Roland

Hi Ted, thanks a lot for your response. You are right about the rounded tops. And it's a pity that I have not yet received morte photos for appraising the hamon like this detail shot... The others are more like this: Even these bad pic show especially in the lower part of the hamon the valleys coming closer to the edge and a strong tendency to more pointed tops. But nevertheless the best idea would be to fly to Cornwall and inspect the blade personally! My friend is quite old and not able to handle a modern camera in the way a Nihonto addict is hoping for. Hm, late Koto early Shinto Den Ganmaku indeed is a possibility I should think about. Thanks a lot for your advise :-)

Dear NMB fellows, A friend of mine in Great Britain offered me a Katana. At a first look it is Sue Koto, Muromachi era, Mino Seki, typical Gunome Midare Hamon. (Yep, I know, I'm a Mino sucker...). Ubu nakago with one mekugi-ana, mumei. Ha-watari 67 cm, Sori 2,2 cm, Kissaki 3,5 cm. A nice blade with a very pronounced irregular hamon of mostly rounded tops, but not everywhere, in between the one or the other togari-ba can be seen, possibly a early attempt of sanbon-sugi. He send me some photos of not the very best quality. Nevertheless they are precise enough for a quick first look. Especially the boshi leaves me a little bit irritated – may be just because of my minor knowledge. It seems to be a Chu-kissaki, Midare komi, i.e. the Gunome Midare hamon continues in the boshi – on one side ending in a small kaeri, on the other side without kaeri but a hint of hakikake. Now I'm contemplating about this boshi... One of the countless Kanemoto smiths? The blade was handed over by the mayor of Mukaishima to a British officer when Japan surrendered in 1945...

Hi Richard, thanks for your quick response! And honestly: You did make a really great job especially for us Nihonto newbies in the last years. Therefore we all are indebted to you! Have a good time. @ Barry: I send you a PM and paypal'd the fee for a foreign JSSUS membership...

Dear NMB community, did I miss something? What did happen with Richard Turner's Nihontokanjipages? I try to visit his helpful site but always get a "Forbidden" from the server???

Dear fellow Nihonto addicts, from time to time I have a look at the offers of British antique arms & militaria shops. Though their presentations and even the informations about the Nihonto blades they offer are lacking detailed insights (both visually and experience wise) there is often enough a chance to discover something special. Like this Katana (titled "A Japanese WW2 Officer's Sword with Very early Ancestral Blade")... The guys of The Lanes Armoury at http://www.thelanesarmoury.co.uk seemed not to be able to give some more hints about the identity of the blade. After some research of the (low resolution!) online pics I assume that this could be a Ko-Nio Katana. It seems to show Yamato influence in the hamon, the sugata reminds me of the late Kamakura or early Nambokucho (like this one at Nihontocraft http://www.nihontocraft.com/Katana_Ko_Nio.html), the hamon seems to be a chu-suguha (?) with hotsure, the nakago looks quite old and has a dark chocolate color. Only one kanji of the mei is visible (a second one seems to be gone by time) and with some effort decipherable: KIYO. This again (if it isn't gimei) would be a hint to the Nio respectively Ko-Nio school with smiths like Kiyotsuna, Kiyonaga or Kiyohisa... Unfortunately the pics are far too bad to identify the typical Herakage Utsuri of early Nio blades. The only figures I've got is the 28" lenghth of the Nagasa. What do you think about this find? If I had time I would fly to Brighton, meet Mark and Daviod Hawkins and inspect the blade personally. Fortunately there are no funds left for such a spontaneous trip

There are some further informations about the new organisation via http://www.thetokenforum.com/index.php... I subsume: The new organisation willl be called NBSK. It has the support of 3/4 national living treasures, the various polishers, sword and koshirae craftsmen organizations. Tokugawa Yoshihisa (Shogunal descendent) has agreed to chair the new organization. It will be recognized by the Ministry of Culture as the only sanctioned provider of papers (!). The NBSK will establish international divisions, perhaps after 1 or 2 years. There will possibly be a dramatic change in in the way papers will be structured: no tier system anymore! Instead of that a corroborative system where papers just affirm "This is a genuine Xxxx from Yyyy period." You may imagine the implications to the market of Nihonto

Dear Nihonto enthusiasts, Studying the mumei Mino Katana I acquired in the meantime (won't like to pick up my old post from months ago: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2183&hilit=Kanesada) I today can add some close-up photos of the hamon and the ji-hada. As D'Arcy and others then assumed it indeed seems to be a late Koto, middle to late Muromachi Mino Kanesada Ha blade. Though I'm still experimenting with the correct lighting it is amazing how much detail the Olympus E-330 with a Leica-R Macro-Elmarit is able to produce. Being in learning mode again I now try to estimate the quality of the jihada. For my amateurish eyes it looks like a not fine but dense mokume/masame hada. What do you think? Is it possible to contain the smith a little bit more? I appreciate your knowledge!

Pardon, Peter, but what's told on ebay and what's definitely true, are two quite different things. And moreover my Kanji know-how is quite rudimental :-) And especially when I did read the published translations with their quite partriotic meaning I was in doubt about their authenticity. Even when the source is an well known ebayer with good reputation like historian333.

Dear Koichi-san, I appreciate your assistance very much. But please be lenient toward my awkward efforts to master the complexity of Kanji... I read: bu-(tatsu?)-cho-kyu = something like: military (success?) lasts (shall last, may last) forever and teki-kan-(???)-chin = something like: Sink (each, every, all?) enemy warship Seems that more or less correct for you? If so then this inscription sounds very patriotic indeed and in so far appropriate for a navy officer of higher rank during the WW1. Again thanks a lot for your kind help.

I'm deeply saddened to hear about this tragic death of Ralph Bell. Though I didn't know him personally I remember that he was President of the Northern California Japanese Sword Club and involved with Japanese Swords for decades. May God bless his family during this time.

Dear NMB members, I found the following inscription on the nakago of a Wak of the Shinto or Shinshinto era which once (so my educated guess) was owned by a prominent member of the Imperial Japanese Navy. After several attempts to decipher it (using tools like the Nihonto Kanji Pages etc.) I'm still not able to translate it. So my hope is that the cumulative competetence of you all is able to solve the riddle of this Wak. Any kind of help is highly appreciated...

"Rust removed on tang" = the blade is worthless! The rust on the nakago of a blade is an essential part of the nihonto. You would never have a chance to go with a blade to a shinsa (for getting it papered by NTHK or NBTHK) if someone has removed the rust. So just forget this "occasion" :-)

Thanx, Steve, you are right, commercial aspects are not the point of this poll. Just the very subjective personal dreams of each of us. I f.e. am fascinated by the "calmness" in the works of the Ko-Mihara school (B), would enjoy to own an early Oei-Bizen Osafune Katana, perhaps one made by Yasumitsu, who's serene shibui suguha hamon I love (A), and I'm thinking of the Fuyuhiro school as a kind of an insider's tip ©. Well, no further dreams here in the forum?

Back again after some absence I wonder what would be the personal dreams of the members of this fabulous group of Nihonto addicts. So let's make a quick and easy poll – three questions: A: What's your personal Nihonto "wet dream" – if money wouldn't be a problem at all? B: What's your personal Nihonto "favorite" – because of it's aesthetics, historical relevance or price/performance-wise? C: What's your personal Nihonto "sleeper" – a smith or a school which is mostly overlooked but nevertheless an insiders' tip? I'm curious about your answers :-)

Thanks a lot, Chris. This indeed seems to be a textbook example of Yoshii school work. A lucky guy who was able to buy such a piece decades ago :-) As far as I know Dr. Honma Junji talks in his Token Bijutsu Koto-lessons of a Kiyonori who moved to Izumo Province and produced an extant work with the inscriptation of "Unshu ju Kiyonori" and the production date of Eikyo 2. Must be Your 2nd gen. Kiyonori.

Mailed!

Hello Ed, my mail was send on friday, 9 pm local time to yakiba1(at)yahoo.com... But there is no problem at all with that :-) The massively positive "karma" you have in this fine forum encourages me to scan Your offers continuously. There will be a new chance - or as Mike said "another blade will come". Thanks a lot for your friendly response!

In the meantime someone bought it. And it was not me! Not so nice that I didn't receive any reply on my mail from the owner of the site when I asked for his conditions to put a Hold on the katana...

There is a Munehisa (just one!) of Yukihira school, Oei (1394-1428), ID MUN105,... Source: NihontoClub: http://nihontoclub.com/smiths/MUN105

Besides the fact that I think of the Yoshii school as one of the most interesting schools of Bizen-den – based on the Osafune style but with their own interpretation of that – I just had a look at a possible Yoshii Kagenori katana at yakiba.com: http://www.yakiba.com/kat_kagenori.htm The original Fujishiro sensei kanteisho doesn't any more exist, just a fotocopy of it. Nevertheless it seems to be a quite interesting blade including koshirae for a interesting price. What I wonder is: As far as I know, the smiths of the Yoshii school tempered a very typical hamon – a narrow ko-gunome in nie or nioi-deki or later a round ko-gunome in a more or less regular pattern. The hada was mostly mokume mixed with itame. This blade is described with a ko-midare or ko-midare based on suguha. So my question: Do you think this could nevertheless be a 3rd or 4th generation Kagenori? I forgot: The boshi seems to be more yakitsume than ko-maru...

In the meantime I came to the conclusion that the hamon seems to be a Hako-midareba in Sue-Seki style, possibly Owari-seki. More opinions?

just to give an update... In Malcolm E. Cox' supplement to "Mino-to" – based on Koto Mei Tsukushi Daizen and Kisei Koto Meikan – I indeed found a Sukenaga (1444-1504) who could fit the Blade. Associated with the Yakuoji school he worked in the Mikawa province. Token Bijutsu No. 599 notes that the founder (?) of this school Seki Kaneharu moved to Yakuoji of Mikawa Province. Followed by his son Yakuoji Suketsugu who possibly was the teacher of Sukenaga. The dates nevertheless are not so distinct – as often with these smaller schools...

I received some photos from the owner. The sugata (see photo!) looked not bad. Nagasa 26-1/3", sori 2.5 cm, iori mune, o-suriage nakago 8-1/4", three mekugi-ana, nakago-jiri kiri, width at munemachi 3 cm, 0.65 cm thick, that are the figures I got. Then I had a look at his photos which showed a, well, suboptimal polish. I just was a little bit irritaded when the guy told something of "no boshi". So I investigated further...

I just had a look at this kissaki of a o-suriage Tachi. And I cannot identify any boshi, though seen from mune-saki there is a nagashi. What has happened to this blade? Ichimai should display minor parts of the outline of the boshi. Just some brutal sanding? May be that's a stupid question but I try to train my eyes.

...so really old and authentic beauty meets really new and also authentic beauty :-) Congrats and kindest regards from me too!