Leaderboard

By popular demand: posting the entire koshirae here for everyone's pleasure. Enjoy!

Hi all, Just like to share my recent acquisition, a unique Mitokoro-mono by the 5th generation mainline head of the Goto school, Tokujo. He was the eldest son of Kujo, born in 1549 and passed away in 1631. After serving Oda Nobunaga, he became the court chisel master for Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Exhibited at the Tokyo National Museum. Enjoy!

It is a modern Chinese fake

In my limited experience, sourcing the parts isn’t what takes the most time. In most cases, the parts are already gathered before a craftsman is even brought in to do the fitting. The real delay comes from the waiting lists of qualified craftsmen. Even if you find parts that almost fit, you can still expect a very long queue before a craftsman can get to your work and fit everything properly. It’s not simply a matter of “find the parts and someone will put them together.” It’s more like “find the parts, then wait years on a craftsman’s list until your turn finally comes.” All this is not meant to be a discouragement; but rather to prepare you - so you know what you're getting into. Hope that makes sense, -Sam

Also agree with Curran and Okan. To me, it looks mostly like a late (modern?) work "inspired" by Owari sensibilities. The workmanship and finished look of the piece, though, do not conform to Owari sukashi, Kanayama, or Yagyu, in my opinion.

Hi Ryan, No that’s it! Make sure all the details of the registration card match the gun, and send off the change of ownership paper to the Education Board of where the gun was registered, or do it online. It also asks for the previous owner’s name and address and contact details. You will need to keep the reg card preferably with the gun or within reaching distance, and you’ll need to keep the gun well wrapped if ever you need to carry it somewhere. Also if the police find it in your car for example you’ll have to provide a good reason for its presence.

This is quite an unusual one. Sorry for the poor quality reproduction. Does the design hold some particular symbolism?

I think he means he found NMB by Googling, at least that was my interpretation.

Apparently it is Chinese, and most are names. But no idea of the purpose.

+

I have finally seen a similar koshirae. This looks very similar to my inexperienced eyes, though it does not include ito on the tsuka. It appears to have the same sort of the three-layer nerikawa tsuba as well. I hope it was OK to include this image, which is not mine, but I posted it because it is clearly not every day when you find something like this, and I thought it might be interesting. Thank you for all the great information on this site! Paul

A question to ask yourself is "why do I like it?". It may be worth owning it to figure out the answer. Here are some common approaches that provide a focus to collecting and help sort out your direction: Category collecting (one example of everything) Collecting certain themes Collecting high quality Collecting certain time periods Collecting certain schools or artists Something that may be helpful is to track tsuba you like on Yahoo Japan to get an idea of price vs. availablility vs. condition. It is also a place to test your eye to see if you can spot the reproductions and modern fakes. Right now there seems to be a good selection of antique tsuba at reasonable prices. Finding out what you like is a journey or process. Discernment and taste will develop over time.

Had 2 more good photos I wanted to share. Showcasing the purple and blue reflections the steel puts off at the right angle. I am using a pure white daylight LED and have indirect sunlight coming in from my windows. Unfortuantely I had to reduce photo size and make a copy to post on the forumn. So quality got reduced.

Goto Tokujo = my favorite mainline Goto dude. His son Kenjo is my #2 pick. Tokujo lead quite a life clashing with the Tokugawa, ending up ronin for a while, AND he did it with daughters En Tout. Elements of the Lone Wolf n Cub story from his life, and he was a top notch artist on top of it all. I saw this recently with someone who I thought was based in Japan. If you picked it up from him, well done. Scoring a complete set of Goto Tokujo work is.... very hard. I haven't been able to do it. I've been searching for one of his rare tsuba for several years and had one or two near misses.

4. Thread your doubled cord through about 20 eyelets in the leather. This is a fiddly job requiring all kinds of useful tools, and plenty of free time and patience. 5. Somehow get the loop and the two loose ends to all go through the ojime. (Note that many beads will look like ojime, but the central channel of a typical ojime is usually larger than most ordinary beads.) 6. Final result with new black cord. Jabara concertina mouth pulled shut with tightly fitting ojime.

St. Croix Blades’ EBAY STORE has Swords and Tosogu ON SALE NOW —MOST ARE 20-30% OFF! Get an ADDITIONAL 5% OFF When You Buy Those Sale Items DIRECT From St. Croix Blades by emailing, texting, or calling (only if not purchasing the piece on eBay). Here's the link: https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fss=1&_saslop=1&_sasl=stcroixblades&LH_SpecificSeller=1&LH_BIN=1&_sop=16 Email info@stcroixblades.com, or call/text 715-557-1688 to purchase. (Layaway available). --Matthew Brice St. Croix Blades www.StCroixBlades.com

see you all next week. Stop bye and say hello to Grey and I Mark

Thank you Geraint

Hi Mike, Here you will find a brochure on care and cleaning: https://nbthk-ab2.org/sword-characteristics/ You would be doing yourself a big favor if you read it at least once through. Do not try to fix anything; amateur repairs often damage both the sword and its value. If you'd like to call and ask a bunch of questions all at once, my number is 218-340-1001 central time, and I won't ask you to sell me your sword. Cheers, Grey

Hello all, just a quick question. I have been planning to purchase an antique firearm from a local antique dealer here in Japan, and I have been reading up on the laws regarding it. However, since my Japanese is limited and I don't want to rely entirely on translation apps, I just wanted to double check what I need to do. (For added context, I am in Niigata-ken) Basically, if the antique, non-functional firearm I intend to purchase already has a registration certificate, do I only need to submit a notification of change of ownership, or are there any other permits or forms I need to submit? I am not exporting it as I will be living here for the near future. Thanks for your help!

@Lewis B Exactly!

@Bugyotsuji These are Tanto's that I own. And truely wanted to know what was written on them.

Konichi Wa. Sundays are for sword cleaning 🫧🧽. Many North American antique collections are found in poor condition due to the lack of awareness on what it takes to keep steel pristine - following the ritualistic cleaning of swords by our predecessors. Pro tip: use a mineral oil specific for carbon steel, like for example Yoshishiro brand oil; it protects the blade and other parts of the steel from rust. Mineral oil is colorless, odourless, and you should regularly clean your blades depending on how often you are studying/exhibiting them. As a rule of thumb I will maintain mine every two to three months, as that is how often our Toronto Token Kai (Sword Club) meets, where I serve as director. I begin by wiping the old oil with a microfibre cloth, and then use rice paper to apply a thin, fresh layer of oil on each sword. This method ensures that the artifacts in our care are preserved for future generations. I also commit to this process out of respect for Japanese history and as a meditative practice. These swords left the battles long behind, and the onus is on us to preserve them for their eventual return to the shrines of glorious Japan. 🇯🇵

@Tristan MacEwen If you could please add picture of yasurime near habaki of your example. Really neat and clean

Just copy/paste text and do edition?

My initial reaction is that the Kane kanji with the 5 lower ‘strokes’ seems a bit ‘odd’. It is usually 4 strokes… but I am far from an expert in this area.

Another one for Trystan to look at. @BANGBANGSAN

To my eye signature seems to be 和泉守兼定作 Izumi no Kami Kanesada saku. I would dare to say it is not "the" Mino Kanesada. However there seem to be 4 other Kanesada (兼定) smiths who had the title Izumi no Kami. Unfortunately I am on my phone and away from my references for the weekend so I cannot check if I have a signature example for any of the lesser known ones.

Thank you, Curran! I knew he didn’t get along with Ieyasu, but I wasn’t aware of the connection to Lone Wolf. I picked it up in Japan from someone well known, along with a Sokujo shishi set, just last week.

Hi, I'm still considering dipping my toe into the vast, deep, unknown of tsuba acquisition and I'm too dumb on the subject to know what I'm looking at - beyond whether it appeals to me or not. I've read here and other places that Nobuie is the tsuba god and so virtually anything you find with that signature will be gimei. However, I like this guard anyway because of its rugged, wabi sabi aesthetic and the Nobuie mei is so worn down as to be hardly legible anyway. All thoughts are welcome, even those that point out my obvious ignorance and deficiencies. Best, Hector

Connor, Don't be bothered by the fact that the signature is gimei. It was a well known practice as long as they were making swords. Samurai, as well as Shoguns, have been known to treasure a sword while knowing it was gimei. As for your fittings. This sword could have been brought to the war by it's owner, refitted with the wooden saya (scabbard) for the field. It would have been covered by a leather cover. They are often lost over the years. Many were donated, or bought up by the military in drives to meet demands of the war effort, then refitted in varying degrees and sold to new officers. Yours looks to have kept the civilian tsuka (handle). Cannot tell if the tsuba (hand guard) was kept or a military one put in its place. You can see an example of how it might have looked: They were also refitted fully with military hardware: There are ways to restore your sword and make it look nice, or you can keep it as is. Either way, please read up on how to take care of it: Japanese Sword Care - Japaneseswordindex.com

Kinai or Kyo-shoami? Much more refined work than cast pieces. 79 X 79 X 4.5

These are often described as "Abalone" design most are not signed and as you already speculate, a signature by Nobuie is likely gimei. The tsuba is featured in the movie "Ichi" - blind swordswoman 2008, image is poor resolution [how is that for trivia ] https://www.ebay.com/itm/296923445362

錆銅製 – Made of bronze 釣鐘竜巻香爐 – A dragon wrapped around a temple bell incense burner

What’s wrapped up on the tray? Mochi and black bean paste balls to keep you going?🙂

Hello Adam, Thank you for sharing! Brings back memories from the DTI this year. Even had my own little cameo!

@Curran can probably tell you more, but there were numerous groups signing Nobuie that are considered legit, but not by THE man or his workshop. Perfectly legit tsuba, but you need to delve into the whole "wide spaced mei" and other variations, and it's a whole rabbit hole.

Matsukawa-bishi and yajiri-tsuki chigai-ya. Needs a bit of TLC!

Congratulations on getting a very nice looking sword. I do like the horimono a lot, even though it is worn down. I do have huge respect for NBTHK and NTHK shinsa, however there are always limitations in play when they are processing hundreds of swords at fast pace in a shinsa session. I think most important thing is that they would see this as late Muromachi Sōshū Masahiro. Japanese way of giving extremely specific attributions is something I don't personally like all that much. They most likely cannot spend hours on researching a single normal sword so they shoot out a reasonable attribution they can agree on. Granted late Muromachi Sōshū is out of my comfort zone and I don't track them in my books, however I don't think I can easily find a reference sword by this smith from the huge amount of references I have at home, that is how rare this smith is. This is pretty obscure smith and very specific attribution, my guess would be that NBTHK would give out a lot more broad and general attribution. I think this entry from Nihontō Meikan is the only info I can dig up about this particular smith.

Info's aboutKajiyama Yasutoshi from Yasukuni Jinja

Quite entertaining, especially for novices who don't know much about Nihonto.

靖國神社謹畫 – Yasukuni shrine respectfully paints. 靖國奉賛會美術部謹製 – Made by the art department of Yasukuni shrine support association

Bit unusual to revive a thread after more than a year (almost 2!) but, I like this tsuba Dan. For the price, it seems like a great pickup...

To add to this - at the price range you're looking for, and even up to double that amount, there's always going to be something 'better' (or at least compelling in a different way) than anything you can get. By the nature of the market, anything in that value range is going to be lacking in some way, so what you're really hoping for is someone selling something decent at a lower price than it should be; and you're not going to find that here or at a reputable dealer, because anyone fitting that category would know what they have and roughly what it's worth. I would recommend spending at least a portion of that money on some good books; if not the usual Nihonto guides then at least one or two catalogues from a museum exhibit (the Sano Museum ones have English indexes, which is nice) so you can look at the best of the best and see what sort of shapes, hamon and jigane appeal to you and then look for scaled down versions of those in the range you can afford. If you must have a sword, right now (and I can understand the urge, I really can) then look for something that appeals to you personally, even in spite of any flaws or shortcomings, even if you can't really explain why. Something that, when you look at it, you just feel really moved or inspired on a personal level, and then when it's in your hands and the initial buzz starts to fade, use it as a jumping-off point to learn more about your own personal tastes and goals in the field - the things that drove you to pick that particular piece. At this lower-end, the best you can really hope for when it's time to move the piece on is to get back roughly what you paid for it; abandon any hopes of selling at a profit and using it to buy something better. The real value you gain will be knowledge and understanding - if not for the blade itself, then about your own aesthetic preferences and desires that led you to that point.

so my comment was accurate, the first 10 blades you buy will never be the best for you at this moment. because your still learning what is good, and what is GOOD for the price range. your price range might be "big" for you. but is in the low lower end of the market. your trying to buy a FULL package, but that means there's no value to add, no learning curve just buy, look/study and move on. papers only give you someones elses opinion, if you buy mumei and study you learn your opinion. this takes 10 blades and time go forth and learn, instead of pigeon holing your self to a budget

@Kristin also to help with your sale he is: YOSHITSUGU 吉次: real name Yoshida Jinrō (吉田任郎). Born Meiji 43 (1910) December 16. Reg. Showa 16 (1941) May 6 (age 30). (“Yoshitsugu” “1944”), (“Yoshida Yoshitsugu”), (“Noshi Seki ju Yoshida Yoshitsugu saku”). see Slough p.202 also see Naval Swords Part 2, in the NMB Downloads (at top of page), other examples.

Hello K, You might want to update your title to include "kaigunto" as this is a Navy officer sword. There are people who are looking for kaigunto, and the added word would help yours show up in online searches. They are worth more than Army gunto, in general. Yours also has the upgraded shark skin on the saya, which looks nice. Good luck with the sale!

Wife has never liked this box but it has fascinated me ever since I first laid eyes on it. An elderly Japanese lady left it and a few other Japanese antiques to us. It looks like it may have a bit of age and it definitely took a great deal of skill to create. I love the butterfly hinges and the fish eye latch. It appears to have no visible seams. It measures 3x4x1.5 inches. What say you fellows? Howard Dennis

I thought I’d show my recent acquisition. A special order tanto by Horii Hideaki

Hi I was wondering if anyone might be able to shed some light on the controversy concerning Yokoya Somin I producing tsuba, I have read two theory's regarding this, one that he did not make tsuba at all, and that all tsuba signed by Yokoya Somin are by later generations, and another that he did produce tsuba but in very limited numbers. I know that there are two Tsuba in the Alexander Mosle catalog supposedly by Yokoya Somin I and one of those( the one with the horse I think) has been published in some Japanese references as made by Yokoya Somin I, and I vaguely remember another tsuba I think depicting Shoki in another Japanese reference also stating that it was by Yokoya Somin I. So I guess my question is what is the general consensus in Japan (if any at all) concerning this, and what is the consensus concerning the legitimacy of the above mentioned Tsuba supposedly by Yokoya Somin I. Thanks in advance for any input Austin Ross