Edo was the sword’s age of connoisseurship: the Hon’ami appraisers, the shogunal register of famous blades of 1719, and a thriving literature turned the sword into an object of study even as it ceased to be drawn in war.
NihontoWatchNihontoWatchQ408. Ubu (unshortened) wakizashi signed, Yokoyama Kozuke Daijo Fujiwara Sukesada, and on the ura, Bishu Osafune Junin. Nagasa: 17 1/8″ 43.3 cm. Sori: 1.4 cm. Moto haba: 2.6 cm. Moto kasane: .7 cm. Saki haba: 1.8 cm. Saki kasane: .5 cm. Nakago nagasa: 5″ 13 cm. Overall in koshirae: 27 1/4″ 69.5 cm. Shinogi zukuri, koshi sori, iore mune, chu kissaki. The hada is tight ko-itame with a few more prominent mokume. The hamon begins with a straight yaki-dashi and becomes a deeply undulating midare with choji, juka chiji, and yo, all worked in a consistent nioi-guchi with the slightest hint of ko-nie. The boshi is suguba ending in a swept o-maru and short kaeri. The sword comes mounted with an elaborate gold foil habaki and, with the exception of a few minor instances of slightly coarse grain, it is flawless. This sword comes with a Hozon paper from the NBTHK in Tokyo, dated 1991 and attesting to the signature and quality of work. The polish is intact except for one spot. The koshirae also is papered, NBTHK Hozon from 1991, and is near pristine. A former owner had the paper translated; I will take from that for the details to follow. The black lacquer saya (kuro roiro nuri saya) is intact except for a bit of chipping at the pocket for kotsuka. There is a shakudo nanako kogai with gold, silver, & shakudo inlay: bird and boat. There is no kotsuka. The iron tsuba has gold, silver, and copper inlay. The paper says: Hotei karashu zu (design of Hotei, Fortune Man) tate-maru shape, iron sukai style, takabori iroe, signed Kakujyorin Keirin-Sai Fujiwara Tadayuki / Koreo Kiru (Shinshinto period tsuba, smith in Hikone Soten influence and copy). There are 2 gold foil seppa, one of which is missing a bit of the foil. The fuchi kashira are Soten School also. The menuki are gold filled dragons and the handle wrap is in mint condition. The sword will arrive in a blue & gold silk brocade bag, also in fine condition. Kozuke Daijo Sukesada was born in 1633, he received his title in 1664, and he passed on in 1721. According to the Nihonto Koza, he was the most famous of the Edo period smiths who signed Sukesada. This is a nicely mounted wakizashi by a well respeced smith and in excellent condition: a lot to like. 2 pounds, 4 ounces.
NihontoWatchYokoyama Kōzuke no Daijō Sukesada祐定
Offered by Japanese Sword Books and Tsuba
This piece has sold
Get an email when a new Yokoyama Kōzuke no Daijō Sukesada piece hits the market.
Bizen-den · Bizen · around 1661-1704
Fujishiro Jo-jo saku · Tōken Taikan top 8%
1 piece on the market now
Bizen-den · Bizen
Phase: Sue-Bizen末備前· 1441–1596
54 pieces on the market now
The last great chapter of Osafune unfolds in the Eisho and Tenbun years of the late Muromachi, when the riverside workshop turned its accumulated craft toward an age of constant war. Where Oei-Bizen had looked backward, reviving the tachi shape and the choji temper of the Kamakura masters under Yasumitsu and Morimitsu, Sue-Bizen faces forward into Sengoku demand. The leading hands carry the same family characters one generation further: the Sukesada group, headed by Yosazaemon-no-jo Sukesada and the Hikobee-jo Sukesada said to be his father, alongside Katsumitsu (often Jirozaemon-no-jo), Munemitsu, Tadamitsu of the Heiroemon-jo line, and the Kiyomitsu smiths Magoemon-no-jo and Gorozaemon-no-jo. The setsumei draw a sharp line through their output. Commissioned blades, chumon-uchi, were signed with full zokumyo, dated, and frequently inscribed with the name of the ordering party, as on the Katsumitsu and Sadamitsu naginata of Meio 8 made for the Miyake of Kojima, a house that fed into the Ukita. Below them ran the bulk trade of kazu-uchimono, the arms that supplied the warring provinces, and it is the chumon-uchi masters that the designations preserve. What the steel does in this window is distinct from every earlier Osafune register. The shape is the uchigatana: wide mihaba with thick kasane, pronounced sakizori, an extended chu-kissaki or o-kissaki, and a short nakago suited to the katate-uchi one-handed draw, a body unlike the koshizori tachi of Ko-Osafune or the broad Nanbokucho profile of Soden-Bizen. The forging tightens into ko-itame over which a midare-utsuri stands faintly rather than vividly, weaker than the bright reflection of the founding generation.
The signature temper is the open-waisted koshi-no-hiraita gunome, splitting at the heads into fukushiki compound midare and mixed with togariba and choji; it is nioi-based with ko-nie and a bright nioiguchi, with ashi, yo, kinsuji and small tobiyaki worked through. Against this, Soden-Bizen had pushed Soshu nie and notare, while the founders had tempered flamboyant choji over a vivid utsuri. Two specialties branch off the gunome base: the Kiyomitsu and Tadamitsu suguha, calm and tightly forged, and the hitatsura of high-tempered pieces with long muneyaki and yubashiri, seen in the warlord-smiths Akamatsu Masanori and Ishikawa Yukihisa. To kantei a Sue-Bizen blade is to read the body first and the temper second. The compact uchigatana sugata with thick kasane and a short tang fixes the late-Muromachi date; the faint utsuri over dense ko-itame keeps it in Bizen; the open-waisted compound gunome names the group. The masters then separate by hand: Katsumitsu is set apart by the abundant choji he folds into the gunome, yielding a more florid, brilliant dekiguchi than his peers; Tadamitsu and the Kiyomitsu smiths are read out by their suguha, with Magoemon-no-jo's itame standing in mokume to distinguish his ground. The cutting reputation is documented directly, as on the Hikobee-jo Sukesada katana of Keicho 5 carrying a tameshi inscription naming the tester Ichihara Hachibee. Provenance threads through the supplementary signatures: Masanori's reward blades cut for his retainers, the Miyake names tying the workshop to the Ukita, and the Shinjuro Sukesada whose few large works may have ended in the Tensho flood. The horimono carried from the mainline, bonji with rendai, Fudo Myoo, and shrine dedications, persist on these blades as a final mark of the line. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Sukesada祐定 | 1504-1551 | 72 |
| Sukesada祐定 | 1532-1583 | 18 |
| Sukesada祐定 | 1547-1592 | 8 |
| Sukesada祐定 | 1487-1521 | 5 |
| Sukesada祐定 | 1532-1573 | 3 |
The Edo period (1615 to 1868)
Edo was the sword’s age of connoisseurship: the Hon’ami appraisers, the shogunal register of famous blades of 1719, and a thriving literature turned the sword into an object of study even as it ceased to be drawn in war.
Certifies a genuine blade worth preserving: a signature confirmed correct, or, if unsigned, an era, province, and school that the NBTHK can reliably identify.
The NBTHK (Nihon Bijutsu Tōken Hozon Kyōkai, the Society for the Preservation of Japanese Art Swords) is a public-interest incorporated foundation founded in 1948 and supervised by Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs (Bunkachō); it is based at the Japanese Sword Museum in Tokyo. Its expert panels physically examine each submitted work (shinsa) and issue a certificate (kanteishō) ranking it by artistic and historical merit. NBTHK papers are the most widely recognized standard of authentication for Japanese swords and fittings.
NBTHK official site3-day return window from receipt.