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About the maker

Ko-Bizen Sukekane助包

Sukekane is a Ko-Bizen swordsmith of the late Heian to early Kamakura period, his name one of the school's enduring puzzles. Two Jūyō-Bijutsuhin tachi designated in 1935, one signed in six characters "Bizen no Kuni Sukekane saku" and held by the Matsudaira house, the other a small-signature blade from the Sakai house, fix him in the historical record; the published sources note that the name Sukekane is found among both the Ko-Bizen group and the Fukuoka Ichimonji line, and that there were likely three or four smiths who shared it. The man profiled here is the Ko-Bizen one, the archaic hand. The published commentary draws the distinction plainly: of the two Sukekane, "the former is an archaic, classical small-midare of nie-based workmanship, whereas the latter forges flamboyant chōji-based midare in which a sense of technical artifice is felt" (前者が沸出来の古雅な小乱の出来であるのに対して後者は丁子の華やかな乱刃を焼き技巧味が感ぜられる). His is the quiet side of the divide. His characteristic temper is a *suguha*-toned small *midare*. Over it run *ko-chōji*, *ko-gunome* and *ko-notare*, with *ashi* and *yō* entering well, the work *nie*-based, with *sunagashi* and fine *kinsuji* coursing through and, on a recurring group, *nijūba* and even *sanjūba* running intermittently along the upper edge. This is not the regular clove-flower of the Ichimonji smiths but the calm, antique line the published sources call the manner of old Bizen, where "flamboyant *midare* is uncommon" (総じて華やかに乱れるものは少なく) and "a *suguha*-toned base with shallow *notare* predominates" (直刃調が浅いのたれを基調とする). The *bōshi* answers the edge below it, running straight to a *ko-maru* or finishing in a *yakizume*-like sweep with *hakikake*, sometimes with *yubashiri* drifting at the turn. The *jigane* is the constant. He forges a well-packed *itame* mixed with *mokume*, the grain standing a little, with *ji-nie* and *chikei* entering frequently, and a clear *midare-utsuri* rising in the ji. On the finest of them the reflection thickens into the patchy *jifu-utsuri* of old Bizen steel. Over that *jigane* the *nioiguchi* is bright and clear, and the *ha* carries thick *ko-nie*. The published sources prize exactly this antique flavor, calling one Tokubetsu-Jūyō tachi a work of "old-scented workmanship characteristic of Ko-Bizen" (古備前物としての古香な出来口), the *ji* and *ha* carrying a savory depth of taste. Within his own record the work divides into two registers of one hand. The typical Sukekane is a slender tachi, *ubu* where it survives so or shortened yet keeping a high *koshizori* with *funbari*, the point a compact *ko-kissaki*, the temper a calm *suguha*-toned *ko-midare*. On his outstanding signed tachi the line opens out: a broad *suguha* into which *chōji*, *gunome* and angular elements are set, flowering into a brilliant *midare* that the judges single out, one such piece called "a particularly outstanding achievement" that strikingly manifests the features of Ko-Bizen. The signature is its own scholarly question. The published commentary records small, intermediate and large hands, and notes that while the convention treats small signatures as Ko-Bizen and large ones as Ichimonji, some Ichimonji works carry small signatures too, so that "a distinction based on the signature alone is not necessarily easy" (銘振りからは、必ずしもその区別は容易とはいえない). What sets the Ko-Bizen Sukekane apart from his Ichimonji namesake is exactly this *nie*-based restraint. His bright *midare-utsuri*, his *suguha*-toned small *midare* with its *nijūba* and deep *nie*, and the archaic, slightly drooping tachi shape with its *ko-kissaki* are read as Ko-Bizen, while the flamboyant chōji and the air of technical display belong to the other hand. On the *ō-suriage mumei* katana and wakizashi attributed to him, the published sources affirm the appraisal from the period and the Ko-Bizen workmanship rather than from any single personal tell, accepting the traditional attribution where the *jigane* and *hamon* are markedly archaic in tone. His blades stand at the root of the Bizen line, before the school's great flowering at Fukuoka. For the collector he is a rare early name. Fujishiro grades him Jō-jō saku, and the *Tōkō Taikan* values his work near the top of its scale. He has no National Treasure of his own Ko-Bizen hand; his record runs instead through the Important Cultural Property rank and the prewar Jūyō-Bijutsuhin, with two blades in the Tokubetsu-Jūyō and twenty-two in the Jūyō. Because his extant works are so few, the published sources call his best signed tachi documentary material of very high value for understanding him at all. His blades carry distinguished provenance, transmitted in the domain era through the Satake house of Akita, the Tokugawa and Matsudaira families, the Sakai house of Tadakatsu, the Ikeda of Inshū, and bearing in one case the gold-inlaid ownership name of Takeda Genshinren. Most are long held, not traded; only the Jūyō and Tokubetsu-Jūyō tier ever moves, and even then a signed Ko-Bizen Sukekane comes to light only seldom. A privately held example, of recorded whereabouts, is a notable thing for a collector to encounter, a document of how Bizen began.

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