A fine copper tsuba

Description:

Japan, signed: Yasuchika, Nara school, mid Edo period, second half of 18th c.
6,3 x 5,8 x 0,4 cm
Tate-maru-gata. Suaka, hira-zogan in gold, silver and shakudo, shishiai-bori, sekigane in shakudo. Decorated with a riverboat with people, landscape with grass, a flock of ducks and with the moon. Kaku-mimi-koniku.
From an old German private collection, published in: Günther Heckmann, ‘Tsuba’. H.U.B Verlag, Nürtingen, 1995, T 81
The Nara - school had been founded in Edo at the beginning of the 17th century by Nara Kozayemon Toshi-teru (1579 - 1629). Four of the following masters were outstanding, and in spite of their different styles it was them who helped to create the high reputation of the Nara - school: Toshinaga, Joi, Yasuchika and Masayuki. Tsuchiya Yasuchika (1669 - 1744) had mainly been working with decorative subjects. He had a large number of pupils, who mixed the style and the subjects of their master more and more. Especially during the 19th century they adapted their work to the current taste. The illustrated object seems rather to have been made by the 3rd or 4th of the Yasuchika