Parts of the Sword
A picture is worth a thousand words! . . .
A tsuba is the sword guard of a japanese katana or tachi. Its primary purposes are to balance
the sword, prevent your hand from sliding down the blade and, as a last resort, as a block
against a thrust or slash. However, as time and skills progressed they evolved into items of
art and the ever popular status symbol. Today, Tsuba are collected by themselves as a
standalone artform seperate to the sword.
Additionally on the previous page we mentioned about kogai and kozuka "accessories" for
the sword . . .
The kozuka is the samurai's utility knife, the kogai his hair arranging tool/hair-pin,
the wari-kogai is split to serve a dual function as chopsticks, and the umabari is a
short stabbing knife I guess.
