Horii Toshihide
堀井俊秀 (Horii Toshihide)
A smith from Ōmi (1886-1943), adopted son of Horii Taneaki, who from 1918 forged swords for the Nippon Seikōsho steelworks in Muroran, in Hokkaidō.
Profile
Horii Toshihide was born in 1886 in Shimosakamoto, in today’s Shiga. In 1904 he became a pupil of Horii Taneaki. In 1906 he worked for a year with Sakurai Masatsugu in the forge of the Zuisen-ji temple, in Kamakura, and in 1911 he followed his master to Takase Ukō’s forge in the 羽沢文庫 in Tokyo; that year Taneaki adopted him. In 1913 the Tōken Hozonkai, a society for the preservation of the sword, gave him the smith name Hideaki (秀明).
In 1918 the Nippon Seikōsho steelworks called him to Muroran, in Hokkaidō, and he was the first of the Zuisen smiths. He is known for the Mikasa swords, forged with material from the guns of the battleship Mikasa. According to Wikipedia, he changed his name from Hideaki to Toshihide on the birth of the crown prince, whose name carries the same character aki (明): in 1933 according to that source, in 1934 according to others. The Token Society of Great Britain also presents him as an official smith of the Imperial Naval Academy.
In 1942 the Imperial Household commissioned ten marshal’s swords (gensui-tō) from him, and he died in 1943, of a brain tumour, while working on them. His sons Horii Nobuhide, who would come to direct the forge, and Horii Tanetsugu were also smiths.
Notable works
- The Mikasa swords, forged with material from the guns of the battleship Mikasa.
- Ten marshal’s swords (gensui-tō) commissioned by the Imperial Household in March 1942.
- Sword of 1939 for the 700th anniversary of the death of the Emperor Go-Toba.