Sword guard (Tsuba) Depicting Bodhidharma Facing a Wall (面壁達磨図鐔)
Not on view
This thick sentoku tsuba shows on its obverse Bodhidharma (Japanese: Daruma) living in a cave, facing a wall for nine years, after being refused to join the Shaolin Monastery. In art history, this motif is referred to as Menpeki Daruma (面壁達磨). The surface of the plate is finished in a deliberately rough manner to represent the wall of the cave. The reverse shows a large pine which continues on the obverse.
The artist Tsuneshige (常重) had studied with the Nara master Shigetsugu (重次). He lived in the Kanda (神田) district of Edo and his real name was Kawamura Ichi’emon (川村市右衛門), although his initial family name has been Sekiguchi (関口). It is said that Tsuneshige was originally a lacquer artist who later in life became a sword fittings maker.
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