Jussi Ekholm

About the back carry of tachi and ōdachi, I would think it would be very rare for the person carrying the sword in back actually draw them from back, as in case of ōdachi the sword would have been very large. I talked about this with Daihōden museum staff this summer, as she was happy how interested I was about their ōdachi she came to talk to me. We talked lot about ōdachi in general and then about their museum ōdachi. I was under the impression that Mori Ranmaru whose name is in the description of the particular sword was the one using it. However she explained to me that Mori Ranmaru was actually sword carrier of Oda Nobunaga, and he would have this large ōdachi strapped in his back and if the situation came where Nobunaga would call, he would take a bow and allow Nobunaga to draw this ōdachi from his back and go into the fight. Here is a picture of that sword. Usually I don't take any pictures of swords but this time she insisted I took pictures of it, and was standing next to me looking if I will take them. It was great to see how she was proud about items in their museum and knew so much about them. There are some other ōdachi that have historical ties to famous warrior or warlord so I would think similarily they would have had someone carrying the large sword for them.

It is good that you are doing the research Eric, Aoi does so many sales ads, as they tend to add few swords daily 6 days per week, sometimes they do have incorrect information in their listings. In my personal opinion there is a huge variance in quality in works of Hasebe Kuninobu. Of course my understanding of quality is bit limited but I will try to explain it with items that I have seen in person. I was lucky to see the amazing Tokubetsu Jūyō tachi in NMB sword meet in Japan (arranged by Yurie & Adrian). That sword was spectacular sword. I would think that could be the pinnacle of Hasebe tachi that can be owned (Of course totally out of league for most people). I remember the owner explaining and discussing things and if I remember correctly he mentioned that the named tachi Karakashiwa would of course be the ultimate Hasebe sword. Unfortunately I have never had the privilege to see that sword in person but I do trust his word as I believe that would be a splendid sword. I have seen the Wakizashi owned by NBTHK and to be honest I am not too fond of that sword... I just can't explain it well but for me it just doesn't click. Yes it is Jūyō sword and featured in many NBTHK publications but I don't like it too much. Then I have viewed the small tantō of Atsuta Jingū and in my memory it was splendid small sword with good craftsmanship. I like Hasebe works even though I don't understand the specifics of their craftsmanship all that well. I understand budget limitations very well but if I would be looking for Hasebe short sword I would perhaps want a signed one. That will of course affect the price and you can find better quality in mumei work for same price. About the 3 signed tachi mentioned I would think they would be the Jūyō Bijutsuhin and 2 Jūyō tachi. For the Tokubetsu Hozon tachi NBTHK had added (後代) late generation in brackets. I tried to do searching and Nihontō Meikan is the only reference where I could find 2nd generation Hasebe Kuninobu and he is listed for Ōei period. So I made a slight fix in data and put is as late Nanbokuchō - Early Muromachi. I am not sure how the Art sword crowd treats these magnificient swords at shrines that I personally love. In the Tōken Bijutsu number 67 there is a 4 page article on the Shizutani Jinja sword and history of it by Kanzan Satō. He raises point that Kanzan, Kunzan and member of Honami all 3 of who saw the sword had doubts and raised specific points which cast doubt. However it was also touted as incredible unknown find, that was not in any major historical oshigata books but was featured in some historical book that had the sword and history for it. It is mentioned that sword will be polished in future, and in the end part of article with inspection report that describes the sword it is said it is going through polishing. Now bear in mind that I read these old Japanese magazines with Google Lens as my Japanese is not up to par in reading full articles. However as that article was 60+ years ago and I have not seen that sword featured in any publication anywhere, I think maybe NBTHK does not think it as legit item.

I might guess the sword is ubu or almost ubu, I don't immidiately see suriage effects when I look at pictures. Sakihaba is very small but Lewis mentioned before I think similarily that it has been reshaped and was wider originally. I would guess it to be from Muromachi period. Maybe you could take a photo from mune side of the nakago so it could show how is the thickness in the area of nakago and base of the blade.

Lukrez wrote amazing post above. As I am not a business person I haven't thought about specifics of market that much. However once you see how many swords there are currently for sale every day of the year, it is easy to understand that the dealers will probably have their own guidelines to price the average items. While it pains me to say it the vast majority of Japanese swords are average items. I am not talking about the quirky items that I personally like, just that even on various levels of quality most items are average. For these average items Japanese dealers most likely have their pattern to price the items and then they can add or reduce price depending on the actual item. Now these are just examples that I chose randomly to give an example. There are 99 Mumei katana with Rai Kunimitsu or den Rai Kunimitsu attribution at Jūyō. Now 13 of them have advanced to Tokubetsu Jūyō (well I am not yet sure of the origin of 2 of these new TJ) + 1 Mumei Kunitoshi and 1 Mumei Kuniyuki were switched to Kunimitsu at TJ. That would leave 86 Mumei Rai Kunimitsu Jūyō katana and I am sure the big dealers will have a common price for Jūyō Rai Kunimitsu katana that they will then adjust depending on the actual item. I have so far recorded 176 Mumei Ko-Mihara katana. I would assume that dealers will have a common base price for Hozon, Tokubetsu Hozon or Jūyō rated item. While the "ladder theory" that Michael mentioned above is not 100% accurate there is usually a minimum price that Jūyō items tend to fetch, and it would need to be a very good Mumei Tokubetsu Hozon Ko-Mihara to achieve the minimum price for Jūyō mumei Ko-Mihara. Even if in my personal opinion the cheaper item might be better, the Jūyō papers carry a prestige. As far as mid-higher level items go NBTHK papers are just something you pretty much expect the item to have. And the attribution that NBTHK gives to a mumei item can have a massive effect on the actual price of the item. There are actually lots and lots of Japanese swords available for purchase at any given moment. As I started to browse many Japanese dealers years and years ago, I was surprised how many high quality items are even listed online by big dealers. Some big inventory dealers like Aoi Art or Meirin Sangyo add few new Japanese swords to their inventory pretty much every day. I was just looking at Yahoo Japan and there seems to be 5,210 listings at Japanese Sword section, there are items that are not swords in there too so I think something like 3,000 swords would be closer to truth. Every now and then an item that was on Yahoo JP makes it to inventory of more established dealer. I admit I am completely clueless about inner workings of sword dealers, their relationships, and most importantly the dealer auctions. I can just imagine the price dealers actually get the basic items is quite low as they are able to make profit even on their cheaper offerings that would be quite affordable. In my personal opinion the high end items are just very small part of the market and the majority of items are lower and middle tier items.

I fully understand Brett and I think it is very important to be supportive of new enthusiasts to the hobby. As someone with quite modest means for collecting I know very well that spending multiple thousands into a purchase is something many people will need to seriously consider and weigh the different options. That is why I initially started looking at the prices and trying to figure out things in order to make most of my potential future purchase. It can be extremely difficult to understand why for example one mumei Ōmiya attributed sword is 600,000 yen, another is 1,100,000 yen and third one 2,800,000 and to be totally transparent I sometimes still struggle to understand the pricing for some items. Originally years I was thinking that there could be a major difference on a 700,000 yen sword and 600,000 yen sword. And many cases there can be major differences just not ones that might affect the price too much. For me personally when an item is jumping through dealers or sold multiple times, it just makes me think there must be something on that item as people don't want to keep it even though the item would be really nice. Here is an example of a Ko-Bizen tachi that was listed at 3 different high quality vendors lately. https://web.archive.org/web/20221203191527/https://wakeidou.com/pages/522/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230603022557/https://eirakudo.shop/token/tachikatana/detail/425951 https://web.archive.org/web/20240424230207/https://www.samurai-nippon.net/SHOP/V-2051.html Each of them had it priced slightly differently but they were of course around the same ballpark. The Japanese dealers of course know their pricing very well. I think the Paul Davidson collection had awesome items but a low level collector like me isn't the target audience. I just felt many of the estimates were beyond what I would have been looking at. Well of course I couldn't afford a single item from there. The most interesting item for me was the Kozori Sadamitsu wakizashi and I think that could have been a good deal: https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2025/important-Japanese-swords-and-armour-from-the-paul-l-davidson-collection/a-ko-wakizashi-signed-bishu-osafune-sadamitsu However the smith is completely irrelevant as long as high end collecting goes so I would guess the Tomomitsu and Morimitsu got a lot more eyes on them, well the Morimitsu seems wonderful item. Of course I understand that my personal view is skewed towards overvaluing some items and not realizing the real potential for most of the items.

Hello! I have finished it and keep updating it yearly. Here is the version I uploaded to NMB: Since then I have done only separate yearly Jūyō results over the years. And I have been correcting errors to the big index on my pc as I have gone through all Jūyō items few times over the years. I think NBTHK should release the 71 shinsa results soon now in december, so I can update them in too and post a full index with all of the corrections. When you are typing thousands of kanji there have been some errors I made. I just got 5 Jūyō books from Yahoo JP that are in the mail. Then I will have all books from 1 to 56 on my bookshelf, and as I have few others too I am only missing about 10 or so books. And for Tōken Bijutsu I have pretty much completed my collection for the moment, I am only missing 21 of the very early numbers and I have 800+ magazines in total.

I consider myself as a sword researcher with 0 financial interest. Now will you still believe that line if I will tell that I have 575 pages of sword prices, and have tracked down interesting swords for over 10 years... Here is a link to an old version that I shared to NMB I think almost 7 years ago: After posting that I had some interesting discussions with few people, back then I didn't understand the bigger picture too well but I try to think I have learned something in 7 years. I had some good ones with Darcy and while we sometimes butted heads a bit as we had maybe a bit different view of the some things, now with more experience under my belt I've come to realize that the actual historical prices are pretty unrelevant. As I go through all of my regular sites every week, I just type down the price down as a habit as I had done it for so many years. Main point for myself is just tracking down the items themselves for my database. Jūyō items are actually quite easy to track down when they pop up as I have the basic data. One thing is that different dealers will sell the same item for different prices and it is just normal in life. Some can squeeze in larger profit (and will have to do it for business) while some are satisfied with smaller profit. I was just commenting last month to a smaller Japanese dealer that they have excellent prices, their answer was of course logical that they are online only, so they don't have any additional costs. Compare that to some of the top dealers, showroom in Ginza with staff etc. I feel that the only relevant thing is the current price of the item and how comfortable you are with it. Items are one of a kind items and if you are happy with the price I think that is the only thing that matters. Of course every week as I browse through all of the interesting new items that dealers and sites in my list have put out, I do keep immidiately thinking how something feels overpriced or something is actually feeling like a very good deal. I am actually super happy that Tōken World at Nagoya won the Mikazuki Kanemitsu, now I can see it some year when I visit Nagoya. For me that is the most important thing that people can actually see the items in museums. Had some top tier private collector won the item, most people would never had the chance to see the sword. I won't say anything about the big auction houses, just that I am extremely against them. I will much rather support Japanese and International dealers and would even pay premium for them for the same item rather than deal with extremely greedy auction houses. Sword dealers have a passion for this which auction houses lack.

I saw this sword at 2024 NBTHK exhibition, and I do need lot more sword study to really understand things. As the NBTHK article states "This is the perfection of Sōshū den work". I personally liked the Sadamune and Hiromitsu short swords in the same exhibition far more than this Masamune.

Unfortunately to me the one with red background seems to be signed 備州長船清光 (Bishū Osafune Kiyomitsu). Kiyomitsu smiths were very prominent during late Muromachi. One thing that might be taken into consideration is that it is common for us to call a gimei for a big name smith, while there could have been other smiths signing the same way. Like for example for Kanemitsu we will easily not pay too much focus on Kanemitsu signed katana like the one in this thread as it does not be a work of Nanbokuchō Kanemitsu. Well that does not maybe make a huge difference to most if it would be by unknown Muromachi Bizen Kanemitsu or a gimei. I just think the Japanese sword appreciation is extremely top heavy as they are the ones featured in almost every reference.

I would agree with the view that Jacques has on this. I would think it would most likely be late Muromachi Bizen sword, wheter actually someone named Kanemitsu that I cannot say. However I would think the sword is in original state. I tried to do quick sketch with paint how I would expect it to look originally in fittings if it would have been machi okuri at your line, of course it is just a rough sketch to give an idea that I have in my mind. To me the hole placement looks perfectly normal now in current state, if it would have been machiokuri then the original hole would have been unusually close to the machi. . I do have some amazing resources on Bizen swords, however I have not been able to find a reference signature of any late Muromachi Kanemitsu. I am extremely grateful for this thread as I tried to search them and ended up discovering absolutely massive Nanbokuchō naginata by Kanemitsu that I was not aware of before. Finding items like that in Japan makes me very happy. One "cursed" thing about smith lineages where there are extremely famous ones is that then many later generations can fall into obscurity.

Here is a tachi by Bizen smith that is dated 1435 Here are some Muromachi ones that I found online. Bungo katana: https://www.e-sword.jp/sale/2013/1310_1045syousai.htm Bungo tantō: https://www.toukenkomachi.com/index_en_tachi&katana_A021018.html Very little info on this: https://n-kosen.com/item/3647/ Out of polish: https://buyee.jp/item/jdirectitems/auction/q1206573915

There is as Morimitsu (守光) lineage in Bizen Kozori group that extends into Muromachi. I have just few examples of Nanbokuchō/Early Muromachi items by them, as I don't record older, however I believe the lineage continued into later Muromachi. Morimitsu (守光) is actually pretty rare name, when you look at Meikan or Sesko, there are only very few smiths that used the signature in general.

I think for this sword NBTHK and Aoi Art have a differing viewpoint, pretty much the polar opposite views. NBTHK specifies in the paper that sword is ō-suriage and Aoi states that they see the sword as almost ubu. Unfortunately I cannot say which one is correct, and I could see both as plausible opinions by just seeing few pictures. Unfortunately I just have seen this in Jūyō book and now at Aoi website so I don't have it in any other sources. NBTHK can also judge suriage mumei blades as tachi but for that to happen I would assume a certain amount of original nakago must be present for that to happen.

In my opinion the tang was most likely signed as, Bishū Osafune (Insert smith here) 備州長船□□. It does not feature the common Gorōzaemon signature, 備前国住長船五郎左衛門尉清光.

It seems like an interesting sword. Gassan signatures are usually located around the original hole on the tang. So I would think the lowermost hole is the original one, or it has been very slightly cut completely off. Now as the current length seems to be c. 73,5 cm and to me I would assume the sword has been cut down something in between 10-15 cm or so, so in original form it could have been c. 85 cm blade. The sword seems to have a large kissaki, which is throwing me off a bit, as almost all of the old Gassan tachi and katana in my references have small/smallish kissaki. I think I could only find 1 reference with a large kissaki: https://www.nipponto.co.jp/swords2/KT218912.htm To me the sword is a plausible Muromachi period Gassan sword. The long length and large kissaki are few things that are throwing me off a bit as I cannot find similar reference item.