| The theme of this tsuba is Xu You and Sou Fu depicts. Both “Xu You” and “Sou Fu” were legendary Chinese recluses of noble character. They despised worldly success and high status, idealizing righteous conduct instead. When the Chinese sage emperor Yao offered his throne to Xu You, Xu You refused and, claiming his ears had been polluted by the offer, washed them in a waterfall. Upon hearing this, Sou Fu declared the river water now tainted and refused to let his ox drink from it, leading the ox back upstream. This tsuba depicts Xu You and Sou Fu, engraved using katakiri and ke-bori techniques on a shakudo ground. This tsuba is mumei, but its style evokes Ishiyama Kito/Mototada [石山基董], a metal craftsman, renga poetry, and painting who was court noble during the mid-Edo period. |
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