Aizu
会津の刀工 (Aizu no tōkō)
The smiths of Aizu: the Kanesada house, which came from Seki, and that of Miyoshi Nagamichi, serving the domain until the Boshin war.
Style and characteristics
Sturdy blades with a reputation for cutting. The Kanesada house keeps Mino features, with sanbonsugi and gunome; Miyoshi Nagamichi worked a nie notare and gunome over a ko-itame jigane with masame, in a manner close to Kotetsu’s.
History
A branch of the Kanesada of Seki settled in Aizu at the end of the sixteenth century and served the successive lords of the castle, from the Gamō to the Matsudaira; the house reached eleven generations. Beside it worked the Miyoshi, with Mutsu Daijō Miyoshi Nagamichi in the seventeenth century, and other families. The eleventh Kanesada forged in the Bakumatsu for the samurai of Aizu and for the Shinsengumi.
Smiths of the school
- Aizu Kanesada 会津兼定
- Aizu Kanesada 兼定
- Aizu Michitoki 会津道辰
- Miyoshi Nagamichi 三善長道