NihontoWatchNihontoWatchThese are menuki by Toshinaga that take the founding myths of our nation as their theme. When encountering a work like this, one's thoughts first expand to the origins of our land. Let us set aside ideological, religious, and political issues for a moment. If we view records such as the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, along with ruins and artifacts, as unbiased tales of old, we can sense the ancient people's view of nature, which must be described as scientifically unknown. In every part of the legends, one can understand that the fear of nature behind the birth of the gods and the characteristics of our land, such as being surrounded by the sea, are shown. The myth of Kuniumi (the birth of the land) by Izanagi no Mikoto and Izanami no Mikoto shows that essence. Depicted in these menuki are the figures of the two deities, Izanagi no Mikoto and Izanami no Mikoto, who received the command from the Amatsu Kami to create the land. Izanagi no Mikoto, carrying a sword on his back, points his left hand toward the heavens and places his right hand on his abdomen, while Izanami no Mikoto has both hands clasped at her abdomen. The scene is carved and depicted with the waves of the great ocean surging toward both deities and clouds rising in the sky, expressing that the boundary between heaven and earth has not yet been determined. After this, the two deities reached the Ama no Ukihashi and, using the Ama no Nuboko given by the Amatsu Kami, stirred the chaotic sea, creating Onogoroshima from the dripping mud. Descending to this Onogoroshima, the two deities recognized the difference between male and female for the first time, and circling the Ama no Mihashira, they gave birth to all things and various deities. The most important is our land called Oyashima, consisting of Awaji no Ho no Sawake no Shima (Awaji Island), Iyo no Futana no Shima (Shikoku), Oki no Mitsugo no Shima (Oki Islands), Tsukushi no Shima (Kyushu), Iki no Shima (Iki Island), Tsushima (Tsushima), Sado no Shima (Sado Island), and Oyamato Toyoakitsu Shima (Honshu). Next, they gave birth to various deities related to the movement of the heavens, the earth, and the weather, such as Amaterasu Omikami, Tsukuyomi no Mikoto, and Takehayasusa no O no Mikoto, clarifying the relationship with the human world. Crafted in a slightly distorted circular shape of shakudo ji with notches provided around the perimeter, clouds are carved and depicted at the top and waves at the bottom, and in the center, where fine nanako has been applied, the two deities are carved in a solemn appearance. The material of solid black shakudo ji without the use of iroe is also solemn, making the existence of the two deities precious. In particular, the state of the nanako ji struck in a circular pattern is like a divine halo, or perhaps reminiscent of the sun's disk, clearly expressing divine power. The figures of the two deities are precise despite the extremely small space, the carving style is sharp and rich in three-dimensional feel, and the point that the facial features and eye expressions are slightly different is skillful. In the Edo period, this scene was expressed in paintings by many artists (photo example). This work is a takabori consisting only of solid black shakudo, different from those paintings that depicted details using fine brushes on large screens, and the technical aspect of expressing three-dimensionality in a space of less than one sun is also a major factor in its charm. Now, regarding the ideological aspect in the Edo period, Motoori Norinaga, who wrote the Kojikiden, had not yet appeared in the era when the maker of these menuki, Toshinaga, was active; if one were to name a contemporary thinker, it would perhaps be Arai Hakuseki of the Koshitsu. Arai Hakuseki held medieval views such as Amaterasu Omikami being a male deity, and the distance from the worldview expressed by these menuki is an interesting point. Sword fittings depicting the two deities Izanagi no Mikoto and Izanami no Mikoto are extremely rare and precious. It is clear from the historical background of production that Toshinaga was not influenced by these early modern ideologies. Rather, it is thought that he perceived these two deities with a recognition close to a classical view of nature, and it could be said that this is a work that should be appreciated slightly apart from the theology that evolved greatly during the Edo period. These menuki, which were handed down in the Matsuzawa family of Edo, were acquired by Mr. Honami Ringa around Taisho 3 or 4 and delivered to the venerable Sugiyama Shigemaru of Sonnichian, but when Sugiyama boasted of them to Mr. Akaboshi Tetsuma, he was earnestly entreated and ended up giving them as a gift, and later in the early Showa period, they became the property of Mr. Aoki Tetsutaro. A piece of stationery recording that Amiya Soemon, who was well-versed in kodogu, purchased this remains, and "Shinpin" (divine work) is written on the box inscription.
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Machibori · Edo
Nara Toshinaga (利寿), whose common name was Tahei, was born in Kanbun 7 (1667) and died in Genbun 1 (1736) at the age of seventy. One record names him a pupil of the Edo Nara master Toshinaga written 利永, the fourth generation of the school, and places his house at Honjo in Edo. With Tsuchiya Yasuchika and Sugiura Joi he is counted among the Nara Sansaku, the three celebrated masters of the Nara school, and the published sources rank him first among them: the eldest of the three and, in their words, the most skilled[[c:1]]. One commentary calls him the master "praised as first in the Nara school"[[c:2]], another sets him at "the summit of the Nara school"[[c:3]].
What the NBTHK names, again and again, is the force of his chisel. Of a kozuka with a tiger beside a waterfall it writes of "carving charged with power into every corner"[[c:4]], of his lions that their leaping high relief is "worth a second look" and "one of the highlights of Toshinaga"[[c:5]]. His relief is high and sukidashi, cut back from the plate so that the figure stands proud, and it is enriched with gold, silver, suaka and shibuichi colour inlay. On a Fujito battle kozuka the waves are carved in iron with finely graded sukidashi relief, the figures raised higher still, and the colour kept to a minimum.
His materials are wide. He works shakudo, iron, shibuichi, oborogin and roughened suaka, very often with an ishime texture that the published sources call his own[[c:6]]. Brass is singled out: of a Jurojin-and-tortoise fuchigashira they write that brass worked in sukidashi is "the method in which this maker excelled"[[c:7]]. Some pieces are finished with lacquer laid over parts of the plate, a Nara touch that darkens the oborogin or the copper. His output is dominated by fuchigashira, the fuchi low-waisted and slightly tall in the ichimonji manner, and the commentary repeats that "tsuba and kozuka are scarce, and fuchigashira are many"[[c:8]]. His tsuba are thick, and an early record doubts that they number more than ten; among them the Omori Hikoshichi and the Mure Takamatsu tsuba are famous.
His subjects run in two registers. The first is the human figure. Shoki and the oni are his particular theme, and the commentary says that "the expressions of Shoki and the oni are especially his own"[[c:9]]. Jurojin with a minogame tortoise is another subject he favoured, with several tsuba and fuchigashira of similar design surviving. Bishamonten, the Three Kingdoms, the Fujito crossing and the vanguard at the Uji river complete it. Of his mounted warriors the NBTHK writes that they follow the Goto manner but are "more true to life than the warriors of the Goto house"[[c:10]]. The second register is birds and beasts: fighting cocks with chicks at their feet, a tiger crouched above a falling torrent, a parent tiger swimming a raging current while its cub crouches on the bank, a lion with peony, and returning geese descending across a brass sky worked smooth in sukidashi.
Through both registers runs a contrast of movement and stillness. On the waterfall kozuka the published sources read the water as movement and the crouching tiger as stillness, a tiger "watching intently"[[c:11]] and about to spring. On one gamecock fuchigashira the bird is not in its fighting pose: beak closed and feathers lowered, it is read as the still "wooden cock" of the old tale, set against the combative cocks of his other works. A Uji river fuchigashira pairs his fuchi with a kashira added in the late Edo period by Toryusai Seiju.
His record numbers thirty designated works: three Important Cultural Properties, four at Tokubetsu Juyo, twenty at Juyo, and three recognised before the war as Juyo Bijutsuhin. The three Important Cultural Properties are national patrimony and do not change hands. The prewar records name Hosokawa Moritatsu, whose set is now with the Eisei Bunko, and Furukawa Toranosuke; a Jurojin fuchigashira comes from the Ryushido collection of Mitsumura Toshimo with a box inscribed by Unno Shomin in Meiji 37 (1904). A Tokubetsu Juyo or Juyo fuchigashira appears from time to time, a tsuba or kozuka far more seldom.
Where Toshinaga stands among comparable artisans: across all of nihontō, and within tradition, era, and period. The tiers (Foremost · Leading · Major · Notable) weigh official designations from the NBTHK and Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs, together with historical honors of lasting repute such as the Sansaku and Meibutsu-chō.
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Machibori · Edo
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The Nara school of kinko (metalwork) emerged in the mid-Edo period as one of the most celebrated independent traditions of sword-fitting craftsmanship, its masters working outside the patronage structures that governed the Goto house. The school coalesced around the figure of Nara Toshihisa (1667--1736), also known as Tahee, who as head master during its creative zenith defined the mature idiom of the lineage. Though the school's origins are often traced through the successive generations of the Nara family beginning with Toshiharu, its lasting fame rests upon the Nara sansaku — the Three Masters of Nara: Toshihisa, Tsuchiya Yasuchika, and Sugiura Joi. " Joi (1701--1761), trained under Juei in the lineage of Toshiharu, rose to become the third pillar of this triumvirate. Together, and joined by masters of allied lineages such as Hayashi Shigemitsu of the Higo kinko tradition, the Nara school and its circle represent the highest achievement of independent metalwork in the Edo period. The collective technical vocabulary of the Nara school encompasses an extraordinary breadth of materials and methods. Its masters worked in iron, shakudo, shibuichi, brass (shinchu), refined copper (suaka), and oborogin, treating surfaces as polished grounds (migaki-ji), hammered textures (tsuchime-ji), and stone-grain finishes (ishime-ji) — the latter developed by Toshihisa into a distinctive personal manner. The school's carving methods span the full spectrum: sukidashi-bori modeled relief, takabori high relief, the thread-fine line work of kebori, and the single-stroke katakiribori incision. " Yet individual specialties distinguish the masters within this shared vocabulary.
Toshihisa's art finds its fullest expression in sukidashi takabori — relief carving in which figures are raised with subtly graduated heights to produce an illusion of spatial depth — executed against his richly textured ishime-ji grounds. Joi developed nikuaibori, a modulated relief technique of unrivaled refinement, producing entire compositions through chisel work alone on polished oborogin grounds, dispensing with inlay and colored-metal accents. Yasuchika's range is perhaps the broadest, encompassing the distinctive daigaku-gata iron tsuba conceived for his patron and kozuka that "draw forth a small universe" within a confined surface, while his late works signed with the art name Tou achieve an austere, detached realm the NBTHK terms kotan. The legacy of the Nara school rests on the singular ability of its masters to transcend decorative function and achieve genuine artistic expression within the confines of sword fittings. Toshihisa, as the senior figure among the sansaku, established the standard of dignified, powerfully carved relief against richly textured grounds, and his figural subjects — gamecocks, tigers, Bishamonten — consistently achieve what NBTHK scholarship identifies as the philosophical duality of do (movement) and sei (stillness) within a single composition. " Joi, working primarily in the intimate format of the kozuka, achieved expressive authority through the sheer subtlety of his nikuaibori chisel work — his celebrated lion-and-cub compositions existing in closely related versions across multiple designations and published in the canonical reference Tagane no Hana. That the school also attracted masters of allied provincial traditions — Hayashi Shigemitsu of Higo, whose iron tsuba display the characteristic murasaki-sabi patina and "somewhat gentler feeling" that distinguishes the second generation from the founder Matahichi — attests to its gravitational influence on Edo-period metalwork as a whole. Across the school's production, the NBTHK's evaluative language converges on a consistent theme: compositional intelligence, technical command across the full range of materials and carving methods, and an expressive depth that elevates the finest works from accomplished craft to art of the highest order. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Yasuchika安親 | — | 87 |
| Toshinaga利寿 | — | 30 |
| Joi乗意 | — | 12 |
| Shigeharu重治 | — | 0 |
| Toshiyoshi利善 | — | 0 |
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