Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

Ashmolean − Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

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Round tsuba with yatsu-hashi, or eight-bridges, design

Glossary

tsuba

  • tsuba

    Japanese sword guard.

Location

    • currently in research collection

Objects are sometimes moved to a different location. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis. Contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular object on display, or would like to arrange an appointment to see an object in our reserve collections.

 

Publications online

  • The A.H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba) by Albert James Koop

    The A. H. Church Collection of Japanese Sword-Guards (Tsuba)

    Openwork design known as yatsu-hashi ("the eight bridges"), consisting of two iris-plants (kakitsubata) and a staggered line of eight small plank foot-bridges spanning the swamp where the plants grow; slight engraving finish on the three blossoms; slender rounded border.

    A version of the design illustrated in the famous work Sōken Kishō, 1781, Bk.V, p.21. The reference is to an acrostic poem by Ariwara no Narihira (825 - 880), in which the initial syllables of the lines make up the work ka-ki-tsu-ba-ta.

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