Signatures:
左馬尉源國頼 samanojō minamoto kuniyori
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Kuniyori came to Kyoto from Yamato province where he had connections with old Kofukuji temple [1]. According to the old directories he was not a swordsmith [2].
He is sometimes listed as Rai smith and is called Rai Kuniyori [3] while other sources list him as Awataguchi smith. Nihon Koto Shi (NKS) provides a plausible explanation [2] (issue 555), as well as Harry Watson in translator's notes in Nihonto Koza [3] (page 54). Kuniyori signed Samanochin 左馬陳 but he used 徠 instead of 陳. This may have been misinterpreted or miscopied in the old books as Rai. Extant work of this smith appear to be closer to Awataguchi style rather than Rai. Kuniyori is not mentioned in any of the Rai genealogies.
There are other discrepancies. Hawley and NK list him as Samanojō 左馬尉, while NKS lists him as Samanochin 左馬陳 and NK refers to the 'Chin' mystery in the commentary. Watson in the NK mentions that original text uses 左馬允 for Samanojō (允 reads as 'Suke', but it can also be read as 'Jō'). NK also has the signature (page 55) as 徠左馬尉源國頼 while nakago image shows no 'Rai' in the beginning, but the quality of the reprint is not good enough to be certain.
There are 2 works mentioned in the books: a tanto from the collection of Asafuki Eiji (see in the list of recorded works above) and another tanto (no images available) which was mentioned in Nihonto Koza, Nihon Koto Shi and Nihonto Meikan [4]. The first one is dated the 2nd year of Bunji (1186), and the second one is dated Gennin 1 (1224), but all sources agree that the latter signature is not reliable. It appears that the first blade is the only well-known extant example of Kuniyori's work.
Worked in chū-suguba.
References