Zenjo Kaneyoshi Uchigatana – Steel Edged Art

During the Muromachi period we start to see swords of medium length. These are what we refer to as uchigatana. The blades are characterized by their sori, which is more prevalent in the monuchi area than in earlier periods. This makes for a well balanced sword, even for one handed use (katateuchi).

This uchigatana seems to have been well cared for by it’s previous owners in history. It is in excellent, but old polish. It has been mounted in fine koshirae of the time and embellished in fine shirasaya. One can see from the treatment of the nakago that this blade was important to its previous bushi owner.

Although it is shortened and unsigned, it is clearly a Mino school blade of excellent quality. The quality of the forging and presence of one small fuschi leads us to a possible attribution to Kanesada (Nosada).

Notice the strong shirake utsuri, it gives us the impression of condensation on the steel. The hamon is sugaha, with many nice activities and one characteristic fuschi. The jigane is forged very well to produce very tight, uniform jihada throughout. The sugata is wide and thick, with graceful uchigatana sori (more prominent curvature closer to the tip) and tapering. It has a high shinogi and is iorimune.

Update:
This blade displays advanced workmanship and passed NTHK Shinsa as Kaneyoshi on February 12th, 2012.

Commentary From Tsuneishi, forwarded by NTHK:

Among the many Mino smiths, Zenjo Kaneyoshi is known for a very well-made sugata and beautiful workmanship. At first glance, one is reminded of the best quality Awataguchi works from Kyoto. On blades with regular Kyo-zori, the mihaba is a little bit thinner with a ko-kissaki and a feeling of a top quality sugata. He executed nioi-deki suguha: tight, thin nioi-deki suguha. The boshi looks like a usual Seki work: midare-komi, Oh-maru feeling with a shallow or short kaeri. Works with deep kaeri or kaku-tome kaeri are not seen. There are no works where there are significant activity of nie and nioi in the ha, which is in contrast to he Awataguchi school.

In addition, he made works of Oe Bizen style with suguha. However, Oe Bizen suguha works feature yakihaba that is wider and the hasuji becomes smoky. Zenjo’s suguha, on the other hand, is a very tight nioi-guchi suguha. This is a kantei point. This is his specialty. His jihada is mokume-hada, tight and beautiful, and like other Mino works, has a black hue. Masame-hada does not appear in the ji; if it appears, which is rare, it is seen in the shinogi-ji.

The Zenjo school – it is said that this group came from the Yamato Tegai smiths; first generation Kaneyoshi was a Yamato Tegai maker who signed Kaneyoshi (包吉). His given name was Seijiro, and having been a believer of the Hokke sect of Buddhism, had a Buddhist name of Zenjo(Zenryo) and belonged to …..temple that was located in the western part of Seki which at some point relocated to the center of Seki later. Among the mino-mono, his has the most beautiful sugata and has a very strong Yamato den influence.

According to the Nihonto Meikan there are then at least 9 generations of Kaneyoshi smiths until the Bakumatsu period and the last Kaneyoshi who would become one of the men who sewed the seeds for modern sword-making.

I think this sword should be submitted to the NBTHK at a chance for Nosada (Kanesada).

		Uchigatana
Period		Muromachi
School		Mino
Mei/Attribution		Zenjo Kaneyoshi
Origami		NTHK
Ratings		Highly regarded smith.
Sugata		Shinogi-zukuri with iori-mune. Uchigatana sori.
Nagasa		54 cm
Motohaba		2.8 cm
Sakihaba		1.8 cm
Nakago		Osuriage
Kissaki		Chu-kissaki
Boshi		Yaki-zume to ko-maru
Hamon		Nioi based sugaha with one small fuschi. Strong shirake-utsuri
Hada		Very fine itame/mokume

Koshirae		Uchigatana form
Tsuba		Choshu Dragon
Fuchi Kashira		Edo, Dragon in fine shakudo nanako
Menuki		Dragon (probably gold)
Habaki		Gold foil, 2 piece
Kozuka		Edo, Dragon in Waves
Saya		Edo
Shirasaya		High quality, with unusual horn embellishments

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