DirkO

seriously ? I mean there are quite a few listed there. Like pages and pages of them. Same for tsuba and so on ... And a lot of them have origami. Seeing the favorable position of the euro vs yen, I thought it to be a good place to shop and maybe try a little gamble.

I bought it btw, for a fair price on yahoo Japan :-)

And here they are :

Sure no probs. Even if i don't buy it, I'll put up the pics I have for you. Just takes some time to find them all

Date and length I had :-) The school i didn't know. Merci beaucoup Jacques! In the explanation it said Tegai, but Sue Tegai also dates it to Muromachi, now I know what characteristics to look for.

Hey guys, I'm looking into buying this wakizashi but I'm not that good at reading origami. I can make out issuedate and length, but that's it. I want to see if the description matches the origami. Seeing it's mumei I'm particularly interested in what the column for mei says. Do they attribute it to some den or smith ?

Hey all ! I got this wak a few weeks ago and although the mei is pretty straightforward and clear, I can't seem to make out which generation it is. In my Hawley's there are 3 : NAO88 Inaba 1804-1860 NAO91 Owari 1818 NAO92 Settsu 1624-1661 I did get hold of a another mei from a Tango No Kami Naomichi, but it's stated as being from 1715, which is totally confusing me :s In my humble opinion the two mei are different, there just something not the same in the way the kanji for Tango is built up. Something else I'm looking for is the school. Here are some measurements : Total length : 70cm (nakago:16cm) Mune : Ihori Hada : Komokume Hamon : Gunome Midare with lots of ko-ashi Yakiba : yakidashi Boshi seems to be notare komi Chu-kissaki Nakagojiri : Iriyamagata Yasurime : Sujikai Tango No Kami Naomichi http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/tang2.jpg Comparison mei from other Naomichi http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/Znaomichimei.jpg ura-mei - any help with what this says would be great ! http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/tang1.jpg pics of the blade : http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/hamon1.jpg http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/hamon2.jpg http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/hamon3.jpg http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/hamon4.jpg http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/kissaki1.jpg http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/kissaki2.jpg http://www.genpuku.com/PICS/wak/new/munemachi1.jpg

Brian, just an idea here, but maybe it's a good idea to have a whitelist and a blacklist of Ebay sellers in this forum ??? Although everyone is entitled to their own opinion about Ebay sellers, this might help along the unsuspecting new guys, or at least give them some informal guidance.

The reason that got me to this forum was that I was looking to buy a blade on Ebay. It turned out to be chinese crap. It was a blow to the ego, but at least no blow to my wallet. But having found this forum, I'm learning rapidly now, and new books are added to my stack on a weekly basis almost. Even more, through this forum I got in contact with Zenon Van Damme who sold me my first nihonto just last weekend. So from an enthousiastic beginner's point of view this forum has undoubtedly been crucial in correcting my erronous ways and pointing me to the right sources of info. You're doing a great job at this forum, Brian, to me it's my first stop every day !!! PS: I hope me being a beginner will also add to my luck in the raffle

Sorry Brian, but the Cyrillic is a real pain if it comes to hiragana, nevertheless I'll give it a go tomorrow

OK, I made the effort to read the Cyrillic Russian site, and there's a suprising amount of info in there. I'll give it for what it's worth : Apparently Kankyuto or the russian descriptive equivalent of the word is made up out of two characters meaning "to pierce" and "with a cord" in old Japanese. They limit the blade from 12-15cm. They go on to say that both surfaces are flat with the exception of a ridgeline on one of them. They were made out of one piece and if you put all those features together you have a very strong "tool" (i'm just using the word "tool" here for argument's sake) Initially, they were strictly used on the battlefield and it had a unique purpose : the head of each killed enemy soldier should be handed over for reporting (with the purpose of receiving awards). There was a strict etiquette about this. When on a battlefield, they cut off the victim's head and drove the Kankyuto ( I think through the ear, can't quite make out that bit) almost full-length into the head. For them this was a way to calculate the general "defeat of arms" (i think bodycount is what they mean here) This was important because before the battle every commander of a division had some set goals to achieve and this "headcount" was used to determine to what level these goals were reached. This was checked by an official treasurer or the commander-in-chief seeing it was their duty to measure the level of defeat they inflicted on the enemy. It then says something vaguely that they used the cut off heads to predict the future, weather,... There was also a different way to "present" the heads. Instead of driving the bashin almost all the way through, they stopped at the handle. This way the head rose for convenience of the examining official representative of the treasurer or the treasurer himself. On the battlefield high ranking officers and important samurai took along a great number of kankyuto, but still there were often shortages. They brought them along in various places in their armour and there is also evidence of secret fastenings in the forearms of the armour in order to carry more kankyuto. There were also fighting techniques described to use any of these weapons in battle, but the text doesn't go into it. Bashin meaning horseneedle were used to bleed horses. After a while the horse's veins swelled up, and bleeding was done to relieve the pressure. Apparently the bashin was part of a set of three horsetools, the other two being a short stick for disobedient horses and a small sickel to cut off grass for the horses but the latter could also be used in battle to cut off the girths of the opponent's horse. Although both Kankyuto and Bashin were designed as tools, they certainly had their value on the battlefield as stabbing knives. The edges were small and strong and they were easy for hiding in clothes and comfortable in hand. If gripped normally they were rested against strong curtailed little finger. If held turned they rested against a bend between the first and second phalanx of the big finger. It ends saying they were also really good throwing knives. So my curious dirk (Dirk's dirk :D )still isn't solved, although I agree it seems to hold the middle between the two of these. I gave this translation for what it's worth. I apologize for the grammar, but I hope this info is usefull in finally putting this matter to rest !!!

hey brian, can you do an update on what nrs are still available ? (i'm somewhat late, but ok, I still want to have a go at it :-) )

ow and this with X-mas coming up, some nihontobooks are just what I need to put on my list

While I was drooling away on Ebay on tsubas I can't afford anyway, I found the following two who are too similar to be coincidence (+what are the chances that both of them are on offer on Ebay at the same time ?) Is it my oversuspicious mind that's playing tricks on Halloween or is this all above board ? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=250180850619&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT&ih=015 http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=290176052806&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT&ih=019

Well, a friend got me hooked to be honest. First I was only into Japan and it's culture (my friend studied Japanese and Japanology and we got talking, his enthousiasm was contagious to say the least). But I've always been very interested in finely crafted antiques, so one thing led to another. At one time I happened by this forum and bang ! Now I'm hooked I read and learn loads on this forum, and there's a lot of info out there on the web. The great thing about this forum is that you can follow discussions so you can see how people come to certain conclusions, which helps you learn a lot faster. Also bought me a stack of books, and I thought "this will quench my thirst for knowledge" but alas, I was mistaken. The more you learn about it, the more you want to add to that knowledge...

I'm only 27 But although I've been studying for more than 6 months now, I'm still waiting for my first blade. It's ordered though !!! (nice Tango no Kami Naomichi wak from Zenon Van Damme - cosignation, he's making me a nice shirasaya to put it in, should be ready in a few weeks) I learn about it every day, and strangely enough, besides books and websites, I learn from ebay. I watch the prices and if something goes for a huge sum, i try to figure out why someone would spend so much money on such an item.

yep it looks indestructable, basically that's what won me over :-) I look at nihonto as follows : first it has to fullfill it's purpose and within that frame it can be art

Thx Rich, The seller thought it was a momoyama piece, and not from the 1800's. Any Kuni Hiro from that era ? I don't have my Haynes with me right now and it'll be days before I can check some things at home in my books...

Hey all, I just got this tsuba. It's really 'plain' but it's very skillfull in it's plainness. Basically I just loved the shape of it, and isn't that what collecting is all about ? I was wondering if someone could tell me more about Kuni Hiro ? Dark patina. Kakugata form and kaku mimi. Kozuka itsu ana and kogai itsu ana are open. Size: 78mm×72mm Nakago ana 28mm×9mm

:-) nice discussion here, I must admit i hadn't considered the sturdiness of the thing, seeing it would be used to relieve the bloodpressure of the horses ankles after a long ride. Seeing an umabari usually replaced the kogai, that would explain the end-bit. @ Rich : I don't know if the blade comes out or not, I found it on a website, seeing I'm looking for a bashin ( a few days ago there was a beautifull piece on Ebay, but it got snatched from me in the last min, i was outsniped and that at 350$ : http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=260166701681)

Hmmm, I'm somewhat puzzled by this piece : It has the end usually found on kogai, it has the heartshaped opening of an umabari and also the blad seems triangular which is also something found in umabari. But it's not made of one piece, so a seperate handle does suggest it being a kozuka. Can someone help me with this ?

nothing to give seeing i'm pretty new at all this, but i'm really gratefull that this forum exists (it's my first stop every day!) and I'll make it up by buying tickets !!!!

Yep, great advice, thx a lot Darcy !!!! The info you provided will go a long way for me

Canada is always related I have some good friends in Ontario. But besides that I also sent a mail to the customs here, coz their website was somewhat unclear about what percentage needs to be paid...

It helps a lot Stephan, danke schön :-) At least now I have a general idea about what i can expect. Isn't it also possible to warn customs upfront about your package ?