Shimada Yoshisuke
島田義助 (Shimada Yoshisuke)
Lineage: the signature does not state the generation
A lineage of smiths from Shimada, in Suruga, from the mid-Muromachi to the mid-Edo period; according to tradition, the fourth Yoshisuke made the spear Otegine, one of the three great spears.
Profile
The Yoshisuke worked in Shimada, in Suruga province, and are also called Gojō Yoshisuke; the name reads Yoshisuke or Gisuke, and both readings are accepted. Local tradition traces the family back to Ichimonji Sukemune, a rotating smith of the retired emperor Go-Toba, and says that the fourth Yoshisuke served the governor of Suruga, Imagawa Yoshitada; as the name seems to be taken from him, that one is believed to have actually been the first. On this account the generations fall in Kōshō, Eishō, Tenbun and Tenshō. They were also famous for their spears. The renga poet Sōchō was the son of a Yoshisuke.
Notable works
- Otegine: a spear attributed to the fourth Yoshisuke, one of the three great spears of Japan.
Rankings
- Maegashira (East) in Tomita Kiyama’s ranking of shintō smiths (1935)