Geraint

Dear Catalin. This appears to be a bonji horimono, have a look here and you might find it, https://swordsofjapan.com/nihonto-library/Japanese-bonji/ This would originally have been carved on the blade above the habaki and so its presence here suggest a sword which is suriage/shortened. The presence of two mekugi ana at his point suggests that it has been shortened quite a lot. A picture of the whole blade without the habaki might help us here. So far this looks like an original piece but the condition of the blade really matters so photographs please? All the best.

And the menuki are tsurugi or ken. Here with a dragon,https://www.ricecracker.com/inventory/896_menuki_ken_dragon/896_menuki_ken_dragon.html All the best.

Dear Burt. To summarise somewhat. This is a very nice sword, the thick seppa/washers and the pierced tsuba/guard as well as some other features are probably what lead your friend to tell you it was 1934, there is a quality about these mounts which not all Shingunto have. The original label called it a tachi because of the fact that the mei/signature is on the side usually called tachi mei, most katana are signed on the other side of the tang. Now as Chandler has already said this is a distinctive feature of the Hizen school who tended to sign tachi mei on katana, it would not mean that the sword was a tachi though from a dealer point of view it might be nice to describe it as such. Dating it to Shinshinto or late Edo period is understandable but in this case wrong I think. Have a look at this thread, particularly about 11 posts down where Morita san has posted an oshigata that matches well with yours. This does suggest that this smith was known for forging gendato, traditionally forged swords as opposed to Showato which are not traditionally forged. To my eye and from your photographs your sword does look interesting and I wouldn't be surprised if it does turn out to be gendaito which puts it into a whole other bracket. Go slow, don't do anything more than wipe the blade surface with some very light oil and get in touch with a local sword club who can examine the sword in hand and tell you more. There is a ton to learn and a never ending mine of information to assimilate but the journey is fun. All the best. All the best.

Dear Pawel. All depends. You have an offer of $1500 which is about £1100, that's certainly within the right realm for what it is right now. If on the other hand you are thinking of importing this then that might add to your difficulties/costs. The next question is what are you going to do with it? Do you want to have it polished and put in shirasaya? If so the costs/ time/ difficulty rise quite a bit. Generally Fujiwara Takada blades are not thought highly of so I doubt that financially you would get your money back but most of us don't collect with that in mind and the joy of restoring a blade might be your reward. If you want to own it as an interesting example and keep is essentially as it is but with some care then it's an interesting proposition. I would be concerned that it only has the one seppa, carelessly lost or have the mounts been altered? It might be possible to replace seppa but you would need to know that the blade and mounts will accept this. I do appreciate that I have raised more questions than I have answered but in the end it is your call. Do let us know how it turns out. All the best.

Welcome to NMB Martin. Point 1 Don't poliosh anything! I assume that you know not to touch the blade with bare hands, just a little light oil on this, very thin coat. So far this looks like a nice example and, depending on what the nakago/tang reveals, by a smith who commands some interest. Do you know how to disassemble the sword? If so then a good shot of the tang/nakago would be interesting. Next question, is the tsuba/guard pierced? Depending on where you are there may be some members not too far away who would be happy yo tell you more with the sword in hand. All the best.

Dear Minh. For some detail on kazu uchimono see here, https://nihonto.com/a-brief-study-of-bizen-blades-of-the-muromachi-era/ To gain more insight you are ging to need to do some seriou study, asking for opinions here is fine but as Jacques intimated we are going from photographs that are moderately good but don't reveal everything, the boshi for example. You have the lead that, in general swords from this time and province with this mei are considered as kazu uchi mono so what does that mean for the chance of TH? What about this sword leads you to believe that it has a chance of going to TH? Given that it is Sue Bizen with the classic mei and nothing more it has papered as a genuine sword, is there something that leads you to think that is has been underestimated by the Japanese seller? If there is something to be gained by having it at TH level why didn't the Japanese seller take it further? What do you think about the slightly loose forging evident in the last photograph? Just some questions for you to think about. All the best.

And just a minor correction, the mei is, 'Bishu Osafune Sukesada'. All the best.

Dear Minh. The date on the nakago is Tensho as Steve has pointed out. Nihonto club is a useful resource but not comprehensive, Hawleys lists several smiths signing this way working between 1350 and 1573. It is not reasonable to jump to a date based on Nihonto club which contradicts the mei on your sword, rather more likely to be one of the other smiths working in the Tensho period. Enjoy your sword and your research. All the best.

Dear Kyle. Obviously you will do your own research on this one and others will express opinions but at first glance this does not have the 'handwriting' of the school. As you look at examples you will note a particular style of cutting which is distinctive and I imagine hard to copy well. All the best.

Dear Stephen. Forgive me is this is presumptuous but I am sure that he would want you to remember the exchanges about tosogu and to cheer you on, I very much doubt that he would have wanted you to feel guilty but rather to remember the friendship shared over the years. All the best.

Dear Srinivas. Just to address your question directly, the hard line in the nakago is a demarcation between the earlier shape and finish of the nakago and the shape and finish of the latest suriage. Sometimes when a sword is shortened the thickness of the nakago needs to be adjusted, in this case the smith has filed the nakago above the line but chosen to retain the earlier patina below the line. Of itself nothing to worry about and not an indication of an added nakago. All the best.

Welcome back Dale! All the best.

Dear William. A significant number of Japanese swords came back to the UK at the end of WWII, most were swords produced specifically for the war using different manufacturing techniques to the process used to produce traditional swords. The Seki stamp on yours and the date range make it one of these. In more recent years such swords have been collected and examples have been brought into the country but given the missing mounts yours has probably been here since the end of the war. They were little regarded during the time following 1945, one collector's story speaks of going to see a sword and finding the fence beside the garden path made up of blades stuck into the ground with a wire threaded through the mekugi ana, the fittings had been stripped off and sold for scrap. Your sword would once have looked like this: If all you need is this thread then so be it but if you find yourself interested then perhaps consider joining the Token Society of Great Britain, easy to find on the web. If you want to do some research then this sword would be a Shingunto, pop that in a browser and you will find a ton of information. Great place to start would be: http://ohmura-study.net/900.html All the best.

Dear Kim. Welcome to NMB! Your approach to this sword is very good and will stand you in good stead in the future. To give some more detail, first picture shows a poorly shaped tsuba with a suspect hole in it, perhaps the copyist was trying to mimic a kozuka ana. The blade has a weak overall shape and the area around the kissaki/point has poor geometry. The nakago is again badly shaped and the signature is cut, metal has been chiseled out of the blade whereas Japanese swords are signed by chasing where a punch dents the metal, none is removed, and the repetitive strokes are clearly visible. The grain of the steel is crude and very obvious, hada/grain on Japanese swords can vary between almost invisible and quite clear but on this sword it seems almost to have a texture to it. The tsuka/hilt does not align well with the overall shape of the mounts, compare to the example that Alexi linked to, and is itself poorly shaped, it seems to wiggle. The fittings are close copies but not the right shapes, especially the menuki and the hangers on the saya/scabbard. The tsuka ito/binding is badly done, skinny and not laced or knotted correctly. You say you did not pay very much for this sword so in the long run this might be a fairly cheap learning experience. I am sure that we all wish you a much more interesting sword next time around. All the best.

Dear Jeremy. David is spot on with advice about not judging sori from the koshirae, after all it is a description of a feature of the sugata of the blade. I have a wakizashi where the habaki is made in such a way that when mounted the sword looks like koshizori but on its own it is clearly not. All the best.