![](http://varshavskycollection.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/TSU-0324-allen130-375x400.jpg)
Jeanne Allen. Designer's guide to Samurai Patterns. Chronicle Books, San Francisco, 1990. Page 114, №130.
Jeanne Allen. Designer's guide to Samurai Patterns. Chronicle Books, San Francisco, 1990. Page 114, №130.
"Traditionally the old iron plate tsuba are classified into Ko Tosho (old sword smith), and Ko Katchushi (old armor maker) styles. It is sometimes difficult to justify attribution of a given tsuba to the Tosho or Katchushi category. Generally guards with raised rims or relatively complex designs tend to be assigned to Katchushi. This is basically a convention we follow out of habit and convenience." [...] "In Token Kai-Shi part six, Articles by Akiyama Kyusaku, Robert Haynes comments: "…from 1300 to 1400 over 150,000 MOUNTED swords were made in Japan for export alone. This means that over four tsuba a day were made for 100 years. This would mean that at least 3000 persons were making nothing but tsuba, let alone all the other fittings needed to complete these swords. With sword smiths, fittings makers and all the other artists need to complete a sword for export, at least 10,000 sword artists were working together, in any one of these hundred years."Reference to design can be found at "Japanese Swords and Tsuba from the Professor A. Z. Freeman and the Phyllis Sharpe Memorial collections" / Sotheby's, London, Thursday 10 April 1997; p. 18-19, lot № 37: "A Kamakura-bori Tsuba, Momoyama Period. ...pierced with two large formalised butterflies..."
A Kamakura-bori tsuba of octagonal form, Momoyama period.
TSU-0319. Ōnin ten-zōgan tsuba, Muromachi period.
Compton Collection, part II, pp. 14-15, №17: Kamakura-bori tsuba, ca. 1450.
Varshavsky Collection: TSU-0345.2018
Compton Collection, part II, pp. 14-15, №17: Kamakura-bori tsuba, ca. 1450.
Gary D. Murtha's tsuba on page 61.
Robert E. Haynes Catalog of April 9-11, 1982, № 36.
Iron tsuba of mokkō form decorated with inome (wild boar's eye) in openwork (sukashi) outlined with brass wire. The plate decorated with 3 concentric circular rows of brass dots in ten-zōgan. Center of the plate outlined with the inlaid circular brass wire (sen-zōgan). Some dots and the outline of inome on the face are missing.
Ōnin school. Unsigned. Mid Muromachi period, middle of the 15th century. Dimensions: 72.1 x 71.3 x 2.3 mm.Iron tsuba of round form with brown patina decorated with the design of a Buddhist temple bell (tsurigane) in openwork (sukashi), with details outlined in brass wire (sen-zōgan), the outer ring decorated with two rows of brass dots (ten-zōgan), and the bell details carved in sukidashi-bori as on kamakura-bori pieces.
Ōnin school. Unsigned. Late Muromachi period, 16th century. Dimensions: 88.8 x 88.3 x 3.0 mm. As per Merrily Baird, two legends are usually associated with the image of tsurigane, a large, suspended Buddhist bell: one is that of Dojo Temple (Dojo-ji), and the other is of Benkei stealing the tsurigane of Miidera Temple. Interestingly, this type of bell (tsurigane) is not described as a family crest (mon), while suzu and hansho bells are.TSU-0353: Tōshō tsuba, Muromachi period.
A kamakura-bori tsuba. Momoyama period. Freeman & Sharpe Memorial Collections.
The Henry D. Rosin Collection №9.
Lundgren Collection №7.