Hasebe Kunishige was a Yamashiro swordsmith of the period and is recognized as a master craftsman of the Hasebe school. Among the Yamashiro smiths of this era, the Hasebe group and the lineage are representative, and both produced many masterpieces. The earliest dated example by Kunishige bears the inscription Bunwa 4 (1355), followed by works dated Enbun and Joji. No signed umei by him are known; rather, the majority of his signed works are and , typically of form with wide , thin , and proportions with slight curvature---an archetypal form seen in -period and .
His forging is characteristically with an overall -inclination; in particular, the areas toward the edge and toward the back tend to flow in a -like manner, and the as a whole is rich in . The most frequently encountered is a shallow mixed with , well covered in , with and appearing. Many of his temperlines become broadly through the proliferation of and , though he also produced works in a more restrained mode of shallow without full tempering. The varies from with to forms displaying -like or characteristics, at times with a tendency toward .
Kunishige's signed works display without reservation the distinctive features of the Hasebe school, and his carvings, though simple, are executed skillfully. His blades demonstrate both the characteristic mode and quieter stylistic variants, attesting to the range of his artistry within the broader -influenced Yamashiro tradition of the period. The signature itself, cut with a somewhat thick chisel in five characters, serves as a model example of the first generation's inscription and constitutes important reference material for attributing unsigned works within the Hasebe lineage.