Echigo no Kami Kanesada
越後守包貞 (Echigo no Kami Kanesada)
First generation (shodai)
Swordsmith from Yamato who settled in Osaka, Settsu province, active in the mid-17th century; first of the Echigo no Kami Kanesada line.
Profile
Echigo no Kami Kanesada, whose civil name was Yamada Heidayū (山田平太夫), came from Yamato and is regarded as a descendant of the Tegai (手掻) school. He moved to Osaka in Settsu and joined the workshop of Iga no Kami Kanemichi (伊賀守包道), another smith of Yamato origin belonging to the line of Mutsu no Kami Kaneyasu (陸奥守包保). In 1664 (Kanbun 4) he received the title Echigo no Kami, which he used in his signature. He died around 1669. His pupil, by school tradition also his adopted son, then took the name Kanesada, since the master's own son was still a child; some years later he passed the name on and began signing as Sakakura Gonnoshin Terukane (坂倉言之進照包). Blades attributed to him show the balanced width and curvature typical of Osaka shintō, a ko-itame hada with mokume, plentiful ji-nie and chikei, and a notare hamon mixed with gunome, chōji and togari-ba that at times approaches tōran.
Swords available
-
Echigo no Kami Kanesada
Shintō katana by the first Echigo no Kami Kanesada of Settsu, signed and with an ubu nakago, in a black-lacquered uchigatana koshirae, with a Tokubetsu Hozon Tōken paper declared by the original seller. Katana by the first Echigo no Kami Kanesada, a Settsu smith of the early Edo period. According to the original seller, his civil name was Yamada Heidayū, he descended from the Tegai line of Yamato and studied under the first Iga no Kami Kanemichi. The blade has a nagasa of 71.4 cm and a sori of 0.9 cm, in shinogi-zukuri with iori-mune. The seller describes a ko-itame with mokume, thick ji-nie and chikei, and a hamon of notare with gunome, chōji and togari-ba in a tōran manner, with ample nie and tobiyaki; the photographs show a broad, undulating hamon consistent with that description. The nakago, declared ubu, appears intact in the photographs, with a single mekugi-ana and the signature 越後守包貞 (Echigo no Kami Kanesada) on the omote; the ura bears no inscription. The blade comes with an uchigatana koshirae: a black roiro-lacquered saya, a tsuka wrapped in black ito over white same, fuchi-kashira with gold accents, a gilt habaki and an iron tsuba with a landscape in relief inlaid with gold and other metals; the original seller describes it but does not date it. According to the seller, the piece also includes a shirasaya and an NBTHK Tokubetsu Hozon Tōken paper, neither of which appears in the photographs.
58.3/100
€20,110
