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出ました出ました古いお家代々大切にされてきた無銘ですが有名な肥前国住近江大掾藤原忠廣の脇差として伝わった脇差が出ました。忠廣の名を知らない人はいない位肥前国住近江大掾藤原忠廣の作品は有名です。近江大掾忠廣は佐賀鍋島藩37万5千石のお抱え鍛冶で有名な初代肥前国忠吉の嫡男です。江戸時代寛永十八年七月（1640年）（386年前）に近江大掾を受領。鍋島藩は外様大名の為に江戸幕府に対し非常に気を使い政治上不利にならない為に幕府の幕閣や有力諸大名に鍋島焼と肥前国忠吉の刀を厚誼の証として外交上のお付き合いとして贈呈する為に、作品は高度な制作技術を要求されそして厳しく品質管理が行われその為に作品は全て名作です。又その技術を他国に流失されないように厳しく管理監督をしていました。超一流の刀の製造に成功したのが近江大掾忠廣を代表とする肥前刀工です。本脇差は元身幅広く先身幅との差の少ない豪快な脇差姿を現し、地金は小板目肌に詰んで梨地肌を現していますが一部に鍛え大肌が現れた為に無銘で出されたのでしょうか、刃紋は匂い出来に小沸の付いた家伝の直刃を焼き覇気有る刃を焼いています。拵えも江戸期の拵えが本肥前国住近江大掾藤原忠廣として伝わった脇差に一層華を添えています。この度古いお家の方より家代々無銘ですが肥前国住近江大掾忠廣として伝わった脇差ですが、自分達も年を取りましたので大切にして頂ける方にお安くお譲り下さいとお預かりした為に、特別に格安にてご提供いたします、脇差らしい脇差をお安く求めたいと言われる方にお勧めです是非お楽しみ下さい。
NihontoWatchHizen School肥前派
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As written by the shop
Shinto · Hizen
104 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.
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