After the Ōnin War broke the Ashikaga order, a century of Sengoku warfare armed nearly every province in Japan. The era rewards a discriminating eye: routine work exists in quantity, and beside it stand custom blades of the first rank.
This is a wakizashi by Sasshu Ju Kiyosuke, dated August 1532, from the late Muromachi period. Kiyosuke was a swordsmith of Satsuma, originally from the Naminohira school, and this blade exhibits distinctive characteristics of that tradition, including an extremely thin suguha and whitish utsuri. It comes with an NBTHK Tokubetsu Hozon Certificate and is housed in a shirasaya.
NihontoWatchmei · Naminohira · Muromachi · nagasa 50.48cm · sori 1.06cm
Wakimono · Satsuma · around 1501-1504
Tōken Taikan top 49%
1 piece on the market now
Wakimono · Satsuma
Phase: Sue-Naminohira末波平· 1393–1900
1 piece on the market now
Within the long Satsuma lineage that ran from the kotō into the shinshintō period, Sue-Naminohira (末波平) names the later chapter that carried the Naminohira tradition forward from the close of the Nanbokuchō age through the Muromachi era and into the early Edo workshops of Satsuma and neighbouring Ōsumi. The setsumei place a roster of dated smiths here: Sadatsugu of Satsuma and Haruyuki around the Tenmon era; Shigekane of Ōsumi, signing "Sūshū jū" and said also to have forged in Satsuma, dated Tenbun 14 (1545); Atsukura, who unusually prefixed the surname Fujiwara, active through Eiroku, Genki and Tenshō; and Sadakiyo, assigned to the Satō line, one of three branches (Hashiguchi, Ishigami, Satō) into which the group divides. The later Yuki-named continuation reaches into the Shintō period with Yasunetsune, counted as the fifty-ninth generation, with works dated to Enkyō and Meiwa. Throughout, the smiths worked under the Shimazu of southern Kyushu, geographically removed from the mainland centres. The setsumei describe a recurring later manner: a forging in which the hada stands out and flows with a whitish cast, a low-tempered suguha carrying hotsure, and a nioiguchi that tends toward urumi, a moist and soft quality, so that both ji and ha can read as subdued. This is framed as transmitting the manner of the forebears, the Ko-Naminohira tradition, and as conservative in character, where the early phase is described instead by a fine hoso-suguha with yaki-otoshi at the hamachi. Several pieces here, however, depart from that base by taking up the fashions of their day.
The setsumei record works in Sue-Bizen style with koshi-biraki gunome mixed with pointed and compound elements, and Atsukura's Sue-Sōshū-leaning blade with tobiyaki approaching a partial hitatsura. Given the thin corpus, these are presented as the documented range rather than as fixed traits of the phase. For kantei, the setsumei separate this phase from Ko-Naminohira by the standing, flowing hada and whitish tone paired with the low, urumi-tending suguha, against which the brighter, saeru and strongly nie-laden examples are flagged as exceptions worth noting. The koshi-biraki gunome with togariba, the katte-sagari or higaki yasurime, and the pointed midare-komi bōshi with hakikake recur as period markers, while sakizori and funbari register Muromachi sugata. Named hands anchor the group: Shigekane and Sadakiyo near Tenmon, Atsukura through Tenshō, and Haruyuki, whose work the setsumei compare to the Bungo Hirataka-Takada school, raising a possible contemporaneous link. The later Yasunetsune line then ties Sue-Naminohira to the Satsuma Shintō idiom, with wide, slightly long proportions and imo-tsuru nie-suji. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Shigeaki重鑑 | 1532-1555 | 1 |
| Nobuyasu延安 | 1532-1555 | 0 |
| Tadayuki忠行 | 1573-1592 | 0 |
| Yasutsugu安次 | 1532-1555 | 0 |
| Kiyosuke清左 | 1501-1504 | 0 |
The Muromachi period (1392 to 1573)
After the Ōnin War broke the Ashikaga order, a century of Sengoku warfare armed nearly every province in Japan. The era rewards a discriminating eye: routine work exists in quantity, and beside it stand custom blades of the first rank.
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 siteIf you wish to return an item, please notify us within 3 days of receipt. After this period we cannot accept cancellations. Please ship the return to us within 5 business days. Cancellation is conditional on the item being kept in the same condition as at the time of sale, so please handle it with care.
This is a wakizashi by Sasshu Ju Kiyosuke, dated August 1532, from the late Muromachi period. Kiyosuke was a swordsmith of Satsuma, originally from the Naminohira school, and this blade exhibits distinctive characteristics of that tradition, including an extremely thin suguha and whitish utsuri. It comes with an NBTHK Tokubetsu Hozon Certificate and is housed in a shirasaya.
NihontoWatchmei · Naminohira · Muromachi · nagasa 50.48cm · sori 1.06cm
Wakimono · Satsuma · around 1501-1504
Tōken Taikan top 49%
1 piece on the market now
Wakimono · Satsuma
Phase: Sue-Naminohira末波平· 1393–1900
1 piece on the market now
Within the long Satsuma lineage that ran from the kotō into the shinshintō period, Sue-Naminohira (末波平) names the later chapter that carried the Naminohira tradition forward from the close of the Nanbokuchō age through the Muromachi era and into the early Edo workshops of Satsuma and neighbouring Ōsumi. The setsumei place a roster of dated smiths here: Sadatsugu of Satsuma and Haruyuki around the Tenmon era; Shigekane of Ōsumi, signing "Sūshū jū" and said also to have forged in Satsuma, dated Tenbun 14 (1545); Atsukura, who unusually prefixed the surname Fujiwara, active through Eiroku, Genki and Tenshō; and Sadakiyo, assigned to the Satō line, one of three branches (Hashiguchi, Ishigami, Satō) into which the group divides. The later Yuki-named continuation reaches into the Shintō period with Yasunetsune, counted as the fifty-ninth generation, with works dated to Enkyō and Meiwa. Throughout, the smiths worked under the Shimazu of southern Kyushu, geographically removed from the mainland centres. The setsumei describe a recurring later manner: a forging in which the hada stands out and flows with a whitish cast, a low-tempered suguha carrying hotsure, and a nioiguchi that tends toward urumi, a moist and soft quality, so that both ji and ha can read as subdued. This is framed as transmitting the manner of the forebears, the Ko-Naminohira tradition, and as conservative in character, where the early phase is described instead by a fine hoso-suguha with yaki-otoshi at the hamachi. Several pieces here, however, depart from that base by taking up the fashions of their day.
The setsumei record works in Sue-Bizen style with koshi-biraki gunome mixed with pointed and compound elements, and Atsukura's Sue-Sōshū-leaning blade with tobiyaki approaching a partial hitatsura. Given the thin corpus, these are presented as the documented range rather than as fixed traits of the phase. For kantei, the setsumei separate this phase from Ko-Naminohira by the standing, flowing hada and whitish tone paired with the low, urumi-tending suguha, against which the brighter, saeru and strongly nie-laden examples are flagged as exceptions worth noting. The koshi-biraki gunome with togariba, the katte-sagari or higaki yasurime, and the pointed midare-komi bōshi with hakikake recur as period markers, while sakizori and funbari register Muromachi sugata. Named hands anchor the group: Shigekane and Sadakiyo near Tenmon, Atsukura through Tenshō, and Haruyuki, whose work the setsumei compare to the Bungo Hirataka-Takada school, raising a possible contemporaneous link. The later Yasunetsune line then ties Sue-Naminohira to the Satsuma Shintō idiom, with wide, slightly long proportions and imo-tsuru nie-suji. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Shigeaki重鑑 | 1532-1555 | 1 |
| Nobuyasu延安 | 1532-1555 | 0 |
| Tadayuki忠行 | 1573-1592 | 0 |
| Yasutsugu安次 | 1532-1555 | 0 |
| Kiyosuke清左 | 1501-1504 | 0 |
The Muromachi period (1392 to 1573)
After the Ōnin War broke the Ashikaga order, a century of Sengoku warfare armed nearly every province in Japan. The era rewards a discriminating eye: routine work exists in quantity, and beside it stand custom blades of the first rank.
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 siteIf you wish to return an item, please notify us within 3 days of receipt. After this period we cannot accept cancellations. Please ship the return to us within 5 business days. Cancellation is conditional on the item being kept in the same condition as at the time of sale, so please handle it with care.
