Sukekuni is the Kokubunji-group smith of Bingo Province, his career fixed by a run of dated blades that carry the eras Tokuji, Genko, Karyaku, Gentoku and Kenmu, placing him from the close of the Kamakura period into the Nanbokucho years. His is one of the standing province problems of the kantei room. Because even his long signatures cut the province only as Bishu (備州), and the Edo-period swordbooks read that single character as Bizen, he was transmitted for centuries as a Bizen Kokubunji smith, and the Kokon Meizukushi named him the founder of the Hokke lineage. The published sources now correct this to Bingo for three reasons: late-Kamakura and Nanbokucho Bingo work customarily cut the province as Bishu, with Bingo no kuni appearing only from the Muromachi period; the Koto Meizukushi Taizen records his residence at Anna Tojo, and the Bingo Kokubunji stood in that Anna district; and the genealogies set this Kokubunji line apart from the Mihara group. The recognition of his hand rests not on shape but on the ji and ha, for his construction stays orthodox, without the broad shinogi-ji and high shinogi by which old Mihara announces itself.
His hand is best read as one smith working in three registers that the published sources name again and again. The first and most characteristic is a suguha or fine hoso-suguha carrying a strong Yamato temperament, and the commentary states it plainly, that 'his style, like that of Mihara works, possesses a Yamato temperament'[[c:1]]. Over an itame that flows and tends to masame, the grain standing, with ji-nie adhering and a whitish shirake-utsuri rising, he tempers a narrow suguha whose habuchi frequently frays into hotsure, with ko-ashi and yo entering, sunagashi and kinsuji running, and ko-nie well laid. The masame-gakari of his steel is the tell that ties him to Mihara and holds him apart from the pure itame of mainstream Bizen, and a reverse inclination, the saka-gokoro that slants his gunome and ashi toward the base, runs through the temper from his earliest dated work.
The jigane is where his two traditions meet. Across the Mihara-toned pieces the steel is an itame flowing to masame, the grain raised, with ji-nie and the whitish utsuri of Bingo; but on the Bizen-leaning blades the ji throws up a mottled, jifu-like utsuri that the published sources liken to the Unrui group, 'work in a suguha manner with a jifu reflection that calls to mind the Unrui of Bizen'[[c:2]]. That jifu-utsuri is the single Bizen trait that distinguishes him within the Yamato-influenced Bingo schools. The boshi runs straight to a ko-maru or finishes in a yakizume-toned sweep with hakikake, and on the ji the published sources find a steel of somewhat dark tone, with chikei entering on the better-forged examples.
The third register the commentary names is a somewhat more decorative midare, a feature it notes is scarcely seen in old Mihara. Into the suguha base he mixes ko-choji, gunome, angular and pointed elements, widening in places to a ko-midare, the whole running saka-gokoro with saka-ashi, ashi and yo frequent, ko-nie well laid and yubashiri appearing, with kinsuji and sunagashi within the ha. The dated works anchor these registers in time: the Genko 3 ubu tachi of 1323 shows the Mihara-toned suguha at its clearest, while the rare Karyaku 2 tanto of 1327 carries the same hand at small scale. The published sources read the more animated tachi against the school directly, observing that this mixing of many kinds of teeth into a suguha base 'corresponds closely to the Gentoku-dated tachi' and is 'a stylistic mode showing a midare-ba scarcely encountered in Ko-Mihara'.
What sets him apart from his neighbours is exactly what the judges name. He stands within the Yamato-influenced Bingo orbit beside the old Mihara smiths, sharing their suguha and standing masame, yet held apart from them by the more decorative midare and by the jifu-like utsuri recalling Bizen Unrui. The published sources describe his working domain as one 'in which Bizen-den and Yamato-den are intermingled'[[c:3]], with the characteristics of Kokubunji Sukekuni shown in both ji and ha, and for that reason they affirm his many o-suriage mumei attributions. Even where a suguha piece at first glance recalls Ko-Mihara, the commentary takes care to note that the construction differs, being orthodox rather than the broad-shinogi Mihara shape; of one such katana it concludes that its appearance, which 'at first glance recalls old Mihara, expresses one facet of Sukekuni's style'[[c:4]].
For the collector Sukekuni is a name encountered seldom and held with care. Fujishiro grades him Jo-jo saku. He has no National Treasures and no Important Cultural Properties; his record runs instead through the Juyo tier, where twenty of his blades are designated, and through the prewar Juyo Bijutsuhin, which holds three more, among them the Gentoku 1 tachi and a Karyaku 2 tanto. Signed works are extremely few, most of them tachi, and the published sources call surviving tanto by this smith exceedingly rare, 'examples by this maker in tanto form being exceedingly rare'[[c:5]], so a dated piece is prized as research material. His blades have passed through long-held private collections rather than museums: the Juyo Bijutsuhin tachi were held by Saito Makoto and by Takashima Tatsunosuke, and the orikaeshi-mei tachi by Okajima Kichiro, while one Juyo Bijutsuhin blade is recorded as having been 'presented as a memento among the belongings of Ito Hirobumi'[[c:6]]. Held mostly in private hands and seldom traded, a signed and dated Kokubunji Sukekuni comes to light only from time to time, a quiet but well-documented witness to the Yamato-influenced swordmaking of late-Kamakura Bingo.
