Short Sword〈Meirai Kunitoshi/November 1997〉

A Dagger Dated to the Winter of 1316

Turn this short blade over and the back of its tang carries a line of characters that most swords never preserve: a date. It reads "eleventh month, fifth year of Shōwa," a Kamakura-period era name that places the work in the winter of 1316. The front of the tang is signed simply "Rai Kunitoshi." Few medieval Japanese blades come with both a name and a year cut into the steel, and that pairing is what makes this small dagger one of the most studied swords of its age.

The piece is a tantō, a dagger meant to be worn at close quarters rather than slung from the belt like a long sword. It measures 25.1 centimetres along the cutting edge, with a base width of 2.5 centimetres and a tang just over 11 centimetres long. It is held by Atsuta Jingū, the great shrine in Nagoya, and has long been nicknamed "the Atsuta Rai Kunitoshi."

The Rai School and a Long-Lived Master

Rai Kunitoshi worked in Yamashiro Province, the region around the capital at Kyoto, where swordmaking went back centuries. His workshop belonged to the Rai school, which rose to prominence after the older Awataguchi smiths and came to rival them across the later Kamakura period. The school's effective founder was Kuniyuki; the line then ran through a smith known as Niji Kunitoshi, then Rai Kunitoshi, and on to Rai Kunimitsu and Rai Kunitsugu, names that anchor the Yamashiro tradition within the five classical schools of Japanese swordmaking.

The dated signature does something rare. By matching it against other inscribed works by the same hand, specialists have concluded the dagger was forged when Kunitoshi was about 76. That is a striking figure for the early fourteenth century, when reaching old age was uncommon. Several other blades carry his name with ages in the seventies and eighties attached, and later sword texts claim he lived past 90, so the picture is of a craftsman still working hard at the forge long after most of his contemporaries had stopped.

One puzzle surrounds his name. Some blades are signed "Kunitoshi" in two characters and others "Rai Kunitoshi" in three, and the workmanship differs between the two groups. Whether they are the same man at different stages or two separate smiths has been argued since at least the late medieval period. Today most specialists treat them as distinct, often casting the two-character Kunitoshi as the elder of the pair. This dagger belongs firmly to the three-character group.

Why It Became a National Treasure

The blade was first listed as a protected national treasure under Japan's prewar system on April 17, 1911. When the present Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties reorganised those listings after the war, the finest works were re-examined and promoted; this dagger was raised to National Treasure on February 2, 1955.

What sets it apart, according to the official assessment, is partly that it does not look like a typical Kunitoshi piece. Compared with his usual daggers it is broad for its length and unusually thick through the body, giving it a sturdy, almost stout feeling in the hand. Yet the qualities that mark his best work are all present: a finely worked surface steel scattered with tight ji-nie crystals, and a straight tempered edge built up in nie. A documented maker, a documented date, and first-rate execution rarely meet in a single object, and here they do.

Reading the Blade

The dagger is made in hira-zukuri, the flat construction without the ridge line found on longer swords, with a three-faceted back and a gentle inward curve known as uchizori that is typical of Kamakura daggers. The temper line, or hamon, is a broad straight suguha that drifts into the faintest waves, with small feet and leaf-shaped activity reaching toward the edge. At the point the temper turns back in a small round ko-maru, with a touch of brushed effect and a doubled line.

Look along the body and you will find a carving on each face: a slender groove paired with a suken, a straight votive blade that stands for the sword of Fudō Myōō, the fierce Buddhist guardian of immovable resolve. The carving is balanced rather than busy, and it sits cleanly within the narrow space the dagger allows. The tang is unaltered from the day it left the forge, finished with a chestnut-shaped end, straight file marks, and two peg holes.

Daggers of this period were carried by warriors and courtiers alike, and an object this small was as much a statement of taste as a weapon. Standing in front of it, the thing to watch for is the grain of the steel, which the older catalogues describe as well-knit and dense, and the quiet, almost severe straightness of the edge. Nearly seven centuries on, both remain easy to read.

Seeing It in Person

Although Atsuta Jingū owns the dagger, the blade is placed on long-term deposit at the Tokyo National Museum in Ueno, where Japanese swords are shown in Room 13 of the main Honkan gallery. That arrangement means the piece appears in Tokyo more often than at the shrine itself, though the museum rotates its collection constantly and no single object is on view year-round. Anyone making a special trip should check the current display list before going.

The Tokyo National Museum sits inside Ueno Park, a short walk from Ueno Station. General admission to the regular galleries is around 1,000 yen for adults, with university students paying less and visitors under 18 or over 70 admitted free with identification. The galleries open at 9:30 in the morning and close at 17:00, with last entry half an hour before closing, and the museum is shut on Mondays unless the Monday falls on a public holiday.

For travellers drawn to the shrine connection, Atsuta Jingū in Nagoya keeps a treasure hall and, since 2021, a dedicated sword gallery called Tsurugi no Hōko Kusanagi-kan. The shrine's bond with blades runs deep: it enshrines Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, one of the three imperial regalia, and holds one of the largest sword collections of any sanctuary in Japan. On the occasions when the dagger returns home for a special showing, it can be seen there instead.