Early Saotome tsubaAlbumsEarly Saotome tsuba
4 Photos · Updated 10 months ago
This piece measures 83.6mm (H) X 79.0mm (W) X 2.54mm (T, nakago ana), 3.81mm (T, mimi). The piece is made from this really hard, blackish iron. No folding of the plate is obvious, but the iron is so hard/well forged I’m not sure it would be obvious. I think perhaps its a little overcleaned (though maybe that’s just me, as I’ve gotten more observant about this over the years), but the piece is really nice in hand. Of note is that somebody stuck a gimei Nobuiye on it (EDIT: see comments below). The mei is almost scratched rather than carved – since it clearly has nothing to do with the piec, I didn’t bother to -re light it to get a good mei image – I did include a close-up though. As an aside here, some people would obliterate this to aid in eventual resale. I won’t be doing that as I feel strongly that this type of alteration steals the piece’s voice/history. This was added for a reason at some point, and… I’d actually posit that it was added during meiji period when when a great many old pieces got fake mei to aid in sales to ignorant gaijin, but that’s still an interesting bit of history. In any case, the prior owner dated it to the late Muromachi period, which seems right to me as well. EDIT: as in a later posting, I studied the mei under the microscope, and I now believe its original to the piece (microphotograph of mei is here: https://www.facebook.com/266005023454853/photos/a.266009073454448.82484.266005023454853/1127046177350729/?type=3&theater ). I also later found out that Bob Haynes owned this piece for a while, and never saw the signature (he was bit astonished when I pointed it out – so don’t feel bad when you miss one… :-) )