Amakuni
天国 (Amakuni)
A legendary Yamato smith whom tradition holds to be the first swordsmith of Japan and to whom it attributes the Kogarasu-maru; no signed work of his survives.
Profile
Tradition places Amakuni in Yamato at the beginning of the 8th century, in the Taihō era (701-704), and calls him the ancestor of the Japanese smiths; other versions take him to the Nara or Heian period, and there are those who believe several people were gathered under the name. His existence cannot be proved. The name, in any case, is old: the monk Nichiren mentions him as a famous smith in one of his letters, and the Kanchiin-bon Meizukushi, one of the earliest catalogues of smiths, records him.
He is credited with the Kogarasu-maru, an unsigned tachi with a double edge along the stretch toward the point, which today belongs to the imperial collection. The other swords that tradition puts under his name cannot be verified. He should not be confused with Yasutsuna of Hōki, with whom some English-language sources mix him up.
Notable works
- Kogarasu-maru: unsigned tachi, double-edged toward the point, attributed to Amakuni by tradition; it belongs to the imperial collection (gyobutsu, «imperial object») and is in the care of the National Institutes for Cultural Heritage.