Hizen swords were a domain enterprise: the Nabeshima sent Tadayoshi to study under Umetada Myōju around 1596, then built a licensed school around him. Nine generations carried its famously consistent konuka-hada work into the Meiji era.
NihontoWatchNihontoWatch四代忠吉は、新三郎と称し、三代陸奥守忠吉の嫡子として、寛文八年(一六六八)に生まれました。十九歳の時に父が早逝したことにより、その後は、祖父近江大掾忠廣に鍛刀を学んでいます。元禄十三年(一七〇〇)に近江大掾を受領、延享四年(一七四七)に、祖父と同じく八十歳で没しています。 元禄六年に祖父が没するまでは、その協力者として鍛刀、それ以後、近江大掾を受領までは、『肥前国忠吉』、『肥前国住人忠吉』銘を切っています。受領後は、ほぼ『(肥前国住)近江大掾藤原忠吉』と切ります。年紀作がほとんど見られず、初期作には皆無、受領後には宝永三年(一七〇六)から享保十年(一七二五)の間で、僅かに見られる程度です。 本作は、貴重な『住人忠吉銘』、年紀はありませんが、前述したように、近江大掾受領前の初期作に当たります。 『住人忠吉銘』は、大半は初代の作ですが、僅かに土佐守忠吉、四代近江大掾忠吉にも残されています。しかしながら、その見極めは、さほど難しくありません。 基本的なポイントとしては、初代と土佐守は、共に『肥前国住人忠吉作』と切りますが、字体がかなり異なります。土佐守の方が、細鏨で稚拙な感じなので、すぐ分かります。四代は、『肥前国住人忠吉』と『作』を切りません。中には、四代を初代に見せ掛けようとしたものもありますが、その場合でも、一文字ずつ見比べれば、まず分かります。 寸法二尺一分弱、身幅、重ねガシッとした優品、地刃も肥前直刃の典型で、良く出来ています。 また本作は『肥前刀大鑑』所載品で、大鑑によると、『四代忠吉の住人銘の作は、近江大掾銘の作に比して、大概は出来が及ばないが、この刀は、寸が詰まっているものの、身幅広く、重ね厚いがっちりとした姿で、地刃の出来が良い。肥前刀は、刀でも寸が短い場合、刀銘になるが、四代ではこれ一口のみである。』とあります。 これで寸法が二尺四、五寸あれば、重要候補筆頭にその名が挙がるでしょう。 肥前刀コレクションとしても不可欠、大変魅力的な四代忠吉です。
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Shinto · Hizen · around 1688-1704
Fujishiro Jo saku · Tōken Taikan top 37%
2 pieces on the market now
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Shinto · Hizen
107 pieces on the market now
The Hizen school began with a single domain commission. In Keicho 1 (1596) the Nabeshima of Hizen ordered Hashimoto Shinzaemon, the smith who would sign Tadayoshi, up to Kyoto with the carver Munenaga; there he entered the gate of Umetada Myoju and studied forging while Munenaga learned the chisel. The two returned to the province in Keicho 3 (1598), and Tadayoshi settled in the castle town below Saga, where under the domain's patronage the line grew into the dominant sword-making house of Kyushu. His own work runs from Keicho 5 (1600) to his death in Kan'ei 9 (1632); in Genna 10 (1624) he received the court title Musashi Daijo, changed his name to Tadahiro, and shifted his clan name from Minamoto to Fujiwara, so that the late Musashi Daijo blades are the founder under a second name. From him the house became a true generational institution: his son the second-generation Omi Daijo Tadahiro carried it forward as its most prolific hand, the third-generation Mutsu no Kami Tadayoshi returned its highest finish, and a Tosa no Kami branch took the founder's signature when he set it aside. Around this main line grew a circle of disciples and collateral hands, the waki-Hizen or Soba-Hizen smiths, several of them, like Yoshiie and Hironori, working as daisaku substitute makers whose own signed pieces are therefore scarce. The school's signature is its steel. Over a ko-itame forged so tightly it shows no slackness, fine ji-nie gathers in minute particles until the surface takes on the rice-bran konuka-hada (also written komenuka-hada) that no other school produces, fine chikei entering throughout and the ji notably clear and bright.
The orthodox temper laid upon it is a chu-suguha or hiro-suguha, sometimes tinged with a shallow notare and ko-gunome, the nioiguchi deep with finely clustered ko-nie and tightened to a bright clarity, the boshi running straight to a quiet ko-maru. The founder aimed this suguha toward the Rai school yet departed from it, his nioiguchi tighter and his forging carrying more vigor; the third generation refined it to what the published sources call the strongest and most precise hand of the first three generations. Against that calm register the house also worked a showier one, the Hizen choji-midare mixing gunome, long ashi, kinsuji and sunagashi, a manner the published sources already find more often in the founder's late Musashi Daijo work than in his Tadayoshi years, and one the second generation made his own. The branches pushed further from the suguha standard: Tadakuni of the Ogi domain ran sunagashi more conspicuously than any other Hizen hand and reached toward old Ichimonji in his o-choji; Masahiro and Yukihiro favored a flamboyant long-ashi choji over the calm main line; and the Iyo no Jo Munetsugu line worked apart in the Soshu-den, building a midareba on notare with a pointed togariba and a jihada that tends to stand and tone slightly blackish. A collector seeks Hizen-to first for that steel, and reads it the same way the appraiser does: a bright suguha lying over a clear, tight konuka-hada identifies the school before the signature is consulted, and the quiet ko-maru boshi on the ura-signed tang confirms the main-line practice. Generation and branch are then told within that frame, the third generation's powerful sugata recalling not his father but his grandfather, the waki-Hizen hands set apart by their irregular temper, their sujikai file marks and a sashi-ura signature, the Munetsugu line by its Soshu togari. The main line, made in real numbers across so long a span, reaches the market more readily than any Kamakura master, so a papered example is within reach of a patient collector, while the founder's own work and the finest konuka-suguha of the third generation come to open hands only from time to time. Provenance runs back through the house the school served, blades recorded to Nabeshima Katsushige and Nabeshima Naomoto and passing onward to the Owari Tokugawa, the Satake and the Imperial families; documentary inscriptions sharpen the picture further, a Myoju soemei attesting the founder's discipleship, Umetada carving adding flowers to brocade on his late blades, and the gold-inlaid cutting tests of Yamano Kanjuro and Yamano Ka'emon, rare on Hizen work, naming the edge as well as the hand. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Tadayoshi忠吉 | 1596-1632 | 155 |
| Tadayoshi忠吉 | 1660-1686 | 61 |
| Tadahiro忠廣 | 1633-1693 | 133 |
| Tadakuni忠國 | 1648-1652 | 32 |
| Masahiro正廣 | 1624-1655 | 30 |
Hizen: a domain enterprise
Hizen swords were a domain enterprise: the Nabeshima sent Tadayoshi to study under Umetada Myōju around 1596, then built a licensed school around him. Nine generations carried its famously consistent konuka-hada work into the Meiji era.
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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