NihontoWatchNihontoWatch我が国の草創神話を題に得た利壽(としなが)の目貫である。このような作品に出会うと、まず我が国土の成り立ちに思いが広がる。思想や宗教、政治的な諸問題は棚の上に置いておこう。遺跡や遺物はもちろん、『古事記』や『日本書紀』などの記録などを、偏ることのない昔語りといった見方をすれば、科学的に未知と言わざるを得ない古代人の自然観などを感じ取ることができる。 伝承の節々に、神が生み出されるに至った背景にある自然への恐れ。海に囲まれている環境など、我が国土の特質が示されていることが理解できよう。伊弉諾尊(いざなぎのみこと)と伊弉冉尊(いざなみのみこと)による国生み神話は、その本質を示しているのである。 この目貫に描かれているのは、天津(あまつ)神(かみ)より国土を創造すべく命を受けた伊弉諾尊と伊弉冉尊両神の姿。剣を背負っている伊弉諾尊は、左手を天に向け、右手を腹にし、伊弉冉尊は両手を腹部で組んでいる。両神に大海の波が寄せ、空には雲が湧いている様子を彫り描き、天地の境界を未だ定めていないことを表現している。 この後、両神は天浮橋に至り、天津神より与えられた天沼矛(あまのぬぼこ)を用いて混沌の海を掻き混ぜ、滴り落ちた泥土で淤能碁呂島(おのころしま)を造り出した。この淤能碁呂島に降り立った両神は、初めて男女の違いを認識することとなり、天御柱(あまのみはしら)を廻って万物諸神を生み出すのである。最も重要なのが大八島(おおやしま)と呼ばれる、淡道之穂之狭別島(あわじのほのさわけのしま)（淡路島）、伊予之二名島(いよのふたなのしま)（四国）、隠伎之三子島(おきのみつごのしま)（隠岐島）、筑紫島(つくしのしま)（九州）、伊伎島(いきのしま)（壱岐島）、津島(つしま)（対馬）、佐度島(さどのしま)（佐渡島）、大倭豊秋津島(おおやまととよあきつしま)（本州）の我が国土。次いで天(あま)照(てらす)大(おお)神(みかみ)、月読(つくよみの)命(みこと)、建速須佐之男(たけはやすさのおの)命(みこと)といった、天の動きと大地や気象に関わる諸神を生み、人間世界との関りを明確にしていくのである。 赤銅(しゃくどう)地をわずかに歪んだ丸形に造り込み、その周囲に刻みを設け、上部には雲を、下には波を彫り描き、微細な魚子(ななこ)を打ち施した中央に二神を厳かな姿に彫り表わしている。色金を用いない赤銅地黒一色の素材もまた厳かであり、両神の存在を尊いものとしている。殊に円周状に打たれた魚子地の様子は神々しい光背のようにも、あるいは日輪をも想わせ、神威を明確に表現している。両神の姿は極めて小さな空間ながら精密で、彫口も鋭く立体感に富み、顔つきと目の表情もわずかに違えている点は巧みである。 江戸時代にはこの場面が多くの絵師によって絵画表現されている(写真例)。本作は、大画面に細筆を用いて細部まで描き表したそれら絵画とは異なる黒一色の赤銅のみからなる高彫で、しかも一寸に満たない空域に立体表現するという技術的な側面も、魅力の大きな要因となっている。 さて、江戸時代における思想的な面では、この目貫の作者利壽が活躍していた時代にはまだ『古事記伝』を著した本居宣長(もとおりのりなが)は登場しておらず、同時代の思想家を挙げるとすれば『古史通』の新井(あらい)白石(はくせき)ぐらいであろう。新井白石は、天照大神は男神であるといったような中世的な考え方をしており、この目貫が表現している世界観との距離については興味深いところである。 伊弉諾尊と伊弉冉尊の二神を彫り描いた装剣小道具は、類例が極めて少なく貴重である。制作の時代背景から利壽がこれら近世の思想から影響を受けていないことは明らか。むしろ古典的な自然観に近い認識でこの二神を捉えていたと考えられ、江戸時代に大きく進化した神学とは少々離れて鑑賞すべき作品ともいえるであろう。 江戸の松沢家に伝来したこの目貫は、本阿弥琳雅氏が大正三、四年頃に譲り受けて其日庵杉山茂丸翁に納めたものだが、杉山翁が赤星鉄馬氏に自慢したところ懇望されて贈ることとなり、さらに後の昭和初期に青木鉄太郎氏の所有となったもの。小道具に通じた阿弥屋惣右衛門がこれを買い受けたことを記した便箋が遺されており、箱書には「神品」と記されている。
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Machibori · Edo
Nara Toshinaga (利寿), whose common name was Tahei, was born in Kanbun 7 (1667) and died in Genbun 1 (1736) at the age of seventy. One record names him a pupil of the Edo Nara master Toshinaga written 利永, the fourth generation of the school, and places his house at Honjo in Edo. With Tsuchiya Yasuchika and Sugiura Joi he is counted among the Nara Sansaku, the three celebrated masters of the Nara school, and the published sources rank him first among them: the eldest of the three and, in their words, the most skilled[[c:1]]. One commentary calls him the master "praised as first in the Nara school"[[c:2]], another sets him at "the summit of the Nara school"[[c:3]].
What the NBTHK names, again and again, is the force of his chisel. Of a kozuka with a tiger beside a waterfall it writes of "carving charged with power into every corner"[[c:4]], of his lions that their leaping high relief is "worth a second look" and "one of the highlights of Toshinaga"[[c:5]]. His relief is high and sukidashi, cut back from the plate so that the figure stands proud, and it is enriched with gold, silver, suaka and shibuichi colour inlay. On a Fujito battle kozuka the waves are carved in iron with finely graded sukidashi relief, the figures raised higher still, and the colour kept to a minimum.
His materials are wide. He works shakudo, iron, shibuichi, oborogin and roughened suaka, very often with an ishime texture that the published sources call his own[[c:6]]. Brass is singled out: of a Jurojin-and-tortoise fuchigashira they write that brass worked in sukidashi is "the method in which this maker excelled"[[c:7]]. Some pieces are finished with lacquer laid over parts of the plate, a Nara touch that darkens the oborogin or the copper. His output is dominated by fuchigashira, the fuchi low-waisted and slightly tall in the ichimonji manner, and the commentary repeats that "tsuba and kozuka are scarce, and fuchigashira are many"[[c:8]]. His tsuba are thick, and an early record doubts that they number more than ten; among them the Omori Hikoshichi and the Mure Takamatsu tsuba are famous.
His subjects run in two registers. The first is the human figure. Shoki and the oni are his particular theme, and the commentary says that "the expressions of Shoki and the oni are especially his own"[[c:9]]. Jurojin with a minogame tortoise is another subject he favoured, with several tsuba and fuchigashira of similar design surviving. Bishamonten, the Three Kingdoms, the Fujito crossing and the vanguard at the Uji river complete it. Of his mounted warriors the NBTHK writes that they follow the Goto manner but are "more true to life than the warriors of the Goto house"[[c:10]]. The second register is birds and beasts: fighting cocks with chicks at their feet, a tiger crouched above a falling torrent, a parent tiger swimming a raging current while its cub crouches on the bank, a lion with peony, and returning geese descending across a brass sky worked smooth in sukidashi.
Through both registers runs a contrast of movement and stillness. On the waterfall kozuka the published sources read the water as movement and the crouching tiger as stillness, a tiger "watching intently"[[c:11]] and about to spring. On one gamecock fuchigashira the bird is not in its fighting pose: beak closed and feathers lowered, it is read as the still "wooden cock" of the old tale, set against the combative cocks of his other works. A Uji river fuchigashira pairs his fuchi with a kashira added in the late Edo period by Toryusai Seiju.
His record numbers thirty designated works: three Important Cultural Properties, four at Tokubetsu Juyo, twenty at Juyo, and three recognised before the war as Juyo Bijutsuhin. The three Important Cultural Properties are national patrimony and do not change hands. The prewar records name Hosokawa Moritatsu, whose set is now with the Eisei Bunko, and Furukawa Toranosuke; a Jurojin fuchigashira comes from the Ryushido collection of Mitsumura Toshimo with a box inscribed by Unno Shomin in Meiji 37 (1904). A Tokubetsu Juyo or Juyo fuchigashira appears from time to time, a tsuba or kozuka far more seldom.
Where Toshinaga 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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Machibori · Edo
79 pieces on the market now
The Nara school of kinko (metalwork) emerged in the mid-Edo period as one of the most celebrated independent traditions of sword-fitting craftsmanship, its masters working outside the patronage structures that governed the Goto house. The school coalesced around the figure of Nara Toshihisa (1667--1736), also known as Tahee, who as head master during its creative zenith defined the mature idiom of the lineage. Though the school's origins are often traced through the successive generations of the Nara family beginning with Toshiharu, its lasting fame rests upon the Nara sansaku — the Three Masters of Nara: Toshihisa, Tsuchiya Yasuchika, and Sugiura Joi. " Joi (1701--1761), trained under Juei in the lineage of Toshiharu, rose to become the third pillar of this triumvirate. Together, and joined by masters of allied lineages such as Hayashi Shigemitsu of the Higo kinko tradition, the Nara school and its circle represent the highest achievement of independent metalwork in the Edo period. The collective technical vocabulary of the Nara school encompasses an extraordinary breadth of materials and methods. Its masters worked in iron, shakudo, shibuichi, brass (shinchu), refined copper (suaka), and oborogin, treating surfaces as polished grounds (migaki-ji), hammered textures (tsuchime-ji), and stone-grain finishes (ishime-ji) — the latter developed by Toshihisa into a distinctive personal manner. The school's carving methods span the full spectrum: sukidashi-bori modeled relief, takabori high relief, the thread-fine line work of kebori, and the single-stroke katakiribori incision. " Yet individual specialties distinguish the masters within this shared vocabulary.
Toshihisa's art finds its fullest expression in sukidashi takabori — relief carving in which figures are raised with subtly graduated heights to produce an illusion of spatial depth — executed against his richly textured ishime-ji grounds. Joi developed nikuaibori, a modulated relief technique of unrivaled refinement, producing entire compositions through chisel work alone on polished oborogin grounds, dispensing with inlay and colored-metal accents. Yasuchika's range is perhaps the broadest, encompassing the distinctive daigaku-gata iron tsuba conceived for his patron and kozuka that "draw forth a small universe" within a confined surface, while his late works signed with the art name Tou achieve an austere, detached realm the NBTHK terms kotan. The legacy of the Nara school rests on the singular ability of its masters to transcend decorative function and achieve genuine artistic expression within the confines of sword fittings. Toshihisa, as the senior figure among the sansaku, established the standard of dignified, powerfully carved relief against richly textured grounds, and his figural subjects — gamecocks, tigers, Bishamonten — consistently achieve what NBTHK scholarship identifies as the philosophical duality of do (movement) and sei (stillness) within a single composition. " Joi, working primarily in the intimate format of the kozuka, achieved expressive authority through the sheer subtlety of his nikuaibori chisel work — his celebrated lion-and-cub compositions existing in closely related versions across multiple designations and published in the canonical reference Tagane no Hana. That the school also attracted masters of allied provincial traditions — Hayashi Shigemitsu of Higo, whose iron tsuba display the characteristic murasaki-sabi patina and "somewhat gentler feeling" that distinguishes the second generation from the founder Matahichi — attests to its gravitational influence on Edo-period metalwork as a whole. Across the school's production, the NBTHK's evaluative language converges on a consistent theme: compositional intelligence, technical command across the full range of materials and carving methods, and an expressive depth that elevates the finest works from accomplished craft to art of the highest order. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Yasuchika安親 | — | 87 |
| Toshinaga利寿 | — | 30 |
| Joi乗意 | — | 12 |
| Minzan谺珉山 | — | 1 |
| Toshiyoshi利善 | — | 0 |
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