Rivkin

Yes, that's Japanese way to do online auction. The bidding is over when beyond the given time, there are no bids for x minutes. The seller can withdraw the listing at absolutely any time. Used to make me upset as well. Kirill R.

The problem is not someone making money or not, the problem is how to attribute things where we don't really have a solid understanding of what are the absolute, unquestionable works of the Master against which everything else needs to be compared. The position of not recognizing a specific type as Muramasa, which is recognized by others, is unfortunately a judgement call. Its not something that can be proven or even given a really solid argument. The problem with the early Soshu is not that people suddenly discover Masamune, if a blade was not considered such during the Edo period, the chances of it suddenly getting this attribution are mostly imaginary. The problem is first that Masamune is still ill defined so there are plenty of Juyo or Hozon or Jubi or whatever Masamune owners who are convinced Shizu, or Hasebe, or Naotsuna, or Go would be more appropriate. Its interesting that Kamakura names - Yukimitsu and Norishige actually seldom come up in this context. There are still questions whether Masamune can be all three - a Kamakura smith, and a great smith, and a smith with unique features in his work. There are solid arguments that one can obtain a reasonable and consistent definition of "real" Masamune, but one of those needs to be relaxed. Second is that there are too many blades, they are not tremendously different from each other, and almost nothing is signed. So you have something that is well defined by features (no, its not about quality only, there are quite a few Norishige in decent condition that should never be Juyo) - Norishige, Akihiro, Hiromitsu, maybe Go, Chogi, maybe even Sadamune. And you have Masamune, Hasebe, Shizu, Tametsugu, Naotsuna where things are kind of shaky. It goes down to personal preference whether someone believes the oshigata from Edo book that says Tametsugu was Mino smith and was related (teacher of?) Kinju-Kaneyuki and thus whole bunch of works in such style go to him. Etc. Etc. Its not about money, its about too many attributions being based on pure judgement calls, guesses and information from Edo publications which might or might not be accurate, because the blades shown there do not exist today, and well all those publications did show plenty of authentic Amakuni works. With Shizu versus Naoe Shizu when it comes to Nambokucho blades it is almost purely a personal preference. One person will say - it has ten togari in daito, too much to call it Shizu. Another will say - I call Naoe only with twelve togari or above. Early Soshu is difficult and never absolutely certain. Just the nature of the game. Those who want certainty, they do collect Edo or some respected Osafune lineage. Or one can accept NBTHK papers of specific color as absolute. Does resolve a lot of headache. Kirill R.

There is 55mm micro-Nikkor, which is one of the best designs in Nikon lineup. Its manual version is not very expensive and fully capable, but still 55mm is a tad wide, though this macro is not known for distortions. Gret corner performance, crisp colors. But since its going to be very close to the subject, light is an issue. 105mm miro-Nikkor will be easier to use and more versite for such shots, though dof will be narrower. And its 1:1 which means you can fell the frame with fuchi. I actually still have both from the times I used Nikon gear. Never got my act together to actually sell them. Both still work decently with f/32, though I did use them with f/16 and focus stacking. There are many techniques to light those up, tsubas usually do well with a ring or box, fk sometimes do benefit from a bit of shadows... Kirill R.

Its kind of deep theory approach. The practice is more along the lines that it is unheard of attribution changing, especially substantially, when H is resubmitted to get TH. Such change would mean the recepient parading around sword clubs in Japan, triumphantly showing the papers with "I told you when I got the H, the shinsa was wrong with the first judgement, what a bunch of fools". Tokuju is a thing in itself etc. The more important issue is that the judgements are seldom random, but as there are plenty of names with either no signed examples, or massive multi-generational production with almost nothing dated or signed with details, in both cases the matter of attribution reflects a specific school of thought. NBTHK today will not paper any wide-gunome Muramasa. NTHK, green papers, Honma and Kanzan sayagaki - did or do. Who's right in this case - how to judge. Its not like there is a Muramasa tanto somewhere that is known for certain to be specifically the authentic second generation. A very big portion of famous Muramasa daito and even a few tanto are made in such a style (suguha etc.) that the only reason they are accepted is because they were well regarded even during the early Edo. Similarly NBTHK attributes a lot of koto to Shimada, Uda and Fuyuhiro. Disproportional to the number of such signed blades in the existance, and with little evidence there is a very similar blade somewhere that is signed by any of such school. An indirect conjecture based on date/style. NTHK NPO likes Gassan Chikanori for every high contrast hadamono. You almost never see this name being used by NBTHK. They would more likely brand the northern-looking hadamono as Houju for the early Muromachi and maybe Fuyuhiro for the late Muromachi. If you give a Muromachi daito with wide suguha with some nie and mokume-itame hada to NBTHK they will churn up some Sue Bizen name. NTHK more likely will say Mihara. Who's right - these schools do cross each other in this style in Muromachi period. And with the early Soshu its really everyone is on his own. Plenty of very high end collectors will not 100% or even 80% trust anything by NBTHK at all levels, even reaching as high as Tokuju. Nor would they trust NTHK. Its more often than not is down to one's personal preferences what exactly to call a top unsigned Soshu daito from about 1340-1360. Kirill R.

Thank you very much, this is the feedback I was looking for. I assume its NTHK non-NPO? I never submitted anything with them, because of purely personal issues, so I can't comment at all on either their numbers or their judgements. 81 on NTHK-NPO - highest personally seen. As a prospective, saw 2 NBTHK Juyo papered with 76 and 78 points respectively with very similar attributions. I do like NTHK NPO shinsa, first and foremost because they are accessible (a month to paper in Japan, compared to half a year with NBTHK unless you manage to match the schedule/visits exactly). Second they strive to be more detailed in their appraisal. In my personal experience if NBTHK issues papers to say 10 Kozori names, NTHK papers to three times that number, i.e. often issues papers to much lesser known smiths which NBTHK will never begin to consider for a mumei blade. Thrice I had NTHK issuing much higher names compared to NBTHK. Twice I had NTHK issuing significantly lower names than NBTHK. There is a very clear pattern - NBTHK is very conservative with things like Soshu tanto, papering quite a few of clearly good pieces to Shimada and Uda, without even adding a name. At the same time, NTHK strives to involve a number of provincial Etchu and Echizen names in its early Soshu judgements, so Norishige can suddenly come back with an almost unheard of Nambokucho period Echizen smith. I have to state a personal opinion - within the last decade regarding NBTHK, it is often that the judgement appears as too generic and made in much haste. Kirill R.

Gassan Chikanori is not supposed to be pure ayasugi, but rather ayasugi that appears in small parts of the blade, like one sees in Houju. In NTHK definition Gassan Chikanori especially is basically late Muromachi blades which exhibit high contrast hada, weak hamon and some evidence of something that looks ayasugi. NBTHK papers would typically yield a different name, though equally vague; Fuyuhiro is a common NBTHK counterpart attribution. Both are not particularly supported by signed blades. Kirill R.

Sword's name I presume, Kirill R.

Well I never miss an opportunity to guess - both items are from 1800, the kozuka is Hamano Nara, the fk is harder to pinpoint, a very popular topic. With such extreme macro focus stacking is usually what I resort to. Kirill R.

I can't offer much except for a very personal opinion: the notion that claim was made that specific collections are in large formed by purchases from Aoi Art is factually false. The discussion on green papers was similarly problematic because of the whole other set of factually false claims - that green paper Sadamune are always available on yahoo (no, they are very rare), that green paper swords are sold for nothing (no, they are expensive, except a steep discount on certain specific categories). Yes, maybe Aoi Art selling green papered swords is not to the liking of someone in America. Tough. Until I see any evidence that Aoi Art's blade was sold with such papers with a statement that the papers are to be trusted, but later failed to repaper - to me judging such sales has no more value than a niche personal preference. People buying green papered swords en masse for nothing in Japan and selling them with 10x markup - not aware of any such cases, its commercially very difficult to impossible. In the original discussion Andy Quirt was the one who had green papered sword for sale, and I really don't think depicting him buying up green papered swords in Japan and then swindling newbies is accurate at all. I personally can highly [!] recommend his shop, as probably most of the actual collectors. Coming back to Aoi Art, I found myself within the last year repeatedly in a difficult position. I was asked to comment about a dozen times on Juyo and above swords on sale by Tsuruta san with a caveat that it is "known" that the images were photoshopped and the item itself is highly problematic. In all cases it turned out to be an opinion coming from one and the same person. Obviously I could not just say - I vouch for the item. Because I did not see the blades myself. Neither did the dealer who did not like them. And why should I take the responsibility? At best I can only comment on the photographs presented, which in my case is not worth that much. In light of this, my position was always - take it with two grains of salt. Somebody who bought a sword, studied it extensively and then voiced what he saw as a problem may or may not have a point. I heard so many times "it will never be Juyo again because it is slightly suriage/hamachi moved/etc.", it seems as much an art of guessing as objective analysis. Had papered swords pronounced saiha by supposed experts. Maybe they are right! But compared to all of those case, Le Grande Opiniators - like me, commenting based on photographs or oshigata should be assigned lesser priority. Every matter reported by those without personal involvement - much lesser priority. I heard so many horrible stories in the past decades about "what really happened", I lost count. When I acted on this rumors I typically made mistakes myself. Just as with Aoi Art, I heard a worrisome tale about Fred Weissberg. Zero chance its real. I can't comment on Hitler, Mao and others, as my understanding of those subject is very slim. Kirill R.

Worksheet for NTHK is a must. Besides the score it can contain comments that don't go on the paper (uncommon). Kirill R.

Dmitry's showing items from Aoi Art and openly discussing this, is a public record on facebook. The case in point - almost everybody uses Aoi once in a while. He has a wide range of items, prices and clients. Is Tsuruta san the most honest, straightforward and worthy dealer? No. The problem is, I don't know any such person. He is better than quite a few, but I never worked with a dealer I did not have an issue with, at least once in a while. Never saw a dealer whose description was not proclaimed dishonest by someone else. Or someone commenting that the items "should not be sold", because they have demerits - mumei, or bad horimono. I heard stories about Fred Weissberg. Spending some time with him I instead formed an opinion he is a very honest and direct man. Does not mean agreeing with everything he says. There are horrible stories about myself. I am glad they are exotic. One thing I learned from that - not to take too seriously anything that does not come from a victim. If someone says - I was wronged in such a way, then at least something did happen. If the story is told by another dealer whose moral qualities demand fixing the world... Maybe I simply don't like people with high morals. I am but a simple unscrupulous man in the world of scholars and ancient nobility on the mother's side. Once I was selling a koshirae; I brought it to a very old and very respectable dealer. He looked at it, said I can take it, but the menuki are new. This can be hard to see for a newbie, but new gold has this distinctive look. He quoted the price reflecting that. I walked out. A few months later I decided I need the money and have to sell it. Brought it back; he looked at it - a really decent koshirae. And well, the price does reflect it having nice gold menuki from a respectable school. Kirill R.

Yes, but are the theoretical numbers they provide real? I was trying to "experience-based" look at it, and to me it seems that the real range is between 68 and 83, i.e. I never saw a blade rated outside it, if Yushu shinsa is taken as a separate matter. In this range I am quite certain of the following: 68-69: problem swords. 70-72: average blades 75-76: good blades, which apparently can/could go Juyo with a slightly different attribution, but in general are not expected to do so. 81+ solid Juyo. Would this mean 78-79 sort of like blue papers NBTHK used to have? And there is I guess still a caveat that they give 78-79 to good shinto and shinshinto blades which however can be not a prime Juyo material (waki). I saw very few 77, 79 and 80, and suspect these are basically rare variations of 76 and 78 groups accordingly. Kirill R.

An advice or personal experience on NTHK NPO paper scores is appreciated, especially its upper portion. My take is that: Below 70 - major condition issues 70-72 - an average blade by chujosaku smith, or a more ambitious sword but with condition issues. 75-76 - TH analogue. This being said, I once had Juyo scoring 76 when submitted to check if there is an alternative name. So I guess this range includes a number of good blades, but with some detriment (mumei etc.). 77 - very rare, kind of 76 in nice condition. 78 - this is an island of sorts, as both 77 and 79 are rare. Good blades of average name smiths. 81 - more or less straightforward Juyo pieces. Signed ubu kamakura. Uncommon. I don't have any experience with their Yushu etc. so any information is appreciated. There are used to be posts that NTHK (NPO?) sort of grades each smith on its own curve, but I did not find it to be particularly holding in my experience. Kirill R.

Everybody buys from Aoi. Suwaguchi, Dmitry, peasants, officers and ncos. I had couple of times issues like a minor fukure which was not disclosed in text and not clear on photographs. Tsuruta san seldom specifically comments on small-mid defects. Its something that a few others pointed out as well. Otherwise, above 250-450k yen it is well known as a shop where one can buy good things for less. High throughput, low margin. The one thing you will find lacking in this thread are the victims. Nobody says I bought a green papered sword from Aoi, which Tsuruta san said he trusts, had issues with repapering it and was sent off when complained. Or I bought papered sword, went to Tanobe for sayagaki and was told its saiha. I heard about a dozen of revelations about Tsuruta's real practices within the last year alone, none from the actual victims. All of them in fact went back to a single person who was kind enough to prevent collectors from being swindled by Tsuruta san. I guess, there are dealers who REALLY dislike Tsuruta. Otherwise if return guarantee is a big thing, then American dealers are the way to go. They also tend to have reasonable deals within this price range. nihonto.us, yakiba, nihontocraft come to mind a reliable shops that do have substantial wares in 1000-5000 usd range. Kirill R.

Absolutely NO. Kirill R.

Modern. Kirill R.

Being an ignorant man, and with reactionary attitudes largely preventing Juyo submissions, I still _guess_ the actual passing is more challenging than 10%. Ubu, signed, Kamakura has probably 99% passing rate. Suriage but still long, Ichimonji - 80%. Katana Kiyomaro - 50%? So at each session after those things are auto-papered, then starts the real competition between still very good blades, but which are better in life than on paper. Fighting for the remaining spots. What kind of chance an absolutely stellar nidai Hizen Masahiro has? Kirill R.

And while we are at it.... Continental chokuto do tend to have one ana and much later they go to two... But sometimes you get this uncommon suriage thing, and even though likely only one probably functional at any given time, it is kind of fun. Kirill R.

Yes its a bit weird, and it was I guess attributed thus as nagomaki naoshi. Regarding the red lacquer, very many people fear it, but I never saw anything disastrous with it. Its actually quite expensive to apply, and was quite often done to temple blades, usually yari and such. One has to guess that while today when publications talk about kogarasumaru they are talking about the one in Tenno collection. But by late Edo there were 16 kogarasumaru, and no less than 4 kusanagi all owned by major temples with supposed provenance all the way to the source. They had quite a lot of blades, especially some temples. Kirill R.

Yes, it is, but I've got only two mekugi coming with it. Kirill R.

There are two mekugi coming as a set. Could it be some weird reuse of a tsuka? I don't have the blade unfortunately, so no proof, but I don't think so. Kirill R.

Personal opinion: Tamahagane requirement applies to post-1935 or so swords, i.e. military patterns and post WWII production. For anything earlier, the historical-artistic value is assumed. You can get a registration for a European 19th century smallsword. You can get a registration for a 19th century Japanese sword where on nakago its written that its made from a Russian anchor. Or something made in 1914 from a steel of such and such Japanese company to commemorate something company-related. The boundary between "can get registered" vs. "illegal to own" is thus somewhat vague when we start dealing with swords made in 1920-1930s. You do see plenty of diplomatic smallswords sold with broken off blades, and then you see identical models with blades fully intact. On the artistic side, once you get to using steel which has very high thermal conductivity (extremely homogeneous and low grain size), including that between folding layers - the ability to form complex patterns in both ji and ha is impacted significantly. Its going to be a good sword, artistic it will never be. Kirill R.

Nice! My personal vote would be on Muromachi. Kirill R.

Sure, on Sunday. I will even boost the suspension - the ana are wide on one side and narrow on the other, and there are still two conical wood mekugi inserted in them. Kirill R.

No, that works in some countries with daggers. But continental chokuto had either iron or copper, not wood mekugi and went from one to two relatively early as well. Kirill R.