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About the maker

Hatakeda Mitsumori光守

Mitsumori of the Hatakeda group is a smith of late-Kamakura Bizen, placed by the published reference works around the Shoo era (1288-93). The Jubi-designated Hotta-family tachi carries the judgment plainly: "this Mitsumori is thought to correspond to the smith recorded in the sword-signature books as a Hatakeda-school artisan working around Shoo (1288-93)" (この光守は銘鑑に正応（一二八八～九三）頃の畠田派の刀工とあるもの). The published sources are candid that beyond this his genealogy is not fixed; the *meikan* record neither his dates nor his line clearly. What anchors him instead is his manner. From his rare signed blades, the NBTHK writes, the brilliant *choji-midare* in which *kaeruko-choji* is especially conspicuous readily suggests affiliation with the Moriie line, and the way he cuts his signature corresponds to it as well. He is judged close in particular to the second-generation Moriie, and the few signed pieces hold the attribution of the many unsigned ones in place. His characteristic hand is a flamboyant, *nioi*-based *choji-midare* led by *kawazuko-choji*, the tadpole-headed clove that is the Hatakeda tell. It rises over an *itame* mixed with *mokume* that tends to stand in the grain, with abundant *ashi* and *yo* working into a temper that varies in height and packs into a dense *midare*. The recurring smith-level sentence in the published commentary fixes the family idiom in one image: the two representative signed works, the Hotta-family *tachi* and the Akimoto-family *orikaeshi-mei* *wakizashi*, "both temper a wide *yakihaba* of *nioi-deki choji-midare*, showing a splendid and ornate manner" (これらは共に焼幅の広い、匂出来の丁子乱れを焼いて華麗な作風を示している). The mumei blades read down from that, their *choji* mixed with *gunome* and pointed teeth, *ko-nie* adhering and the *nioiguchi* bright; on the 50th-session *katana* the NBTHK records that the *hamon* "clearly manifests his distinctive features" and the bright *nioiguchi* carries a superior result. The *jigane* is an *itame* with *mokume*, in places flowing and standing in the grain, on which fine *ji-nie* gathers in dust-like *mijin* and delicate *chikei* enter. Across it a vivid *midare-utsuri* stands, named first in nearly every entry and, with the standing grain, the surest thing the published sources point to. The 14th-session *tachi*, the earliest in the record, sets the note at once: "the *itame* tends to flow and stand in the grain, and a vivid *midare-utsuri* appears" (板目やや流れごころに肌立ち、乱れ映りあざやかに立つ). Within the *ha*, fine *kinsuji* and *sunagashi* run, and on the busier blades *tobiyaki* are scattered along the *yakigashira*; the *boshi* runs *midare-komi*, turning with a pointed tendency and *hakikake*, or settling in *ko-maru*. The *nioiguchi* tends at times toward a slight *urumi*, a soft, moist quality, yet on the best of them it is bright and clear. Two registers divide the corpus. The signed register is the most flamboyant: on a closely forged *ko-itame* the temper widens into a *nioi*-based *choji-midare* carrying *fukuro-choji*, *kawazuko-choji* and *juka-choji* together, the *nioi* deep and the *nioiguchi* bright and clear, with *ashi* and *yo* active. The signature is a large, strongly individual two-character *mei* cut in a fine chisel, and on the shortened blades it survives as a *gaku-mei*, the inlaid plaque, or an *orikaeshi-mei*, the folded-back skin of the tang. The published commentary notes of one such piece that it is "cut with a fine chisel yet in a large, bold manner, as is usual for this smith." The prime register is the *o-suriage mumei* attribution: greatly shortened blades whose make and temper fit his signed work so closely that, in the recurring phrase, the appraisal of Mitsumori is drawn from the aspect of the *yakiba* and the workmanship as a whole. The 24th-session *katana* states the reasoning openly, that "the brilliant *choji-midare* in which *kaeruko-choji* is conspicuous accords with the Moriie line, and the manner of signing answers to it too" (蛙子丁子が目立つ華やかな丁子乱れが一見守家系と首肯され、銘振りも相通じるものがある). Within the Hatakeda group he stands beside his fellow Sanemori, the two read off the same idiom of wide *nioi*-based clove with *kaeruko-choji* and a bright *midare-utsuri*, the manner that runs the school toward the Osafune mainstream. The published sources draw his distinction not by contrast but by what his own blades carry: the *kaeruko-choji* dense in his temper where the old Ko-Bizen hands have none, a *midare-utsuri* that stands on nearly every blade, and an *itame* read a shade more openly than his Hatakeda fellow's. On the 42nd-session *tachi* the NBTHK writes that the *choji*, with the tadpole-style clove mixed in over a *jigane* in which the *midare-utsuri* stands, "well expresses the characteristic features of this smith" (同工の特徴がよく表れている), and even where the lower character of the signature is lost under a *mekugi-ana*, the calligraphy of the surviving "光" and the workmanship leave no doubt of his hand. Mitsumori is *Jo-jo saku* in Fujishiro's grading. Ten of his blades are designated Juyo and two more are Juyo Bijutsuhin, those two the representative signed works the published sources cite, the Hotta-family *tachi* and the Akimoto-family *orikaeshi-mei wakizashi*. The Hotta *tachi* is recorded in the *Kozan Oshigata* and descended through the Tokugawa shogunal house; both Jubi pieces are now held by the Tokyo National Museum, and one of the signed Juyo *tachi* is, in the NBTHK's words, "of note as one of the few signed works of Mitsumori" (数少ない光守の有銘作として注目される). The provenance recorded against his blades runs through the Hotta and Akimoto houses, the Tokugawa shogunal family, the Akimoto family and the Imperial Family. The two museum-held Jubi pieces are patrimony that does not trade; of the rest, ten stand in the Juyo tier and the signed examples are scarce, so a Mitsumori reaching open hands is uncommon, a blade a collector may encounter from time to time and with patience rather than at will.

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