The armour of the Miochins was formed of thin iron plates, very light, but wonderfully strong. One specimen, a helmet of the sixteenth century, though 12 inches in length, 10 in width, and 8 in height, only weighs 2 lbs. 2 oz. The usual shape of helmet was a domelike headpiece, strengthened with ridges of iron plates, while flaps formed of a number of narrow plates hung at the sides, and covered the back of the neck. From the centre, just above the forehead, rose two curious curved horns, called tsunomoto, and between them was worn the crest of the warrior. In a famous suit of Miochin armour of the twelfth century the helmet has a dragon worked in repoussé coiling round it, the head, with open mouth, glaring from between the tsunomoto, while the tail forms the spike on the top. Although wrought in so hard a metal as iron the dragon’s head stands up in relief at least an inch from the background. Similar work in repoussé adorns the breastplate and armpieces.

But much of the finest work of the Japanese metal worker is found in the two-handed swords, which were the chief weapon of the soldiers, and which, in feudal times, became the distinctive mark of the Samurai, the aristocratic military class. The Japanese blades are unsurpassed by the most famous swords of Damascus, India, and Persia, and the craft of the swordsmith was looked on as the most honourable of all handicrafts. Men of aristocratic birth often took up its duties, and the famous swordmakers had the highest titles conferred upon them. The name of the greatest of them all—Masamuné—passed into the language as a term signifying supreme excellence, for a Masamuné blade was unequalled, and would sever a floating hair carried against its edge by the gentle current of a stream, or cleave through a solid bar of iron.

The sword, indeed, was the centre of the old military life of Japan. To know its history, its etiquette, was part of the education of all Samurai youths, and it was a grand moment for them when, at the age of fifteen, they entered on man’s estate and girded on the coveted weapon.

A fine sword was handed down from father to son as an heirloom; it was their most cherished possession, and especially in the more peaceful times which followed the establishment of the Tokugawa dynasty it was enriched with the finest work that art could produce.

The forging of a sword was conducted with almost the solemnity attending a religious rite. The katanya, or swordsmith, fasted for days before, and when all was prepared he went to the temple and prayed for a blessing on his work. In the forge was hung a consecrated rope of straw and clippings of paper to drive away evil spirits; and, having first propitiated the five elements—fire, water, wood, metal, and earth—the smith donned the ceremonial robes of a Court noble, and, binding back the wide sleeves, was ready to take hammer in hand.

First a strip of steel is welded to a bar of iron, which serves as a handle; other strips are placed upon it, and it is wrought into a bar of the required dimensions. Carefully coated with a paste of clay and ashes, and never touched with the naked hand, this bar is heated in the charcoal furnace, notched in the middle with a chisel, doubled over, and then beaten out to its former size and shape. This folding process is repeated fifteen times, then four such bars are welded together, and the doubling and welding repeated five more times, so that if each bar consisted first of all of four flakes this has now been increased to 16,777,216 layers of metal. Many different textures are obtained by flattening the bar in different manners, some giving the appearance of a grain as in wood. The preparatory welding being finished, the blade is then drawn out to its full length, shaped, and roughly ground.

But the most critical part of the process, the tempering of the steel, is now to come. And the peculiar combination required—an extremely hard edge, with the rest of the blade soft and tough—the Japanese swordsmith, unlike others, produces in one operation instead of two. The blade is coated with a mixture of fine clay and powdered charcoal. This covering is then scraped away along the edge, leaving exposed a strip of metal about a quarter of an inch wide. Raised in the furnace to the required heat, the blade glowing dull red while the edge is white hot, the sword is then plunged into a bath of water at a certain temperature, and the operation is finished.

The process of tempering was always conducted by the forger himself, no one else being allowed to enter the precincts of the forge, so jealously were his professional secrets guarded. It is said that a famous swordsmith paid for this knowledge by the loss of his hand. He had learned all but the heat of the tempering bath, and this vital secret his master refused to impart to him, so at the critical moment he burst into the forge and plunged his hand into the water. The furious master struck off his hand with one blow of the unfinished sword, but the apprentice had learned his secret.

The old smiths used to sing while tempering a blade, and the spirit of the music was said to enter into the metal. Masamuné chanted a refrain: “Tenku, taihei, taihei”—“Peace be on earth, peace”—and his swords never failed their owner, but always bore him to victory. But the blades of his saturnine pupil Muramasa always brought trouble with them. Their owners were ever in quarrels, and, once unsheathed, the sword was never satisfied without blood, so that it could not even be handled with safety. The reason for this was that, as he tempered the blades, Muramasa sang grimly: “Tenku tairan, tenku tairan”—“Trouble in the world, trouble in the world.”

After tempering, the blade was slowly ground on a series of whetstones, getting finer and finer, finishing with a careful polishing with stone-powder, and oil.

A volume might be written on the decoration of the sword. The tsuba or guard, the handle of the ko-katana or little knife, carried in the side of the scabbard; the fuchi and kashira, or mounts of the handle, especially were marked by the most exquisite ornamentation.

In his knowledge of the properties of different metals and their alloys, and in his combinations of these for one general effect, the Japanese metal worker is unique. Many of the alloys used by him were quite unknown to us, and were chosen chiefly for their colours. For the metal workers’ designs were in reality colour studies, and in metal he possessed a palette of really astonishing variety. For black he had shakudo, a rich, deep tint, flashing in some lights a violet blue. Oxidised iron gave a very dark brown, almost black, and also a rich chocolate colour. Light browns, running from coffee colour to saffron yellow, were obtained from different kinds of bronze. Copper gave a deep ruddy tint, coban and other combinations of gold and silver a pale greenish yellow, gold a rich, full yellow, shibu-ichi a dull grey, while white was obtained by the use of silver or polished steel.

In South Kensington there is a vase, a very fine specimen of this work in colours. The vase itself, beautifully shaped, is of iron, a warm chocolate brown. On this is inlaid a graceful design of birds and flowers, gleaming and sparkling in gold and silver, copper colour, green, blue, and violet.

In sword mountings this style of decoration was extensively used, and effects of great richness and beauty were obtained.

The tsuba, or sword guard, is a flat plate of metal, usually circular or slightly elliptical in form; but other styles, such as diamonds, squares, octagons, and irregular shapes decided by the exigencies of the design, are not uncommon. In size they vary from three to four inches in diameter, according to the size of the sword, and weigh from two to three ounces. The tsuba usually contains three openings—the central one wedge-shaped, through which the tang of the blade passes, and two other smaller openings, one on each side, to allow for the passage of the kozuka and kogai to their sheaths in the sides of the scabbard.

The earliest guards were made entirely of iron, and in many later tsuba this still forms the basis. But bronze in its various forms was also much used as a ground for ornamentation; and an alloy, sentoku, containing copper, zinc, tin, and lead, and of a soft yellow tint like brass, was another favourite material. In the latest periods other substances, such as bone, ivory, tortoiseshell, wood, leather, and papier-maché, the last three being coated with lacquer, were sometimes used.

One of the earliest methods of ornamenting the iron tsuba was what is known as kebori, or hair-line chasing. This was not executed with a graving tool but with a small chisel held in the left hand, and driven towards the worker with blows from a light hammer. This style of ornament reached its height during the sixteenth century, and may be seen in great perfection in the work of Goto Yujo.

A development of this style was the hira-zogan. In this lines were first engraved to a uniform depth and then undercut. Soft gold or silver wire was then hammered in, the wedge-shaped opening retaining it firmly without the use of any solder. Kebori-zogan was a combination of the two styles.