Mokkō-shaped tsuba with cherry flowers and snow heaps

Title

Mokkō-shaped tsuba with cherry flowers and snow heaps
Artist/maker

Umetada School (active 16th century - 19th century) (armourer)
Associated place

Japan (place of creation)
Date

18th century (1701 - 1800)
Material and technique

iron, with cut and filed openwork decoration, gold foil, and gold and gold wire nunome-zōgan decoration; ryōhitsu plugged with soft metal, probably shakudō; tang-hole plugged with soft metal, probably copper
Material index

iron;

gold;

copper;

shakudo
Technique index

forged;

inlaid;

plugged
Object type

tsuba
Dimensions

8.4 x 7.8 cm (height x width)
No. of items

1
Credit line

Bequeathed by Dame Jemima Church, in accordance with the wishes of her Husband, Sir Arthur H. Church, 1929.
Museum location

not on display
Museum department

Eastern Art
Accession no.

EAX.10236

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Catalogue text

Bold mokkō; narrow border joined to the sides of the seppadai by two curved square bars, thus ) ( [see Fig. 12], forming four open compartments, the upper and lower each partly filled by half of a large double-cherry-flower with gold nunome centre, its petals edged with squares of foil (compare the laquer technique kirikane); in each side compartment is a representation of a snow-heap, with dots, lines and groups of radiations in gold wire nunome; border and edge with portions of linear diapers in the same.

For the design, compare a guard in the Furukawa Collection, no.103, signed by a Bushū artist.

nunome-zōgan

shakudō

tsuba

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