NihontoWatchThe Mihara school of Bingo province was founded by Masaie at the end of the Kamakura period. The Masahiro line followed in three recorded generations: the first around the Kenmu era (1334-1338), the second around the Jôji era (1362-1368), and the third in the Ôei era (1394-1428), to whom this katana is attributed. Bingo was known for high-quality iron, and close ties with Yamato province left a strong Yamato influence on Mihara work, with suguha as the base and a grain often mixed with masame. This is a striking ô-suriage blade, mumei, with a nagasa of 62.8cm and a powerful 9.3cm ô-kissaki that strongly suggests a nagamaki origin from the Nanbokuchô period. Such blades were commonly shortened into katana after the Edo shogunate restricted long swords, a process known as nagamaki-naoshi, and reworked examples earned a reputation for exceptional quality. The jihada is a well-forged ko-mokume mixed with ô-hada, with sparkling ji-nie, plentiful chikei and a vibrant shirake-utsuri. The hamon is a bright, precise hoso-suguha with sections of ko-notare, tiny nezumi-ashi and subtle kuichi-gaiba, all in clean nioi-deki. The boshi turns back deeply in ko-maru. Stable hada-ware on the lower blade runs parallel to the grain and adds character to a sword some 600 years old. It carries NBTHK Tokubetsu Hozon, issued in Reiwa 7 (2025) to Mihara Masahiro, Ôei-goro. Nozomi-san, a shodô artist, inscribed the shirasaya with sayagaki and tsunagi-gaki in September 2026. The late Edo period uchigatana-koshirae is a delight. The saya is finished in zen-like swirls of red and black lacquer, the tsuka is wrapped in dark chocolate brown ito over black-lacquered samekawa, and white heron menuki shine through the wrap. The focal point is the iron tsuba attributed to Toyonobu, 7th generation of the Okamoto school of Chôshû, carved in sukidashi-bori with a gold moon reflected in the paddies, the motif of tagoto-no-tsuki. The shibuichi fuchi-kashira by the Mito school captures Yodo Castle in deep high relief with gold inlay and holds its own NBTHK Hozon. A samurai-spirited katana with history in every detail.
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Yamato-den · Bingo · around 1394-1428
Tōken Taikan top 31%
Where Masahiro stands among comparable artisans: across all of nihontō, and within tradition, era, and period. The tiers (Foremost · Leading · Major · Notable) weigh official designations from the NBTHK and Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs, together with historical honors of lasting repute such as the Sansaku and Meibutsu-chō.
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Years he was demonstrably active, proven by signed-and-dated blades
Yamato-den · Bingo
Phase: Ko-Mihara古三原· 1288–1393
6 pieces on the market now
Ko-Mihara (古三原) opens the Mihara story at its Bingo base, where a body of smiths gathered from the close of the Kamakura period and through the Nanbokuchō era. The setsumei treat the term as a chronological bracket rather than a separate workshop: works of this span are "collectively termed Ko-Mihara," with Masaie and Masahiro repeatedly named as the leading figures, and Masahiro held by tradition to be Masaie's son. The province's web of shōen estates tied to Kinai temples such as Tōji and Rengeō-in (Sanjūsangendō) drew the early smiths into regular contact with the central provinces, and the Yamato-den temperament that the records read in these blades is referred to that exchange. A second current runs alongside it: because some pieces show an Aoe manner, the appraisals also weigh influence from neighbouring Bitchū, as the Chikatsugu tachi of Shōhei 7 (1352) makes plain, sitting on the seam between Yamato bearing and Aoe surface. In the ji, the early hand keeps an itame-tending ground that takes on mokume, nagare, and a masame-like flow, with the grain inclined to stand (hada-dachi) and fine ji-nie set densely across it; a pale shirake-utsuri recurs as the most cited diagnostic, though the Masaie ōdachi of around Jōji instead shows a darkish steel with a midare-utsuri-like cast. The temper holds to a refined chū-suguha with ko-ashi and yō, the nioiguchi drawn tight or shizumi, the habuchi breaking into hotsure, kuichigai-ba, uchi-noke, and a nijūba suggestion, with fine kinsuji and sunagashi threading through.
The bōshi runs sugu, closing in yakizume, ko-maru, or maru with hakikake at the tip. The records keep these early works the cleaner pole of the school: a quiet, controlled Yamato manner whose forging shows "not the slightest looseness," set against the coarser, looser later Sue-Mihara of the closing Muromachi, where the disciplined suguha and tight ground give way. For kantei, the early phase reads as Yamato bearing without Yamato vigour: the nie of ji and ha runs weaker than in the Nara schools proper, the steel turns whitish, and the nioiguchi tightens, so a bright clean suguha with pointed bōshi can be mistaken at a glance for Aoe until the broad shinogi-ji, high shinogi, standing mokume, and hotsure with kuichigai-ba declare Mihara. Masaie and Masahiro divide on sugata: Masaie is the man of the bold ō-kissaki and the ōdachi, while Masahiro keeps ordinary chū-kissaki proportions and a freer, midare-gokoro edge with deeper kaeri, as in the Meibutsu Ō-Mihara cited by name. Because Yamato habit left few signed Mihara works, the early phase rests heavily on mumei and kinzogan attributions, several of them given to Masaie by Hon'ami Kōtoku, while dated and signed survivors stay scarce and so carry weight as reference material. Provenance threads through the great houses, the signed Masaie tachi presented to Emperor Meiji by the Shimazu family and another Masaie transmitted in the Date. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Masahiro正廣 | 1362-1389 | 35 |
| Masaie正家 | 1353-1375 | 29 |
| Kaneyasu兼安 | 1352-1369 | 12 |
| Masanobu正信 | 1376-1394 | 4 |
| Noritada則忠 | 1352-1356 | 0 |
Yamato in the Muromachi period
The monasteries that had sustained Yamato lost ground through the Muromachi period, and the schools thinned with them; Sue-Tegai kept the old masame manner alive in quantity. The burning of Tōdaiji’s Great Buddha hall in 1567 closed the temple age.
A Hozon-certified blade judged to show notably superior workmanship and a better state of preservation. The bar is higher: re-tempered blades and most unsigned Muromachi/Edo works are excluded.
The NBTHK (Nihon Bijutsu Tōken Hozon Kyōkai, the Society for the Preservation of Japanese Art Swords) is a public-interest incorporated foundation founded in 1948 and supervised by Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs (Bunkachō); it is based at the Japanese Sword Museum in Tokyo. Its expert panels physically examine each submitted work (shinsa) and issue a certificate (kanteishō) ranking it by artistic and historical merit. NBTHK papers are the most widely recognized standard of authentication for Japanese swords and fittings.
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