Kantei

From Kii to Edo

Life and times

Little is known of his life: an origin that two treatises tell differently, three possible masters, two titles and a fame that came two centuries later.

On this page
  1. Where he came from
  2. The arrival in Edo
  3. The titles
  4. His family and his students
  5. Fame at the end of the shogunate

Where he came from

According to the Japanese Wikipedia, the 新刀弁疑 (Shintō Bengi) has him come from the Ishidō (石堂, Ishidō) school of Kii, makers of spears and arrowheads who at the end of Muromachi passed through Ōmi, Kyoto and Kii, and that is today the most widespread opinion; the 古今鍛冶備考 (Kokon Kaji Bikō), on the other hand, made him one of the Shimosaka (下坂, Shimosaka) swordsmiths of Echizen. The Tokyo National Museum, in the record of his wakizashi, also has him coming from the Ishidō school of Kii.

The arrival in Edo

He arrived in Edo around 1648 (Keian 1). The Japanese Wikipedia records that he is held to be a student of the second Yasutsugu (康継, Yasutsugu), something that Iida Kazuo, founder of the newspaper Tōken Shunjū, considers impossible because of the dates; Yasuhiro and Izumi no Kami Kaneshige (和泉守兼重) are also proposed as his masters. The Tokyo National Museum says that around the Keian era (1648-1652) he went to Edo and that he is said to have learned with Izumi no Kami Kaneshige.

According to the same Wikipedia, the 新刃銘尽 (Shinjin Meizukushi) and the 新刀一覧 (Shintō Ichiran) say that he lived in Kanda Shirogane-chō and that he was a swordsmith of a single generation.

The titles

He first received the title of 大和大掾 (Yamato Daijō) and then that of 大和守 (Yamato no Kami), which gives its name to his signature. His last dated work is from 1673 (Kanbun 13).

His family and his students

According to the Japanese Wikipedia, his son used for a time the name of second Yasusada and signed blades with it.

Ogasawara Nobuo, who worked for the NBTHK and the Tokyo National Museum, notes that he had many students from Sendai and links this to the influence of the tester Yamano Kaemon.

Fame at the end of the shogunate

The Japanese Wikipedia relates that his blades became popular at the end of the shogunate because of how well they cut, and that they are said to have been used by Iba Hachirō, of the Yūgekitai, and Ōishi Kuwajirō and Okita Sōji, of the Shinsengumi. It is told by literary sources; no blade is known today that can be identified as that of any of them.