SAS

And even more difficult for the Japanese to accept it.

Thank you for posting this.

Steel and stone....done well it is beautiful beyond mere functionality; done poorly it ruins the geometry designed by the maker. A high degree of knowledge and hand-eye coordination is required; all else is cultural baggage in my opinion. Traditional apprenticeships were more an economic arrangement to gain some recompense for the investment spent in passing on knowledge, than the time necessary to pass on the knowledge.

I can't argue with anything you have said except this.....which is patently wrong. Black Hills gold for example has a high copper percentage, as do many other mines in the world.

I ordered some other stuff as well; the same was grade # 2 and was about $85 USD a piece and shipping was around $25 USD. I had 2 pieces of same, some pine resin, a couple of buffalo horn pieces and some jittekko and nugui in the box.

I ordered some samegawa grade 2 from Namikawa and picked it up from the post office today....quality was above expectation. Now i can finish a few projects

Thank you to Peter Bleed for sponsoring the prize i won of 3 iron tsuba!

Could #1 be for a western saber style handle?

I find it strange that you are posting a request for a translation, when you are claiming to be expert enough to have "discovered" a code for Hizen mei....that speaks volumes....are you listening?

At the risk of upsetting some delicate natures, how has it been determined that this is an oil-quenched blade? I see none of the dark areas at the nioiguchi that is an indicator. Also, a sword at the boundary area of size could be considered as either perhaps; maybe the carrier was a short statured man....carrying only one sword in WW2 anyway? I believe that the Western mind tends to create categories more rigid than the Eastern mind which originated the things considered.

Hada is similar to the sword in the thread about possible acid treatment. Interesting. http://www.ebay.com/...kMAAOSw4SlV77Yy

The sudare continues into the nakago; i do not believe this is a result of acid treatment. Some other type of steel has been mixed into the forging to get this appearance. It is too bad this sword has not been through shinsa, as the comments would be enlightening. i am not in the position of bidding on this sword, but it would be worth owning in my opinion. Too bad the seller provides no information about the style or smith.

Oh my, are you kidding? Please say you will leave that to me when the spaceship arrives......

Seller says it is from Edo period, that is quite a broad range in age. it seems Shinshinto to me; we had a discussion about these types of swords several months ago, though i can't remember names of smiths who did this style. As for the polish, i am baffled, as the laminations within the hamon area are shiny while the overall area is frosty. I would not know how this was done; I am doubting that an acid process can result in this appearance, but i could be wrong. It has its own unique beauty for what it is, a very nontypical sword.

His sashikomi looks too artificial to my eyes. His photography is very nice, it is tough to get good photographs of swords.

Interesting that this subject came up, as I was just reading my copy of Bushido in which the article appeared. It seems there was quite a variance of success in the composition of the billets in multi-bar construction. Puts a bit of a dent in the myth of the perfection of Japanese forging quality.

Even when it seems dry, a reaction to the urushi can occur. Just applying the small amount of red with a brush caused microspoic amounts of urushi to get on my holding hand and cause a rash that lasted over a week. Thank you for the positive comments.

Oysters and beer opener....

Big rust pits that would not polish out; i would pass. Lots of swords in much better condition for this price.

It is very difficult to get the red to show up in pictures, though it is visible to the eye. One more try.... My intention is to just use samegawa without ito if it comes out good, but i have some blue and gold ito if it doesn't. I am still waiting for the samegawa. Thanks,

Hamon looks like it is approaching crab claw style. Lots of activity there.

I can see it ok on my monitor, but there is not a lot of red, just kind of abstract splashes of it. I can try to take pictures in better light if you would like.

Does anybody like the way my saya is turning out? Or not, and why?

I get mine from Namikawa Heibei.

By the way, urushi has an affect on many people similar to poison oak and poison ivy; be careful if you try it. I have gotten multiple rashes from this and i was being careful.