Umetada Myōju
埋忠明寿 (Umetada Myōju)
A Kyoto swordsmith and metalworker (1558-1631), head of the Umetada house; he is called the founder of shintō, and his tsuba with coloured inlays set a fashion.
Profile
Umetada Myōju lived in Nishijin, in Kyoto, in a house of metalworkers and engravers that worked for the Ashikaga shōgun; Myōju later worked for Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Hidetsugu, and tradition says for the Tokugawa as well. The Umetada workshop shortened old blades, added gold-inlaid attributions and made mountings, and it recorded that work between 1605 and 1660. He forged few blades, almost all tantō with rich carvings such as Fudō or the Kurikara dragon, in suguha or notare; of long blades only one tachi is known, that of 1598. He is regarded as the founder of shintō; according to Markus Sesko, Hizen Tadayoshi trained with him, and the Sekai Daihyakka Jiten also counts Aki Teruhiro among his pupils. In tsuba he was an innovator: he used brass, shakudō and copper, and flat inlays of coloured metals with large-scale designs.
Monograph
Umetada Myōju (埋忠明寿)
His quick profile and the essentials.
Read the monograph
Notable works
- Tachi dated 1598, from the Sōma house, at the Kyoto National Museum: important cultural property.
- Tsuba with an oak (kashiwa) tree motif: important cultural property.
Rankings
- Gyōji (Special ranks) in Tomita Kiyama’s ranking of shintō smiths (1935)