Okitenugui kawari kabuto

Okitenugui kabuto

Samurai helmet shaped as a cloth headgear (tenugui)

Haruta school
Momoyama period, 16th-17th century

The Haruta armorers who moved to Kii province in the early 17th century, took the name from the village where they worked, Saika, near Wakayama, possibly on request of the local daimyo, Asano Yukinaga, a great armor amateur. Specialised in the construction of plate helmets, they produced mainly two typologies of kabuto: one with six plates covered with a chrysanthemum-shaped plate on top, sometimes decorated with a large wave-shaped pre-cut iron application (kirigane), and one shaped as a “placed towel”, called okitenugui. This last configuration was made with thick and heavy curved iron plates, make to resist to firearms bullets.

This okitenugui kabuto features also all the distinctive decorations from this school: applied eyebrows, za–boshi rivets (decorated with chrysanthemum-shaped washers), pre-cut applications (kirigane) and rope-shaped fukurin (rim). 

Kabuto  for sale. Price on application. Please include item stock number: kab-1227