Tsuba

Late 18th to early 19th century iron Japanese sword tsuba with design a Japanese court hat with cords (appears to be a variation of kanmuri hat) next to multimetal inlays of a water lily and maple branches with leaves, and a riding crop with tassels on the back. Wonderful quality detailed work - see leaf veining and crop textures. Beautiful patina on the plate, very nice feel of age. Height 2 3/8 inches.

A rare oval und convex shaped Japanese iron sword guard with two amaryu in gold nunome. Condition: good. Dimensions: 6,9 cm high x 6,1 cm wide.

Cut iron tsuba. Mysterious motif where two spades appear which should represent spearheads or swords. The tail of Japanese dragons is sometimes depicted in this way. The decor is simple but very elegant. The carving as well as the finish are very neat. Difficult to date with precision. Probably from the Edo period, maybe earlier. Wide: 79mm Thickness: 5mm Good condition

18th century good size unsigned iron Japanese sword tsuba with a scene of an egret in a shallow stream with aquatic plants and reeds under a bare willow tree. Elegant design in Japanese taste, bronze and silver inlays with gilded highlights, overall in very good condition. Height 3 5/16 inches.

19th century bronze Japanese sword tsuba with perforated design of Shoki the demon Queller threatening a terrified oni with a sword. Nicely made, pleasant dark patina, in great condition. Height 2.96 inches.

An armorer's iron tsuba, possibly for a wakizashi as it is somewhat diminuitive in size. Or perhaps more in keeping with its apparent age, an early example of a proportionately small tsuba used with an uchigatana as was first the fashion. Sukashi decoration of a conch (horagai) traditionally used for ritual practices and for signaling on the battlefield...

An excellent shakudo tsuba inlaid with a "thousand flowers" decoration in gold, silver and sentoku. The technique is particular, the tsuba is first cast in shakudo with all the flowers in relief, then chiseled. Then each flower is covered with a thick sheet of metal, gold, silver or sentoku, this sheet is hammered on the sides of the flowers as one would border a bed sheet. Excellent work , exceedingly difficult more than inlaid...

Japanese hand-forged iron tsuba, used to protect a swordsman's hand from sliding up the blade during use as well as to provide balance. The openwork tsuba depicting two sages, their robes accented in gilt, one sage with a face of silver and the other with a face of copper. The front image is signed 'Soheishi Nyudo Soten' , the other side reads 'Goshu Hikone ju' (resides in Goshu-current Shiga prefecture).

Dimensions: 3 1/8" x 3 1/4"

Very unusual late 19th century Japanese lacquer small table screen decorated on both sides with tsuba (Japanese sword guards). Excellent clever work with different lacquer colors and textures imitating rusting iron and cleaner silvery surfaces of different tsuba. Beautiful carved textured surface of the rest of the screen with lower layer of red lacquer and upper layer of tan colored one. Wonderful patina, in excellent condition. Height 6 7/8 inches (17.5 cm), maximum length 10 inches (25 cm).

18th century Japanese sword iron tsuba made in a shape of two confronting SHU - Japanese flute instruments for use in Shinto ceremony and consisting of bamboo reeds forming a circular wind chamber. The lower parts of the flutes are inlaid with pine designs in gold. Very clever design in Japanese taste, wonderful quality inlay, some rusting as can be seen in photos, great feel of age. Height 2.85 inches (72.4 mm).

Tsuba in cut iron, details inlaid in solid gold. The characters are excessively in relief, thickness of the tsuba 4.8 mm and 9.6 mm for the characters. Diameter: 76mm. Decor representing Jô and Uba with their broom and rake under a pine tree. This refers to the legend of 2 lovers who, united for life, were very happy and together became very old. They died the same day at the same time. Their spirit lives in 2 old pines, one in Sumi-Yoshi and one on the beach of Taka-Sago...

18th to early 19th century iron Japanese sword tsuba worked in low relief with a scene of a boy trying to scare an alert tiger. The subject is a legend of Yoko - one of the paragons of filial virtue. Yoko accompanied his father in the mountains, where a tiger sprang upon them. The boy jumped in front of his father, who was thus saved, but the boy was killed by the beast. Mountain waterfall and a gnarled pine on the back...

A beautiful limited reference book containing the collection of the Baur Museum in Geneva, Switzerland of "Japanese Sword Fittings and Associated Metalwork", written by Basil William Robinson (former in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London). Hardback with 444 pages, 752 illustrations (several in color), section with signatures. Cloth with dustjacket, printed 1980 in a limited numbered edition of 1600, this is No. 52. Condition: fine. Dimension: c. 28.8 cm x 24 cm x 5.1 cm, 3 kg.

18th to early 19th century iron Japanese sword tsuba worked in low relief with an ama-ryu (rain dragon) in flight among pouring rain and wispy clouds. Clever and elegant design in Japanese taste, gilded highlights, in great condition. Height 2.86 inches.

Very beautiful tsuba in sentoku inlaid with shakudo, gold and silver by Jo-I, first-rank artist from the end of the 18th century. The funny subject represents a man driving demons out of his house by throwing beans on the ground. Excellent work, perfect finish. No restoration or hidden defects. Original patinas. 67x58x4 mm

This iron plaque is in a very good condition. Size: Approximately 2 inch (50mm)

The Katchushi style of this tsuba gives it an earlier look and feel. But it is probably an Edo period work (might expect more wear on the seppa-dai or more conspicuous tekkotsu on an older example.) The thin body nonetheless resilient. Strong, sparse, decorative file marks on the vertical add to character. Adept use of the file, thin plate and slight taper toward the rim could support argument a swordsmith may have made the tsuba...

Late 18th to early 19th century iron Japanese sword tsuba with multimetal inlays depicting sennin Bukan Zenshi standing under a rock and waving for his faithful tiger to approach, which the beast seems to be very happy to do, the back showing mountains with pines and a waterfall. Bukan Zenshi (Pu Hsien in Chinese) was a 7th century priest and is usually shown with a tiger as his attendant...