SOLD

Tracked across 76 dealers worldwide · price history · sold archive

Specifications

About the maker

Nakajima Rai Kuninaga國長

Kuninaga is the smith the published sources call Nakajima Rai, a pupil of Rai Kunitoshi who left Yamashiro and settled at Nakajima in Settsu, carrying the Rai manner forward into the Nanbokucho period. The *Meikan* records two generations of the name, placing the first about the Gentoku era at the close of Kamakura and the second about the Shohei and Oan eras; only the three-character signature Rai Kuninaga (来国長) is known, and not a single dated work survives. From this scarcity grows the central scholarly fact about him: the published commentary holds that he resembles Rai Kunimitsu while falling slightly short of him, and it makes the Nakajima Rai attribution itself a standing question of connoisseurship rather than a settled record. His *jigane*, his quiet temper, and a signature that comes in one form alone are what the judges read him by. The constant of his work is the *jigane*. Over a well-forged *itame* he mixes *mokume* and a flowing *nagare-hada*, the grain tending to stand a little, *hada-tatsu*, with thick *ji-nie* and frequent bold *chikei*. His is a faint *utsuri* or a quiet *nie-utsuri* standing on this open, standing grain, the steel a step away from the closely packed *jigane* of the Yamashiro Rai mainstream. That standing *itame* is the feature the judges mean when they place him just below Kunimitsu; it is also, by their own account, the basis of the attribution problem. Examining his mumei katana, one of them writes that the Nakajima Rai *kiwame* has from old times been directed to *suguha* works of somewhat lesser technical level than Kunimitsu, and asks whether the convention is sound: 「やや技術が劣る直刃出来の作をそれに当てている事が、果して妥当なりや否やという問題に始まる」 (the matter begins with the question of whether it is right that suguha works of somewhat inferior technique have been assigned to him). For the present, the commentary follows tradition. Over that *jigane* his temper stays calm. The characteristic line is a *suguha*-toned or medium *suguha* into which *ko-gunome*, *ko-choji* and a shallow *notare* enter, with *ashi* and *yo*, *ko-nie* well adhered, and *kinsuji* and *sunagashi* running through, the *nioiguchi* now tight, now bright. The *boshi* runs straight to a small *ko-maru*, or sweeps with *hakikake* to a slightly pointed turnback. This restrained register, not the flamboyant *choji* of a Bizen hand, is the Rai inheritance he carries; and the published sources note that the first generation in particular was proficient in *suguha*, 「初代は直刃を得意」とした. It is the steel and this quiet edge, taken together, that the judges weigh against Rai Kunimitsu, finding the resemblance plain and the refinement a degree less. The record divides cleanly along the line of signature and form. The body of it is the *o-suriage*, *mumei* katana attributed to Nakajima Rai, wide in body with a *chu-kissaki* over the standing *itame*, the temper a broad or medium *suguha*, often carved with a plain *bo-hi*. The signed pieces, encountered only from time to time, are the work of the second generation in *hira-zukuri* with *mitsu-mune*, wide and slightly elongated with a thin *kasane*, the three-character signature cut large below the *mekugi-ana*. The published sources draw a distinction within his own work: the first generation was the *suguha* hand, while in the second 「二代にはむしろ直刃の作は少なく」, more irregular *notare* tempering becoming common. The signed *wakizashi* and *tanto* keep a consistent carving habit, a *suken* on the *omote* and *gomabashi* on the *ura*, each with a *tsume* beneath, a devotional program that sets them apart from the grooved mumei blades. One piece stands outside every part of this account. A Tokubetsu Juyo *wakizashi*, signed by *kinzogan-mei*, breaks the calm: over an *itame* with flowing *nagare*, *ji-nie*, *chikei* and a *nie-utsuri* standing strongly on the *ji*, he sets a *gunome* mixed with *choji* and *ko-notare*, and in the upper half *tobiyaki* with a *yubashiri*-like feeling intermingle until the whole becomes a *hitatsura* that undulates flamboyantly. The published commentary calls it 「来派の作としては異色な出来口」 (an idiom unusual for a Rai work), the activity within the temper abundant and the *nie-utsuri* strongly expressed, an outstanding example among this smith's work and 「資料的にも頗る貴重」 (extremely valuable as documentary material) for the breadth of expression possible within the Rai tradition. What separates Kuninaga from his Yamashiro source is exactly this: his is the Rai manner carried a step away from its origin, the *jigane* standing where Kunimitsu's is packed, the *utsuri* turned to *nie*, and the school's reserve held even where, once, it gives way to *hitatsura*. For the collector Kuninaga is a scarce Nanbokucho name whose extant work, signed and attributed together, is exceedingly few. He has no National Treasures. His record runs instead through the Important Cultural Properties, a signed first-generation *tachi* in *suguha* preserved at Eirin-ji in Yamashiro and an attributed *tachi* held at Sakurayama Shrine, with two Tokubetsu Juyo blades and a long run of Juyo pieces carrying the rest. The denrai roll is a daimyo one, the Hisamatsu Matsudaira house, former lords of Matsuyama in Iyo, the Owari Tokugawa, and other Matsudaira lines among recorded owners. The published sources call one signed example 「同作中のみならず同名中の白眉」 (the finest not only among surviving works but among all smiths bearing this name). Most of his blades are held rather than traded, and a signed Nakajima Rai comes to light only seldom, so a privately held example is a notable thing for a collector to encounter, and a document of how the Rai line continued once it had left Kyoto.

Yushindou

yushindou.com