai” really looks like a sailing ship in front view with its bow and fully blown sail (see picture below). But Kunitoshi was and is not the only one noticing this similarity and so this theory is probably nothing more than a nice anecdote.

And since we are on the subject, I want to introduce a blade of a meikan-more Rai smith, i.e. of a Rai smith whois not found in the meikan records, namely of Rai Kunikiyo (来国清). It is dated Meitoku four (明徳, 1393) and dates thus to the very end of the Nanbokuchô period. One year later the Ôei era (応永, 1394-1428) started, what means in historic terms Muromachi period. So this is probably one of the latest dated Rai works known and comes from a time when the school gave up its predominance and left the field to its offshoots like Ryôkai, Nobukuni, Enju, or Chiyozuru. Nothing to do with the main topic I know but I thought he blade is nevertheless of interest.

Picture 2: tantô, mei: “Rai Kunikiyo – Meitoku yonnen hachigatsu-hi” (来国清・明徳二二年八月日, “on a day of the eighth month Meitoku four [1393]”), nagasa 26.3 cm, only a hint of a sori, hira-zukuri, mitsu-mune, relative wide mihaba, thin kasane, dense ko-itame mixed with some ô-hada, ji-nie, a little bit of utsuri, chû-suguha which is a bit wider and mixed with hotsure on the ura side, rather wide nioiguchi in ko-nie-deki and with sunagashi, sugu-bôshi with a ko-maru-kaeri

Last year, Iiyama Yoshimasa (飯山嘉昌) forwarded in a brief article (Tôken-Bijutsu 677, June 2013) the theory that the famous “bird of prey catching a monkey” (môkin-hoen no zu, 猛禽捕猿図鐔) tsuba of Shimizu Jingo (志水甚吾) (picture 1) depicts actually an eagle rescuing a monkey rather than catching him. When the June magazine arrived last year, I just skimmed through the text as I was quite busy at that time and I even forgot to reply to an inquiry from a fellow enthusiast who asked me if the article is on the eagle motif in general or on Jingo´s eagle interpretation in particular. Now just a few days ago, I stumbled by chance over Itô Sanpei´s (伊藤三平) comment on Iiyama´s article in his highly interesting blog which made me curious and so I reread the article. And as it is really exciting to get a complete new view on a well-known motif, I thought I better share Iiyama´s find with my readers.

Picture 1: môkin-hoen no zu tsuba, attributed to Shimizu Jingo

 Apart from the discussion that this tsuba is actually a work of Nishigaki Kanshirô (西垣勘四郎) – the present owner, the Tôkyô National Museum labels it as work of Jingo, Itô Mitsuru (伊藤満), the author of the excellent Higo books says it’s a work of Kanshirô – all publications quote the tsuba´s motif as mentioned above, i.e. “bird of prey catching a monkey.” Iiyama now saw in an art show on TV a report on the Kangi´in´s (歓喜院) Shôtendô (聖天堂) which was designated as kokuhô in July 2012. The temple is located in Menuma (妻沼) in Kumagaya (熊谷市) in Saitama Prefecture and the Shôten Hall holds a panelling into which the motif “eagle and a monkey” (washi to saru, 鷲と猿) is carved (picture 2). The carvings are attributed to the semi-legendary early Edo-period sculptor and carpenter Hidari Jingorô (左甚五郎). Striking is the similarity of this carving to the motif of the tsuba and now things get interesting. The Shôten Hall´s carving is namely described as follows: “Motif of an eagle rescuing a monkey who fell from a tree into a raging stream … The monkey stands for the hard to control human earthly/carnal desires and the eagle for Shôten (聖天) – also called Kangiten (歓喜天), the patron saint of the temple and Shôten Hall – who rescues us from these desires.” Shôten is generally considered to be the Japanese Buddhist form of the Hindu elephant-headed god Ganesha, but is also identified with the Shôkannon-Bosatsu (聖観音菩薩), the Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara who embodies the compassion of all Buddhas.

Picture 2: carving of the Shôten Hall

And when we now take a closer look at the tsuba, we see it as Iiyama and Itô write in a different light, namely that we are not facing a like so often described “fierce and determined eagle standing for the austere bushi of the Sengoku period,” but a calm eagle with a closed beak, without any claws, grasping the more grateful than scared monkey right at the shoulders, who is about to drop him off gently onto the ground. Compared to the carving, at which the artist created in the context of the temple an allusion to the deity Shôten, the new interpretation of the tsuba´s motif makes pretty much sense. And so Iiyama suggests that the motif should be renamed to “ôtori saru o sukuu” (鷲救猿), i.e. “eagle rescuing a monkey.”