Tachi Sword Signed “Kuniyoshi”
This sword dates to the thirteenth century and is the work of an artisan named Kuniyoshi, who came from a renowned family of Kyoto swordsmiths but was hired by the Kamakura shogunate and moved his workshop to Kamakura. The sword is designated an Important Cultural Property. It was presented to the shrine by the Emperor Meiji (1852–1912). In 1873, six years after the restoration of imperial rule had ended almost seven centuries of warrior dominion over Japan, Emperor Meiji visited Kamakura to observe a military exercise from Mt. Daijin, the mountain behind Tsurugaoka Hachimangu. On his way down, he stopped at the shrine to pray, and years later dedicated this tachi longsword to its deities, as many elite samurai had done in previous centuries to demonstrate their faith. The Meiji government cultivated Shinto as the spiritual backbone of the nation.