Weight (toshin only): 760g It has arrived, it has arrived! A meito by the famous but rare 2nd generation Oshu Sendai-ju Kunikane has appeared. The 1st generation Kunikane was said to be a descendant of Yamato Hosho Sadamune. Employed by Date Masamune of the 630,000-koku domain, he became a disciple of Ecchu no Kami Masatoshi in Kyoto, Yamashiro Province, at the age of 23 by Masamune's order in Keicho 19. Because he rushed from Kyoto to participate in the Osaka Winter and Summer Campaigns and fought bravely, he was personally awarded Masamune's own gunsen (war fan) as a reward. He returned to Sendai in Genna 5 at the age of 28. His works are highly evaluated as Saijo Owazamono due to their outstanding sharpness. This 2nd generation Kunikane also flourished as a hanko (domain smith) for the Date clan. His real name was Genzaburo, later changed to Hongo Kichiemon. Born in Keicho 17 (1612) (414 years ago), he received the title of Yamashiro no Kami at the age of 56 in Kanbun 7 (1667) (359 years ago). Based on the meiburi (style of signature), this sword is a masterpiece from around Kanbun 2 (1662) (364 years ago), when he was approximately 51 years old, before receiving the Yamashiro no Kami title. It is said he also studied sword-making under Yamato no Kami Yasusada in Edo. As he devised his own tameshigiri methods, his swords are rated as Ryowazamono for their superb cutting ability. Because he was an okakae-kaji (retained smith) for the Date clan, he originally forged this as a long 2-shaku 7-sun senjin-yo (battlefield) sword at the request of the Lord. However, a high-ranking samurai connected to later Date lords shortened it to match his own kenpo (swordsmanship) style for use as a saryo (personal wear). The sugata follows the family tradition of the Yamato Hosho school, featuring a high shinogi, a noticeable difference between the motohaba and sakihaba, and a slightly shallow sori, presenting an enchanting and excellent form. The jigane is forged in the traditional Yamato Hosho masame-hada, with abundant chikei and ji-nie appearing along the masame grain. The hamon is a small-nie based notare-midare with kuichigai-ba and niju-ba along the habuchi. It displays many uchinoke along the habuchi, similar to Mikazuki Munechika, creating a wonderfully attractive blade. The boshi is elegantly finished in komaru, resulting in a meito of magnificent dignity. The Kunikane lineage continued as prestigious okakae-kaji for the Sendai Date family until the 14th generation at the end of the Edo period. The koshirae features a kuro-ro-kizami-saya (black lacquer notched scabbard). The tsuba is a Mogarashi Soten work depicting warriors with a luxurious kin-fukurin (gold rim). The menuki are shakudo-ji with a floral design, the fuchi is shakudo-ji with a floral design, and the kashira is made of horn, forming a denchu-koshirae (palace mount) that adds further splendor to this meito by the 2nd generation Oshu Sendai-ju Kunikane. We received this sword from an elderly connoisseur who purchased it at a high price long ago. As they have aged, they requested that we pass this rare and precious work by the 2nd generation Kunikane to a younger generation at an affordable price. Therefore, we are offering it at a special discount. Please enjoy this opportunity.
NihontoWatchEdo · nagasa 73.4cm · sori 0.4cm
Sendai Kunikane, Mutsu (Sendai Shinto) · Rikuzen · around 1644-1670
Fujishiro Jo saku · Tōken Taikan top 31%
2 pieces on the market now
Yamashiro-no-kami Fujiwara Kunikane, the second of the Sendai line, was born in Keicho 17 (1612), succeeded to the house in Shoho 2 (1645) at the age of thirty-four, received the Yamashiro-no-kami title in Kanbun 7 (1667), and died in Kanbun 12 (1672) aged sixty-one. He was the eldest son of the founder, the shodai Yamashiro-daijo Kunikane, who claimed descent from the late line of Yamato Hosho, served Date Masamune of Sendai, and by his lord's order went up to Kyoto to study under Etchu-no-kami Masatoshi before receiving the Yamashiro-daijo title in Kanbun 3 (1626). The Kunikane name was the standing forge of the Date house, and across both generations its identity rests on a single inherited manner: the masame forging of the Yamato Hosho tradition, tempered in suguha. The published sources call this his hereditary specialty, the family's transmitted Hosho-style masame at which he was particularly accomplished in the straight temper, and they rate the second generation a master of suguha second only to his father.
His hand is recognized first in the jigane. The blade is a shinogi-zukuri katana with iori-mune, the curvature shallow in the Kanbun manner and the kissaki medium, and over its whole length runs a masame-hada forged tight and well ordered, with ji-nie laid and chikei entering along the masame. This straight-grain jigane is the first of the two Hosho marks, a forging almost no other Shinto school takes as its default, and the second mark is set into it: a chu-suguha frayed at the habuchi into hotsure, mixing kuichigai-ba and a tendency to nijuba, with sunagashi and kinsuji running freely along the masame, the nioi deep and the nioiguchi bright and clear with ko-nie. Where the suguha and the masame both appear on every blade on record, the two together are the surest reading of the smith.
The boshi runs straight, sweeping into hakikake, and closes as often in a yakizume without turnback as in a small round, a Yamato-Hosho boshi habit that follows from the masame and the suguha rather than against them. To this inherited core the published sources add a tell peculiar to the Kunikane hand, and name it as such: a mizukage rising from below the hamachi, a faint pale reflection that on the broad, slightly long late blades connects and runs as an utsuri-like aspect across the lower half. Of one Kanbun katana they write that 「区下より水影が立っているが, 初代同様二代にも見る手くせであり」[[c:1]], a habit seen in the second generation as in the founder, and they note alongside it that the nakago file is sometimes finished as a plain, simplified kesho, another of the points to watch in his work. On that same wide blade the masame stands a little on the ura, the ji-nie laid dust-fine and thick, the chikei finely formed.
Against the calm suguha the published sources record that the second generation also leaves a gunome-midare. On these the chu-suguha base mixes in small gunome and a shallow notare, ashi entering and the habuchi frayed, and one wide, long blade carries a suguha that swells into a large, shallow undulation with ko-nie and ara-nie and a nijuba tendency. The sources frame this as the exception within a hand whose default is the straight temper, writing that 「家伝の保昌流の柾目鍍を得意とし」 he was particularly skilled at suguha, with slight gunome-midare seen at times besides. A small register within the corpus carries the founder's own signatures rather than the second generation's, the go Yokei and the title Yamashiro-daijo: blades signed Yamashiro-daijo Fujiwara Yokei Kunikane, one dated Keian 1 (1648), in the same Hosho idiom but read with a founder's accent, the koshi-zori standing high with funbari, the masame tending to stand, the suguha a ko-nie chu-suguha damp and frayed with sunagashi following.
What sets his work apart within the broad world of Kanbun Shinto is not a flourish but the consistency of the Hosho reading: the masame carried the length of the blade, the quiet suguha laid over it, the swept yakizume boshi, and the mizukage below the machi. The published sources keep his standing honestly relative to the founder. They write of one second-generation katana that it is in fact forceful and that its quality is 「殆んど初代に劣らない」[[c:3]], scarcely inferior to the first generation, and of his masame finest pieces that some approach the shodai while his ordinary technique does not equal him. The signature itself is a connoisseur's field: in the second generation's mei the horizontal strokes are driven hard and pressed at their close so that they read like the character ichi, and within the character 包 the inner element is cut in a distinctive form, both, the sources say, important features when reading a Kunikane signature.
Kunikane is rated Jo-saku by Fujishiro. His record is held entirely in the Juyo tier, ten katana of the second generation on record there, with two further blades under the founder's Yokei signature reaching the prewar Juyo Bijutsuhin. He holds no National Treasure and no Important Cultural Property, so the work that can be encountered is the designated Juyo katana, and these come to market only from time to time and with patience, a steady Sendai-Shinto name rather than a rarity locked wholly away. The published sources single out the well-forged, in-the-style pieces as typical and representative of the second generation, one of which, worn at the side of Kan Shinbei, carries a gold-inlaid cutting-test inscription dated Kanbun 11 (1671) and is valued as a documentary representative work. Of his quietest masame katana the sources write that it is 「上品に静温に仕上げている」[[c:4]], finished with refined elegance and a quiet warmth. Among recorded owners of his blades are Kurokawa Fukusaburo and the Kurokawa Institute for Ancient Cultures, which hold the two Yokei-signed Juyo Bijutsuhin, and Itaya Taneo.
Where Kunikane 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.
Select a lens to see how it's measured.
Years he was demonstrably active, proven by signed-and-dated blades
Yamato-den · Rikuzen
12 pieces on the market now
Below Sendai Castle, at Kokubu Wakabayashi in Miyagi District of Ōshū (later Rikuzen, present-day Sendai), the first Kunikane established a forge that served the Date house across the early shintō period. The setsumei record him as a member of the Hongō family, first called Genzō and later Yoshinosuke, born in Bunroku 1 (1592), who claimed descent from a later branch of Yamato Hōshō Gorō. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Kunikane國包 | 1624-1644 | 33 |
| Kunikane國包 | 1644-1670 | 12 |
| Kaneshige包重 | 1661-1673 | 1 |
| Tomosuke倫助 | 1661-1673 | 1 |
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.
NBTHK official siteFor returns due to customer circumstances, the cost is the customer's responsibility. For returns due to our mis-shipment or a defective item, we bear the cost.
Weight (toshin only): 760g It has arrived, it has arrived! A meito by the famous but rare 2nd generation Oshu Sendai-ju Kunikane has appeared. The 1st generation Kunikane was said to be a descendant of Yamato Hosho Sadamune. Employed by Date Masamune of the 630,000-koku domain, he became a disciple of Ecchu no Kami Masatoshi in Kyoto, Yamashiro Province, at the age of 23 by Masamune's order in Keicho 19. Because he rushed from Kyoto to participate in the Osaka Winter and Summer Campaigns and fought bravely, he was personally awarded Masamune's own gunsen (war fan) as a reward. He returned to Sendai in Genna 5 at the age of 28. His works are highly evaluated as Saijo Owazamono due to their outstanding sharpness. This 2nd generation Kunikane also flourished as a hanko (domain smith) for the Date clan. His real name was Genzaburo, later changed to Hongo Kichiemon. Born in Keicho 17 (1612) (414 years ago), he received the title of Yamashiro no Kami at the age of 56 in Kanbun 7 (1667) (359 years ago). Based on the meiburi (style of signature), this sword is a masterpiece from around Kanbun 2 (1662) (364 years ago), when he was approximately 51 years old, before receiving the Yamashiro no Kami title. It is said he also studied sword-making under Yamato no Kami Yasusada in Edo. As he devised his own tameshigiri methods, his swords are rated as Ryowazamono for their superb cutting ability. Because he was an okakae-kaji (retained smith) for the Date clan, he originally forged this as a long 2-shaku 7-sun senjin-yo (battlefield) sword at the request of the Lord. However, a high-ranking samurai connected to later Date lords shortened it to match his own kenpo (swordsmanship) style for use as a saryo (personal wear). The sugata follows the family tradition of the Yamato Hosho school, featuring a high shinogi, a noticeable difference between the motohaba and sakihaba, and a slightly shallow sori, presenting an enchanting and excellent form. The jigane is forged in the traditional Yamato Hosho masame-hada, with abundant chikei and ji-nie appearing along the masame grain. The hamon is a small-nie based notare-midare with kuichigai-ba and niju-ba along the habuchi. It displays many uchinoke along the habuchi, similar to Mikazuki Munechika, creating a wonderfully attractive blade. The boshi is elegantly finished in komaru, resulting in a meito of magnificent dignity. The Kunikane lineage continued as prestigious okakae-kaji for the Sendai Date family until the 14th generation at the end of the Edo period. The koshirae features a kuro-ro-kizami-saya (black lacquer notched scabbard). The tsuba is a Mogarashi Soten work depicting warriors with a luxurious kin-fukurin (gold rim). The menuki are shakudo-ji with a floral design, the fuchi is shakudo-ji with a floral design, and the kashira is made of horn, forming a denchu-koshirae (palace mount) that adds further splendor to this meito by the 2nd generation Oshu Sendai-ju Kunikane. We received this sword from an elderly connoisseur who purchased it at a high price long ago. As they have aged, they requested that we pass this rare and precious work by the 2nd generation Kunikane to a younger generation at an affordable price. Therefore, we are offering it at a special discount. Please enjoy this opportunity.
NihontoWatchEdo · nagasa 73.4cm · sori 0.4cm
Sendai Kunikane, Mutsu (Sendai Shinto) · Rikuzen · around 1644-1670
Fujishiro Jo saku · Tōken Taikan top 31%
2 pieces on the market now
Yamashiro-no-kami Fujiwara Kunikane, the second of the Sendai line, was born in Keicho 17 (1612), succeeded to the house in Shoho 2 (1645) at the age of thirty-four, received the Yamashiro-no-kami title in Kanbun 7 (1667), and died in Kanbun 12 (1672) aged sixty-one. He was the eldest son of the founder, the shodai Yamashiro-daijo Kunikane, who claimed descent from the late line of Yamato Hosho, served Date Masamune of Sendai, and by his lord's order went up to Kyoto to study under Etchu-no-kami Masatoshi before receiving the Yamashiro-daijo title in Kanbun 3 (1626). The Kunikane name was the standing forge of the Date house, and across both generations its identity rests on a single inherited manner: the masame forging of the Yamato Hosho tradition, tempered in suguha. The published sources call this his hereditary specialty, the family's transmitted Hosho-style masame at which he was particularly accomplished in the straight temper, and they rate the second generation a master of suguha second only to his father.
His hand is recognized first in the jigane. The blade is a shinogi-zukuri katana with iori-mune, the curvature shallow in the Kanbun manner and the kissaki medium, and over its whole length runs a masame-hada forged tight and well ordered, with ji-nie laid and chikei entering along the masame. This straight-grain jigane is the first of the two Hosho marks, a forging almost no other Shinto school takes as its default, and the second mark is set into it: a chu-suguha frayed at the habuchi into hotsure, mixing kuichigai-ba and a tendency to nijuba, with sunagashi and kinsuji running freely along the masame, the nioi deep and the nioiguchi bright and clear with ko-nie. Where the suguha and the masame both appear on every blade on record, the two together are the surest reading of the smith.
The boshi runs straight, sweeping into hakikake, and closes as often in a yakizume without turnback as in a small round, a Yamato-Hosho boshi habit that follows from the masame and the suguha rather than against them. To this inherited core the published sources add a tell peculiar to the Kunikane hand, and name it as such: a mizukage rising from below the hamachi, a faint pale reflection that on the broad, slightly long late blades connects and runs as an utsuri-like aspect across the lower half. Of one Kanbun katana they write that 「区下より水影が立っているが, 初代同様二代にも見る手くせであり」[[c:1]], a habit seen in the second generation as in the founder, and they note alongside it that the nakago file is sometimes finished as a plain, simplified kesho, another of the points to watch in his work. On that same wide blade the masame stands a little on the ura, the ji-nie laid dust-fine and thick, the chikei finely formed.
Against the calm suguha the published sources record that the second generation also leaves a gunome-midare. On these the chu-suguha base mixes in small gunome and a shallow notare, ashi entering and the habuchi frayed, and one wide, long blade carries a suguha that swells into a large, shallow undulation with ko-nie and ara-nie and a nijuba tendency. The sources frame this as the exception within a hand whose default is the straight temper, writing that 「家伝の保昌流の柾目鍍を得意とし」 he was particularly skilled at suguha, with slight gunome-midare seen at times besides. A small register within the corpus carries the founder's own signatures rather than the second generation's, the go Yokei and the title Yamashiro-daijo: blades signed Yamashiro-daijo Fujiwara Yokei Kunikane, one dated Keian 1 (1648), in the same Hosho idiom but read with a founder's accent, the koshi-zori standing high with funbari, the masame tending to stand, the suguha a ko-nie chu-suguha damp and frayed with sunagashi following.
What sets his work apart within the broad world of Kanbun Shinto is not a flourish but the consistency of the Hosho reading: the masame carried the length of the blade, the quiet suguha laid over it, the swept yakizume boshi, and the mizukage below the machi. The published sources keep his standing honestly relative to the founder. They write of one second-generation katana that it is in fact forceful and that its quality is 「殆んど初代に劣らない」[[c:3]], scarcely inferior to the first generation, and of his masame finest pieces that some approach the shodai while his ordinary technique does not equal him. The signature itself is a connoisseur's field: in the second generation's mei the horizontal strokes are driven hard and pressed at their close so that they read like the character ichi, and within the character 包 the inner element is cut in a distinctive form, both, the sources say, important features when reading a Kunikane signature.
Kunikane is rated Jo-saku by Fujishiro. His record is held entirely in the Juyo tier, ten katana of the second generation on record there, with two further blades under the founder's Yokei signature reaching the prewar Juyo Bijutsuhin. He holds no National Treasure and no Important Cultural Property, so the work that can be encountered is the designated Juyo katana, and these come to market only from time to time and with patience, a steady Sendai-Shinto name rather than a rarity locked wholly away. The published sources single out the well-forged, in-the-style pieces as typical and representative of the second generation, one of which, worn at the side of Kan Shinbei, carries a gold-inlaid cutting-test inscription dated Kanbun 11 (1671) and is valued as a documentary representative work. Of his quietest masame katana the sources write that it is 「上品に静温に仕上げている」[[c:4]], finished with refined elegance and a quiet warmth. Among recorded owners of his blades are Kurokawa Fukusaburo and the Kurokawa Institute for Ancient Cultures, which hold the two Yokei-signed Juyo Bijutsuhin, and Itaya Taneo.
Where Kunikane 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.
Select a lens to see how it's measured.
Years he was demonstrably active, proven by signed-and-dated blades
Yamato-den · Rikuzen
12 pieces on the market now
Below Sendai Castle, at Kokubu Wakabayashi in Miyagi District of Ōshū (later Rikuzen, present-day Sendai), the first Kunikane established a forge that served the Date house across the early shintō period. The setsumei record him as a member of the Hongō family, first called Genzō and later Yoshinosuke, born in Bunroku 1 (1592), who claimed descent from a later branch of Yamato Hōshō Gorō. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Kunikane國包 | 1624-1644 | 33 |
| Kunikane國包 | 1644-1670 | 12 |
| Kaneshige包重 | 1661-1673 | 1 |
| Tomosuke倫助 | 1661-1673 | 1 |
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.
NBTHK official siteFor returns due to customer circumstances, the cost is the customer's responsibility. For returns due to our mis-shipment or a defective item, we bear the cost.
