Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

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The A. H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba)

An unpublished catalogue of the A. H. Church collection of Japanese sword-guards (tsuba) by Albert James Koop.

The A.H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba) by Albert James Koop

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Mokkō-shaped tsuba with Chinese sage standing with his attendant in a landscape

  • Literature notes

    Mokkō; on the right, standing on a rocky ledge, is a Chinese sage with his boy attendant, both in very high relief incrustation of sentoku and tinted gold; the man gazes at the full moon, which, with its disk silvered in nunome, is represented in openwork with wisps of cloud; back modelled and engraved with rocks overhanging water; hammered-up edge. Signed on the front in bold armourer's style: Sakuyō no shi ("a samurai [in the service of Matsudaira, lord] of Tsuyama, capital of Mimasaka province") Miōchin Ki no (see Group IV) Muneyasu [Japanese text]; and, on the back; Ichijō kizamu ([Japanese text], "chiselled").

    As with No. 912, the two artists were contempories, and Ichijō was probably responsible for the addition of the two figures.
  • Details

    Associated place
    Asia Japan (place of creation)
    Date
    19th century (1801 - 1900)
    Material and technique
    iron, with cut and filed openwork decoration, and hammered-up edge; tang-hole plugged with soft metal, probably copper obverse: inlaid with sentoku and gold, and with silver nunome-zōgan decoration reverse: with engraved decoration
    Dimensions
    8.9 x 8.4 cm (height x width)
    Material index
    Technique index
    cut,
    Object type index
    No. of items
    1
    Credit line
    Bequeathed by Sir Arthur H. Church, 1915.
    Accession no.
    EAX.10914
  • Further reading

    Koop, Albert James, The A. H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba), 3 vols (Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, 1929), no. 914

Glossary (3)

nunome-zōgan, sentoku, tsuba

  • nunome-zōgan

    Decorative application of metal sheeting (generally of gold or silver) where the iron ground is first cross-hatched and the metal burnished on.

  • sentoku

    A kind of brass made from an alloy of copper, zinc, and tin.

  • tsuba

    Japanese sword guard.

Location

    • currently in research collection

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Publications online

  • The A.H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba) by Albert James Koop

    The A. H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba)

    Mokkō; on the right, standing on a rocky ledge, is a Chinese sage with his boy attendant, both in very high relief incrustation of sentoku and tinted gold; the man gazes at the full moon, which, with its disk silvered in nunome, is represented in openwork with wisps of cloud; back modelled and engraved with rocks overhanging water; hammered-up edge. Signed on the front in bold armourer's style: Sakuyō no shi ("a samurai [in the service of Matsudaira, lord] of Tsuyama, capital of Mimasaka province") Miōchin Ki no (see Group IV) Muneyasu [Japanese text]; and, on the back; Ichijō kizamu ([Japanese text], "chiselled").

    As with No. 912, the two artists were contempories, and Ichijō was probably responsible for the addition of the two figures.
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