Bizen (no) Kuni Jyu Kagehide worked around the Bunei period (1265). He was the younger brother of Bizen Mitsutada. There are very few signed works of Kagehide remaining. His most famous blade is known as Kuronbo-giri that was a treasure of the famous Date Masamune of Sendai.

This tachi is an excellent example of his work. It is o-suriage mumei but retains its wonderful graceful shape despite the fact that much of its original sori has been lost due to shortening. The measurements of this blade are as follows:

Nagasa: 70.3 cm.

Sori:1.3 cm.

Moto-haba: 2.8 cm.

Saki-haba:1.6 cm.

Boshi: 2.0 cm.

Nakago: 19.4 cm.

Nakago Sori: 0.2 cm.

SUGATA:	The sugata of Kagehide is typical of swords made in the Middle Kamakura Era. There was deep sori and funbari (marked narrowing between the width at the hamachi and the width at the kissaki). His blades tended to be slimmer than his older brother, Mitsutada.
JITETSU:	The grain of the steel is a fine itame with an occasional trace of masame . There will be midare-utsuri present.
HAMON:	Most of his blades will have hamon comprised of ko-choji midare and ko-gunome. One of the important features of his hamon and one that separates his works from that of Mitsutada is the presence of togareba. Ashi and yo will also be found. Ko-nie will be present.
BOSHI:	The boshi of Kagehide tend to be small. Some will have an ikubi kissaki shape and others more of a ko-boshi, which is closer to Ko-Bizen blades.
NAKAGO:	On the few existing ubu blades by Kagehide, the nakago has a ha-agari-kirijiri tip. Both the mune and the ha sides of the nakago are slightly rounded.
MEI:	The few existing signed blades by Kagehide are all signed with ni-ji mei (two character signatures). The writing is large and somewhat unrefined characters.

There is some speculation that because the shape and structure of the blades of Kagehide are closer to the Ko-Bizen tradition than that of the remaining works of Mitsutada , that he should be classified as a Ko-Bizen smith rather than a member of the Osafune School. While this is a valid argument, because of the lack of a great amount of signed blades by Kagehide, we must remember that he worked in a time of transition. If, in fact, he was the younger brother of Mitsutada, it stands to reason that they were contemporary and that when Mitsutada broke from his more traditional Ichimonji style so it follows that the works of Kagehide might retain many of the characteristics of the older Ko-Bizen school.

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