This book is a catalogue of a special exhibition (1907-1908) of Japanese sword guards, or tsuba, has been prepared by Mr. Okabe-Kakuya. To our knowledge it is the first attempt to treat the history of the tsuba and tsuba makers apart from the other branches of metal work which enter into the ornamentation of the Japanese sword. Of the three sections into which the book is divided, the first gives a brief general history of the art, specifying the different periods in which the artists worked, the various circumstances and influences which from time to time caused new developments of form and material, and the results due to these changes. The illustrations in this section are reproductions of drawings by Mr. Okabe from woodcuts in the Japanese books at the Museum. The second section consists of an alphabetical list of the more important schools of tsuba makers. The list of names given is strictly confined to those of men who actually made tsuba, and does not include artists who worked only in other forms of metal work. The third section serves as a guide to the present exhibition. It is accompanied with half-tone plates giving typical illustrations of various schools and artists. In instances where the execution, design, or material is of particular interest, special notes have been added.

Excerpt from Museum of Fine Arts, Boston: Japanese Sword Guards With the introduction of Zen modes of thought during the Kamakura (1190-1337) and Ashikaga (1337-1582) periods, the samurai embodied in the sword their supreme conception of honor and man hood. In the icy steel, born of fire, they saw revealed the mystery of Life, indivisible from that of Death. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.