A Museum Grade Samurai Shinto Period Wakazashi

o-suriage blade with one mekugi-ana and midare hamon, fully bound tsuka with iron Higo fuchi and kabuto-gane decorated in gold with scrolls, shakudo and gilt Tomoe mon, of the Kobayakawa clan, and the mon of Kobayakawa Takakage, iron sukashi tsuba chiselled and pierced with gilded and silvered dragons, contained in its textured red lacquer saya with iron mounts ensuite with the tsuka.Kobayakawa Takakage (小早川 隆景, 1533 – July 26, 1597) was a samurai and daimyō (feudal lord) during the Sengoku period and Azuchi–Momoyama period. He was the third son of Mōri Motonari who was adopted by the Kobayakawa clan and became its 14th clan head. He merged the two branches of the Kobayakawa, the Takehara-Kobayakawa clan (竹原小早川氏) and Numata-Kobayakawa clan (沼田小早川氏). He became an active commander of the Mōri army and he with his brother Kikkawa Motoharu became known as the “Mōri Ryōkawa", or “Mōri's Two Rivers" (毛利両川). As head of the Kobayakawa clan, he expanded the clan's territory in the Chūgoku region (western Honshū), and fought for the Mōri clan in all their campaigns

At first he opposed Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi but later swore loyalty and became a retainer of Hideyoshi who awarded him domains in Iyo Province on Shikoku and Chikuzen Province on Kyūshū, totalling 350,000 koku. Hideyoshi gave him the title Chûnagon also appointed him to the Council of Five Elders but died before Hideyoshi himself

Code: 23550