Tosa Myôchin Ji-Sukashi tsuba. Circa: Middle Edo ( 江戸中期 Chuki Edo ) app 1780 Toshû jû Kuniyoshi saku. Well forged iron and nice brown patina. Fine carving ( Kebori - 毛彫 ) on the hira of a Torii and Pine tree. This theme invokes images of the gods and purity. Kuniyoshi passed away in 1800 ( Wakayama ). That leaves us to surmise that this is a mid to late 1700's Tosa Myôchin work.

This tsuba is signed on the Ura (裏). This is not cvompletely uncommon but still not seen all that often. The nakago tagane-ato (鏨跡) and the setting of the ryohitsu shitate (両櫃仕立) point to the real face or Omote 表 of the tsuba.

Sasano argued in his early work that the Tosay Myochin school did not exist until the mid 1800's. This of course has been proved wrong and Sasano himself changed his thoughts on this later on.

土州住國吉作