The message of Tsuba

Tsuba (sword guards) are used to protect the hand from sliding onto the blade of a Japanese sword. They are art works in their own right and are widely collected. Some koshirae (sword mounts), mostly tanto, were made without tsuba (aikuchi koshirae). Tsuba were mostly made by specialized kodogu and tosogu (sword fittings) artists, although some sword makers produced tsuba (tosho tsuba) as did armour makers (katchushi tsuba). Some tsuba artists also made fuchi-kashira and menuki. In some cases the maker used a forged, folded plate; in other cases a homogeneous plate was used. Many tsuba are signed by the maker on the seppa-dai (area around the nakago ana). When mounted, the tsuba seppa-dai is covered by seppa (metal spacers) and the signature (mei) is not visible.

Occasionally tsuba will be found with two small holes near the base of the tsuba. These are udenuki-ana which represent the sun and moon and were likely used for threading a leather wrist thong to prevent dropping the sword in battle. Tsuba are commonly divided into two types; iron (tetsu) and soft metal (kinko). The kinko tsuba may be made of a variety of alloys; most commonly either shaduko (blue-black colored copper-gold alloy), sentoku (brown colored copper-lead-zinc alloy), shibuichi (gray colored copper-silver alloy), brass or copper. Both iron and kinko tsuba may have various carved and/or applied decor and/or cut-out designs (sukashi). Tsuba with extensive cut-out designs are commonly referred to as "sukashi tsuba". Depending on the style, the sukashi may depict designs in either positive or negative silhouette. See more examples of various styles of tsuba.