DirkO

Ron, Fujishiro's says that Naotsugu refers to Mishina Naomichi - this is in fact Naomichi Mishina (1716) where it is stated that he was called Naotsugu. This is the nidai Naomichi and not Kanemichi who signed Naomichi early in his career. The 1681 on this unfamiliar origami seems to be ok if the general working time was 1716 and he signed Naotsugu in his (very) early career. Kanemichi shodai, who also signed Naomichi in his early days, is list 1648 which is too early to be your Tenwa guy. Also see nihontocraft.com: Naomichi, 3rd generation, 1716, Settsu, Settsu ju Naomichi 摂州住直道, Oite Banshu Mishina Tango (no) Kami Fujiwara Naomichi 於播州 三品 丹後守藤原直道. Son of the nidai Tango (no) Kami Kanemichi, early name Naotsugu 直次. Lived in Osaka of Setsu and moved to Banshu. Worked in similar styles as his father.

Fascinated by the “wild highland bird” quote – I did a bit of looking and the raichou (雷鳥) comes in view, more so seeing it shares a kanji with the name 山鳥毛 Maybe a clever wordplay? (or more likely - my imagination! ) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_Ptarmigan

In Showa Dai Meito Zufu it is described as follows: "The by-name "Yamadorige" is said to have come from the way the exuberant hamon appears to be similar to the feathers of wild highland birds, but because of existence of varied propositions no definite story has been established to date." It's one of the few books actually containing pictures of the Yamadorige, do you perhaps have an oshigata? I always thought it was in a private collection...

Just from the top of my head, but didn't Goto Ichijo do this kind of design? eg. http://sanmei.com/Pictures/tuba/Tuba1889.jpg

+1 My guess would be Uda school

Didn't she only engrave blades? Although I did find work alledgedly done by her:

Maybe hit the submit button a bit too quick there, Chris? :D

We don't, we use mm instead :-) That's the beauty of the metric system! so in this case, 0,75cm or 7,5mm

Now here's a truly impressive piece of carving on Yahoo Japan! Reminds me of a blade (I think it was a wakizashi) that Darcy posted about years ago. Here the whole rokasen is done on a o-kogatana (30.5cm). Quite impressive, but not surprising from this smith. https://www.jauce.com/auction/n135619442

Here are some more examples that are identical on both sides:

Shin Nihonto Kantei Nyumon by Yuichi and Kazuo is also a good one, and Afu Watson did a translation of the text.

Hi Jean, my picture is shodai. I know the nakago of the one for sale is more in line with the second generation, but it's still off in my opinion. " The finish of the tang of the first generation as his students Masashige and Masazane shows a conspicious roundness at the back and also the edge of the ha-mune is noticeably round. Only the second generation finished his tangs with an angular back but a round ha-mune..... Another important characteristic of Muramasa blades is the typical tanago-bara which tapers along the side of the cutting edge. Also forgeries try to emulate this peculiarity, but the ha-mune is too thick which proves that the tang was just reduced but not thinned later. Authentic work show a constant thickness of the hamune at the upper and lower areas, whereof we can conclude that this shape was applied right at the beginning " I know we don't see the blade from the mune side (just put that in for the benefit of the readers) , but my main issue is the weird form of the tanago bara - it has a more accute angle than any example of Muramasa I know of (obviously I can be wrong)

OK, discard the mekugi ana (and thx for pointing out the typos! - lack of sleep is catching up with me ) Compare the Yahoo JP nakago + mei with these 2 and you'll see what I mean when I say that the tanago bara is not quite what it's supposed to be (also compare mei and nakago-jiri) From Nihonto Wo Miru:

Indeed, and not a good tanago bara at that. The angle is off. Also, the lower mekugi-ana indicates shortening or at least a good portion of machi-okuri, however then they reformed the tang to its original shape whereas it should be kiri at the end. And the mei should be placed lower as well then. It could also be a second ana for grip as you sometimes see with gendaito, however, the placement is well off for that. In my opinion, if the 2nd ana wasn't there, it would've been a lot more convincing. Just my opinion though... /edited typos/

I'm particularly impressed by the 2nd nakago-ana - it really raises a lot of questions that shouldn't be there :-)

some close ups would be nice :-) I think the date might be : 昭和 貮拾 壹 年 戌 although I can't quite make it out with the current pics.

代金 子 五 拾枚 – dai-kinsu goju mai - value 50 gold coins

I wouldn't make a print, but a pencil oshigata/tracing on a simple piece of paper would suffice to get a better look at the signature and what's written in the textbox!

I've been looking for an affordable copy of these for some time now - sometimes you see prices of +1500$ - which in my view is a bit steep. But it is a very desirable set to have and the benifits of full length oshigata can't be denied! (also see the .pdf Eric posted)

Realistically in 5-10 years a nice Norishige In my dreams a Shintogo Kunimitsu tanto...

Brian, Isn't this you can simply see in your webalyzer or webstats tool? Most hostings have this and you can actually see the platform from which the pageviews or hits are coming...

I've always thought Choshu to be an underestimated school - this is a very fine example indeed! It's not all vague mountains and Sansui themes... Some of them were quite inventive. The cut out moon in reeds comes to mind (Choshu Yukitaka I think - should look it up in my books).

Hi Fred, A very similar, if not the exact same, tsuba was discussed here: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4608&start=0&st=0&sk=t&sd=a

Yuichi Hiroi is co-author of the books so that makes sense, thanks for all the info Piers