NihontoWatch● This Bizen Kagenori Tachi is an extremely rare, signed work, which is not only ubu, but is also signed and dated. In terms of Koto era blades, this makes it an extremely relevant and rare piece since unshortened, let alone signed and dated works from the Nanbokucho era in the form of daito are scarce, to the point where, before this piece, I have never personally held one that was in the private market for sale. This sword also has an extremely large figure, which, for the Yoshii School, is almost unheard of because they are much more well known for having feminine, slender blades, even when quite healthy. As said above, the dated signature is inscribed as “On a day in August on Eitoku 1384” (永徳二二年八月 日), which would indicate that this is a work done by the fourth Kagenori. The hamon on this sword is done in a beautiful choji-gunome style, which is very reminiscent of the Fukuoka Ichimonji School, and is atypical for the Yoshii School as well, making this not just a unique sword in the signature, date, condition, and shape, but in the very deki in the hamon as well. The itame mokume mix is absolutely stunning to behold as well and suits the sword perfectly. There are also multiple old kirikomi on this sword, one very visible on the mune, with some exceedingly small ones which are less visible as well, and a single kirikomi on the shinogi alongside as a dent in the ha towards the ha-machi, where the user repelled an enemy strike. It is interesting to see such a dent on the blade so low because, in most cases, these result in a substantial chip to the blade. These kinds of dents are much more common to see on the kissaki on account of their use in thrusting. This sword is also remarkably healthy given its age, and given its signs of use in combat, I have seen many Gendaito in similar or even worse condition in my time studying swords. The boshi appears to be a standard ko-maru boshi, as it is similar to many swords of the era. The boshi is finished remarkably close to the edge of the kissaki, and is also in fine condition. The dimensions of the sword are ● Nagasa: 63cm ● Motohaba 3.1cm ● Motokasane 5.9mm ● Sakihaba: 2.1cm ● Sakikasane: 4.4mm THE BIZEN YOSHII SCHOOL 備前吉井派 The Bizen Yoshii were a group of swordsmiths who worked in Bizen Province in the Kamakura Period until the Muromachi Period. They were called the Yoshii School on account of their being situated along the Yoshii River in Bizen Province. This river was extremely rich in iron sand, which they used to produce high-quality swords. The Yoshii school, in general, was rather large and spanned multiple provinces. There were Yoshii smiths in, of course, Bizen Province, which is the core focus of this written piece; however, Mimasaka Province, just north of Bizen, alongside two groups in Izumo Province called Yoshii Doei and Yoshii Chutei, respectively. The Bizen Yoshii group had two main lines: the Kagenori line and the Naganori line. The Kagenori line learned from the swordsmith Osafune K
NihontoWatchOffered by Tosa Touken Do
This piece has sold
5 on the market
Get an email when a new Yoshii Kagenori piece hits the market.
Bizen-den · Bizen · around 1381-1384
Tōken Taikan top 17%
Where Kagenori 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.
Select a lens to see how it's measured.
Years he was demonstrably active, proven by signed-and-dated blades
Bizen-den · Bizen
5 pieces on the market now
The Yoshii school (吉井) took its name from a locality on the Yoshii River in Bizen province, the stretch of country facing Osafune across the water, and it is from that base that the lineage is read in the late Kamakura period, through the Nanbokucho, and on into the Muromachi. Tradition holds that the line began with Tamenori toward the close of the Kamakura age, though pieces reaching that far back are exceedingly rare; the NBTHK separates the older tier, of Nanbokucho date and before, as Ko-Yoshii, reserving the plain name Yoshii for the full Muromachi production. The dated, signed hands by whom the school is most clearly told run from Kagenori and Noritsuna in the fourteenth century, through Morinori and Naganori of the late Nanbokucho into Oei, to Kiyonori in the middle Muromachi, the name passing along a chain of Nori- and Tsugu-cut signatures (Yoshinori, Kiyonori, Naganori his son) that fixes the school to the year across roughly a century and a half. Kagenori, whose lineage-name endured longest and is held by one account to be the main line, anchors the early record; Kiyonori supplies its textbook Muromachi face. What binds the school as a body, and what no other branch of Bizen-den shares in the same way, is a single distinctive temper: a small gunome (the ko-gunome or ko-choji the trade calls the "Yoshii-ba") linked in a regular, orderly, repeating run, often with a slight slant or togari-gokoro and pointed elements folded into the row. Over this the school raises its second great hallmark, a midare-utsuri so particular that the published sources describe the very shape of the hardened edge as though cast straight into the ji as a shadow, echoing the outline of the temper rather than drifting as an ordinary Bizen reflection would. The jigane is a tight, standing ko-itame mixed with mokume, at times taking an ayasugi-like or masame tendency that itself reads as a Yoshii tell, with ji-nie densely applied and chikei entering; the boshi follows the temper into the point in midare-komi, turning in ko-maru. Within this shared vocabulary the generations diverge in degree: the older Ko-Yoshii hands work nie-laden, with vigorous sunagashi and kinsuji that on Kagenori's boldest tachi recall the oldest Bizen, while the Muromachi production is mostly nioi-based with modest ko-nie and a soft nioiguchi.
A quieter second register runs throughout the school, a narrow suguha carrying only a slight admixture of small gunome, the calm half of the same hand; even there it is the folded-in gunome that returns the attribution to Yoshii. The long signatures, cut toward the mune, frequently use saka-tagane, reverse-driven chisel strokes that mark the very mei as the school's own. To kantei a Yoshii blade is therefore to read the regular linking first: the orderly, repeating ko-gunome and the shadow-cast utsuri distinguish it at once from the softer, cloud-like midare-utsuri and the broader choji of the Osafune mainstream, and the strength of the nie on older pieces is what guards against a later confusion with Mino. The school's standing rests less on grand provenance than on this recognizability and on its documentary value, the dated inscriptions making its smiths placeable to the year, which for late Bizen hands is much of the appeal. Among the named members Kagenori and Morinori carry the line at its Ko-Yoshii finest, the Fujishiro appraisers rating Morinori and Naganori at chu-jo saku, a step above the school's average run; Kiyonori's best wakizashi is judged to approach the Ko-Yoshii range within a Muromachi frame. Recorded whereabouts scatter across temple, museum, and private hands, a Kagenori tachi in the Sano Art Museum, a Kiyonori tachi at Yasukuni Shrine, a Naganori odachi in the Tokugawa Art Museum, and a Kagenori once appraised as Ko-Bizen passing through the Date family; none rises above the Important Sword tier into National Treasure or Important Cultural Property. A signed, dated Yoshii blade thus remains an attainable way to hold late Bizen-den in its most exactly knowable and most immediately recognizable form. Learn more →
| Smith | Era | Designated |
|---|---|---|
| Kiyonori清則 | 1429-1453 | 10 |
| Kagenori景則 | 1362-1375 | 6 |
| Naganori永則 | 1429-1441 | 4 |
| Morinori盛則 | 1378-1428 | 4 |
| Noritsuna則綱 | 1364-1394 | 3 |
Bizen in the Nanbokuchō period
Sixty years of war between two courts drove blades long and broad, and Osafune met the demand: Kanemitsu and Chōgi led forges serving the provincial warriors who did the fighting, while Sōshū influence arrived with the armies to create Sōden-Bizen.
As a rule, we do not accept returns from overseas. Once a deposit is paid, we hold the item for up to 3 months. The deposit is non-refundable.