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

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Tsuba depicting the battle of Uji river

Glossary (2)

nunome-zōgan, 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.

  • tsuba

    Japanese sword guard.

Location

    • currently in research collection

Objects are sometimes moved to a different location. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis. Contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular object on display, or would like to arrange an appointment to see an object in our reserve collections.

 

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)

    The Uji-gawa episode (Gempei Wars, 1184). On the front is the well-known design, with Kajiwara Kagesuye on the bank of the Uji, bow in teeth, tightening his horse's surcingle, while Sasaki Takatsuna rides across the stream with drawn sword trailing in the water (to cut through possible entanglements); above are mist-enshrouded hills and pine-trees. The design continues at the back with a view of the Uji bridge, partly destroyed. Kagesuye's face is encrusted in silver, and a few details are in silver wire nunome (hands, sword-blade, arrow-featherings); the edge is richly gilt. Signed in nunome gold wire: Yamashiro no jū ("resident of Yamashiro province") Fujiwara no Kiyonaga [Japanese text] with kakihan [Japanese text] [see EAX.10859].

    This artist appears to be unrecorded, though several of his guards are known, notably with a striking design of folding screens (one such in the V. and A. M.)

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