Information
Made of nade-maru-gata iron, with a particularly fine manufacture, light sukashi around the edge, engraving in hira-zogan making the subject more real. The veins of the leaf are underlined in kebori. The extremely linear design depicts a leaf of 'aoi', an Oriental plant of the mallow family. The Aoi leaf is often used in heraldic coats of arms, for example the one of the Tokugawa family, who used three leaves in a circle. Since 1600, the Kinai school of Echizen has used the founder's mei for two hundred years for the same subjects, therefore it is difficult to establish its precise date, which should be early 19th century. Provenance: Asada Koichi, Kyoto, 1991.