SteveM

Hello Truc, Compare your sword with this Nagamitsu here, in fine condition and in a fine state of polish, with non-military mounts, going for a bit over US$3000 here in Japan. http://www.nipponto.co.jp/swords3/KT327378.htm

Is there a reason you think this? I mean, if it is a traditionally made sword from the early 19th century, your sword is not a WW2 blade - it is an Edo-period (presumably) hand-made relic from Japan's feudal past, and in this sense it is certainly worth a professional polish provided the sword doesn't have any obvious flaws or other vulnerabilities that would be worsened by a polish. It could be an average sword from an obscure smith, and therefore even a polish isn't going to reveal anything that would push its value up more than the cost of the polish, but I think the affordability question is a different argument - a relevant argument, maybe, but if you are talking about preservation and presentation, I wouldn't dismiss getting it professionally polished.

No Mick - the use of last name + first name, precludes that inscription being any kind of dedication, and is almost certainly self-referential - indicating it is the name of the owner, maker, inscriber, giver, etc... Den could be a possibility. I wonder about the lack of the 人偏, and I wonder that it isn't the old style 傳. But...as above, I am not happy with any of my own guesses, so, still scratching my head.

I don't think so. In other circumstances Sukehiro would be a valid, two-kanji name, but it would be unusual to have Shu-no-sukehiro. If my reading is correct, then the personal name in this case ends at suke, and the final kanji I would expect be some verb that applies to Shunosuke: something like made by (作、造) owned by (所), or cut by (彫), or given by (贈), etc... But nothing leaps out at me. This all assumes my original reading of the name is correct, of course.

Looks like a personal name. Looks like 浅井周之助　Asai Shūnosuke, but I am not 100% positive, and I am missing the final kanji...

昭和四参年拾弐月拾九日 Shōwa 43, December 19th Column to the right of this date (inside the grid) is the column for the mei. There are two headings; one for front and one for back. Underneath the kanji for "front" (表) are the words 無銘 "mumei".

Nope - not a clue. Hoping Morita-san or Nobody-san will step in. If I had a gun to my head I'd say the last one vaguely reminds me of 祐. But the top two.... I got nuthin.

Nice-looking piece. Must be even nicer in hand. Slight correction on the reading; 上野住人(Kōzuke Junin/Kōzuke residence) Ryuminsai Kanetomo I think in this case the above kanji for location is read as "Kōzuke" and refers to the old province of the same name (modern-day Gunma), where Kanetomo lived and worked. The same kanji can be read as "Ueno", but Ueno is a location in the city of Tokyo, and has nothing to do with this smith, I think.

A personal name 斎藤善吉 Saitō Zenkichi

赤尾吉次　Akao Yoshitsugu Right side is maybe 江府住 Kōfu-jū For reference, take a look at this one http://www.finesword.co.jp/sale/kodougu/htm/951_1000/958/958.htm

It doesn't seem too unusual. Its just the location that is rubber-stamped. Maybe there were a number of swords collected at that location, and the rubber stamp was the most efficient way of recording them. The name itself looks hand written 竹内勝義 島根縣鹿足群日原村 Takeuchi Katsuyoshi Shimane-ken, Kanoashi-gun, Nichihara-mura

I could only go for a about an hour on the last day. By that time the organizers had run out of catalogs, so I guess from their point of view it was a success. There were more foreigners than I'd ever seen before. There were more females than I'd ever seen before. There was still a ton of product to see in the last hour; everything from high end (20M yen) Shinkai pieces, to garden-variety mumei wakizashi. So many tsuba to look at, you'd need at least a day just for tsuba. I nearly bought a gendai tsuba made by a smith in Nagoya (I think) called Yoshiyuki (義之). It was selling for 125,000 and I'm kind of kicking myself now that I didn't buy it. I was hoping the dealer would come down in price, since it was the closing minutes of the show, but he wasn't having any of it. The tsuba was made from absolutely gorgeous iron - the design was a phrase (in letters) 長運武久 and and was lovely to look at and hold. In this style. http://www.e-sword.jp/sale/2013/1310_6043syousai.htm As it is I walked away without having bought anything. I wish I could have spent more time there.

Hello I think the first one, though confusingly etched, is 運者在天 (Unsha zaiten), which leads me to believe the other side should be 勝者在人. Together, these form a saying that is linked with Miyamoto Musashi, "Luck belongs to heaven, Victory belongs to man". However, the second side doesn't say what I would expect it to say. It looks instead like 囗戦者不実 which is kind of a random selection of characters, but the inclusion of 者 on both sides indicates that it is a couplet, with the same sort of juxtaposition of luck and skill. It looks somewhat amateurish, with the same choppy strokes one sees in the mei of WW2 blades - so to me it has the look of an inscription someone might have done before going off to war, or maybe during?

Hello, Your reading is correct Bungo-ju Fujiwara Saneyuki. I agree with Geraint - this looks like an Edo period wakizashi to me. See also the example here http://www.samuraishokai.jp/sword/13322.html

I thnk Thierry nailed it. Tamagawa Yoshihisa saku. 玉川美久作 The style of this tsuba (the design) is similar to other tsubas made by Tamagawa Yoshihisa. https://www.google.co.jp/search?q=%E7%8E%89%E5%B7%9D%E7%BE%8E%E4%B9%85%E4%BD%9C&espv=2&biw=1788&bih=893&tbm=isch&imgil=YiHgKZ5AolO_GM%253A%253BAZ2Cd0BiSOqKYM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.t-touken.com%25252Farchives%25252F5153&source=iu&pf=m&fir=YiHgKZ5AolO_GM%253A%252CAZ2Cd0BiSOqKYM%252C_&usg=__O_Gq5qwJjfpILVOXne8-Eb6BIdo%3D&ved=0ahUKEwjftJP6tLnQAhUGO7wKHZtVAiMQyjcIKA&ei=-60yWJ_LJob28AWbq4mYAg#imgrc=h655x60n8MSiiM%3A

Yes - good points. And in any event it is an interesting piece of history that should be preserved and cared for.

Hello Evan, No, it doesn't necessarily mean that. Wartime swordsmiths oversaw factory production, and they put their names to some swords, or had assistants/apprentices sign on their behalf. As you noticed, in addition to the signature, your sword also has a Showa stamp on it. It is the character shō - 昭 - inside of a five--petaled cherry blossom. You can make out the left side of 昭 in the stamp on your sword. Anyway, with this stamp I wouldn't expect your sword to be handmade.

Absolutely - By all means read up on this site and others how to preserve and store this item. I am not familiar with this smith, but there are a number of sites that offer fairly detailed lists of WWII smiths, and that discuss the production of arsenal swords. A look through the "links" section on this site should point you to other avenues of study. Yours is in civilian mounts - the wrapping of the tsuka looks in good shape (maybe it is recent?). If the blade is rusty I would resist the urge to polish, scrape, sharpen the blade by yourself.

Name inscribed on the tang is 佐藤幸平 Satō Yukihira

Left picture: 桜井町　　Sakurai cho (location name)　Not overly confident in Sakura 角井　二十五才 Kadoi 25 yrs (Kadoi is a surname. Various possible pronunciations, Tsunoi, Kakui) Right picture 部訓練可 Bukunren (ka?) Club practice/training. The last character, if 可 (ka), means that this item may be used by the club/group for training.

濃州関住福田祐光 Nōshū Seki-jū Fukuda Sukemitsu Not so much an old style of text, but a bit cryptic if you are unused to sword signatures. The 州 is written as three katanas (刀) which is a stylistic variation.

I think Hōken and Amakuni are correct, Amakuni being a reference to the legendary swordsmith of the same name. My guess; this is a tourist piece. Not necessarily poor quality blade. .

This might be true for the medieval origins of the kamon. However, the use of kamon are largely unrestricted, therefore you couldn't properly conclude that this tanto was associated with any one particular class of society. Anyone is free to to use the kikuza tachibana mon, and so without knowing the precise family from where this item came, you couldn't say much just by looking at the mon.

There is an authenticated, 3rd generation Kanewaka on Aoi's website. I attach a link here for your reference. http://www.aoijapan.com/wakizashi-gashu-ju-kanewaka-3rd-generation I do not know enough to tell you if the signatures are an exact match. They look close enough to me, but... You would need to send this to shinsa for an authoritative opinion.

Sadaroku is your man. Check out the thread here http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/6316-echigo-sadaroku/