Jussi Ekholm

I do think the price estimations seem quite low to me, only a good thing though. Lot 4025 - For me the most special item is definately the one Brian linked above. This will start to be very fickle stuff with the designations as there are lots of categories which you could call that one but in my own personal opinion it is of very rare form 長刀 (Nagatō). I have briefly mentioned these on the few naginata presentations I have held. This form usually has swordlike blade and shorter handle length. I do think late Muromachi to early Edo would be my age guess for this one. If anyone from the forum ends up getting this one I would love to chat more about this (or if someone you know gets the item). Maybe some day I might even offer to purchase it if stars align. Unfortunately at the moment I cannot make a bid on any of the items. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-1c8ac754-b1a3-4f3f-9b1e-b42000e12482 Lot 4026 - I was surprised of the price this. I guess I shouldn't comment this too much without seeing this in person but just for the price I would skip this one. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-150b7b97-1509-401c-aa97-b42000e124d9 Lot 4039 - Interesting naginata package with very low estimate, unfortunately limited pics https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-9101f1fb-683d-4bfd-8998-b42000e1299b Lot 4040 - Same as above. I like the koshirae of this more than the above item but blade less... https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-32105988-f154-40f7-b52f-b42000e129f5 Lot 4041 - Pretty wild horimono, not my style but I think some will like this. In my opinion possibly a later Edo piece. I see the signature potentially as 国義 Kuniyoshi. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-f61afeae-a250-4d9c-8934-b42000e12a51 Lot 4042 - There is a signature 丹波守吉道 Tanba no Kami Yoshimichi. Unfortunately I am not well versed in the smith lineage as there are lots of generations. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-1666d620-198d-499a-a16a-b42000e12aa5 Lot 4043 - This is in my opinion very interesting one, unfortunately they cannot remove the blade from the shaft. It is supposedly signed too, however it cannot be confirmed right now. Unfortunately the condition of the blades is what it is but this might be my number 2 as far as interesting items go. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-1649c8f7-4508-4af1-a7e3-b42000e12afd Lot 4044 - This might be number 3 in my list. Unfortunately no pictures of the tang, as this too seems to be signed. In general I am not fan of such a strong sweep in the upper portion. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-b078239b-726a-43cb-921f-b42000e12b59 Lot 4059 - This seems way too cheap and would feel like a killer deal. I like the size and shape of this a lot. I almost missed this one. By shape alone I would think it could be tad older but when looking it as a whole I think Knutsen had it pinned as Edo period item and that would be fitting. There is a signature 正吉 Masayoshi. https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/tooveys/catalogue-id-srtoo10562/lot-ac53fcea-86cc-4e0c-89ac-b42000e130aa These are the naginata in the sales lot. In overall I think the estimates are very reasonable. Of course the condition of the items needs to be taken into consideration but apart from that 1 item that I think they see as the prized one, everything seems to have surprisingly low estimates. If it would be possible for me, I would definately bid on few of them but this time I cannot.

One point where people might disagree is when we are starting to consider what items and authenticating bodies we see as legitimate ones. I am very allowing and I often accept museum and shrine items as legitimate ones, yet I know many people can disagree with this view. I feel I am not the correct person to judge authencity of the items. In my personal opinion some shrine items for example have much more interesting history than some newly minted NBTHK Tokubetsu Jūyō, still these are often just differences in viewpoints, For example here is a signed Masamune that I think is flying under the radar, named sword 夫馬正宗 (Fuma Masamune), no designation it is in the collection of Tokyo National Museum https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/489835 https://meitou.info/index.php/夫馬正宗 Here is named sword 朱判正宗 (Shuhan Masamune), no official designation and currently in private collection https://meitou.info/index.php/朱判正宗 Named sword 島津正宗 (Shimazu Masamune), no designation, is in the collection of Kyoto National Museum https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/565922 https://meitou.info/index.php/島津正宗 If you check Yahoo Japan auctions there are often Masamune being sold in there too... There is just lot of wiggle room depending on what you will accept as legitimate item.

There are actually surprisingly many swords that are by Masamune or attributed to Masamune. So far I have 113 blades in my list. There are also several blades that have been historically seen as Masamune but modern organizations have reattributed them, those are excluded from that number. As I saw my own post there about 3,5 years ago, it seems I have found 10 Masamune from my references during that time.

Unfortunately I am not that skilled in kantei that I could tell the differences. However as I am slightly obsessive about data collecting I can provide that. I might have slightly controverisial view that I see only signed swords and attributed swords. I know many people might view kinzōgan, shumei etc. differently but to me it is just one form of attribution. Also over the years I have been starting to me much more relaxed about the attributions thinking it is just the best guess the organization (NBTHK or NTHK) giving as it is having in a fast paced shinsa session. With high level items and museum pieces for example I think the attribution will be much more researched. Here are some numbers for the Mihara smiths I will just have signed / attributed works Masaie : 16 signed / 18 attributed Masahiro : 32 signed / 16 attributed Masanobu : 4 signed / 25 attributed Other Ko-Mihara smiths 11 signed Ko-Mihara attributed mumei swords found so far 223

I should be able to catch the final days of the exhibition. I think I am getting way too specialized as I prioritized some rural museums over this one and I am most excited about number 94 the naginata and the 93 Ō-Denta. I am lucky this year to get the later rotation as I have already seen all the blades of Tokyo National Museum 1-4 rotation so it will be nice too see others. I do remember seeing Kotegiri Masamune years ago, will be nice to see it again and see if I think differently about it.

I am a budget traveller with very basic needs. So my standards are most likely way below average forum member. There are lots and lots of very affordable and good hotels in Tokyo. I personally see APA Hotels as very good quality for the money. People do have different standards. There are huge amounts of APA chain hotels in Tokyo, you can just pick a city region where you want to stay. There are lots of even more affordable hotels than APA, that are good enough for me. I would recommend the Keikyu Line train from Haneda Airport, it is very easy to use and Tokyo train system is amazing. Depending on the location of your hotel it will be quite easy to navigate to a nearby station. Even though the train system map can be intimidating because of huge size and number of different lines, it is excellent system.

It is National Treasure and supposedly is among the best works of Sadamune as judged by the experts. I think these might be the best images I was able to find of the sword online by quick search, they are from here: https://colbase.nich.go.jp/collection_items/tnm/F-20107?locale=ja You can also view the sword at closeup in e-Museum: https://emuseum.nich.go.jp/detail?langId=en&webView=0&content_base_id=100193&content_part_id=0&content_pict_id=0 Just checked Branos big resolution pics in his link and they do show incredible details

I would think they are from Hanwei https://www.samurai-katana-shop.nl/en/katana-samurai-sword/buying-sword-paul-chen/forged-katana-sword/yasukuni-colonels-gunto https://www.samurai-katana-shop.nl/en/katana-samurai-sword/buying-sword-paul-chen/forged-katana-sword/yasukuni-captain-s-gunto

My first guess would be 国助 Kunisuke.

As a disclaimer I must say I am not a martial artist even though I dabbled few years in Japanese sword arts when I was teenager. As a ōdachi fan I will vouch many of them were indeed used in battles. So far I have seen 30 historical ōdachi in various places in Japan and I am hoping to still see many more in the future. There are however some limitations by size and by age that are my own personal feelings, I will expand more on them later on the post. Most of the ōdachi I have seen are preserved in various shrines in Japan and photography in shrine treasure rooms is forbidden. So I don't have pictures taken at the shrines apart from few where the museum staff wanted me to take a picture of the item. However in books I do have lots and lots of pictures and information. I don't know my martial arts history that well but I know in Japan there are some arts that are seen as koryū (古流) and they have strong historical standing. I believe the martial art shown in above video is Enshin-ryū (円心流), which is to my understanding classified as koryū, old historical martial art. To my limited understanding the meaning and specifics of kata in koryū is not really given outside the school. So even if you see that ōdachi is drawn from the hip in videos it could possibly be just a form of training. I believe I have seen other videos of this same person using the same sword over the years. I believe it is ōdachi with a blade length of 三尺六寸 3 shaku 6 sun which in centimeters is 109 cm. He does have impressive drawing and sheating technique and I believe he would be very seasoned martial artist. This brings me to the koshirae and how they were worn. I have recorded currently 151 ōdachi in Japan. Extremely few of them are in katana koshirae, as wearing them thrusted through the belt was not really that good option in my personal opinion, and as they were intended for battlefield use I don't see wearing them thrusted through the belt, they were already out when going to live battle or in many cases high ranking samurai had sword bearers who carried the ōdachi and allowed their master to draw it. There are however few very large Edo period swords that I classify as an ōdachi that are in katana koshirae, I can remember few from memory. - Itsukushima Jinja has 99,8 cm blade dated 1867, it was commissioned by a sumo wrestler at that time. (I have seen this sword at the shrine) - Matsubara Hachimangu had 101,3 cm blade (if I understand correctly it is dated 1644 and dedicated to the shrine when made). - Unfortunately there is only small picture but I believe the Takaoka Jinja sword 106,1 cm and 1641 dated blade that was in previous Okayama Branch restoration project might have katana koshirae, the pic I have seen is very small. However mostly the old historical ōdachi had various types of ōdachi koshirae. Many of the Edo period ōdachi that still have koshirae have an ōdachi koshirae too. Also the dating on the blades for Edo period can show how it will fit historically into timeline of Japan, as battles ceased after the early 1600's. I watched some Japanese youtube videos and in one of them it was mentioned that actually commissioning an ōdachi cost several times the normal amount of money, which is easy to understand, as the project of making a giant sword is lot more complicated than a normal sized one. This usually would mean that the person commissioning the sword must be wealthy and/or possibly a high ranking samurai. Finally comes the size of the ōdachi. These are just my personal opinions after seeing many of them live at shrines and lots and lots in books. Of course unfortunately currently handling experience is limited to modern swords. I am talking about blade lengths here, I see the length range of 3 to 4 shaku (90-120 cm) as perfectly reasonable range, there shouldn't be any issues with these. blade lengths of 4 to 5 shaku (120-150 cm) is where I see the upper end of actually usable ōdachi. When you go to blade lengths of over 5 shaku (150+ cm) I just don't see them all that reasonable for usability. As you have to calculate the tsuka in, these weapons are over 200 cm in total length and the majority of it is in blade. For usability I would rather exchange some of that blade length to handle/shaft length, arriving towards large bladed nagamaki and naginata. I think the longest ōdachi that I know has historical record of it being used in battle is the gigantic Tarōtachi (太郎太刀) of Atsuta Jingū it has blade length of 221,5 cm. There is a historical legend and provenance to back that up and there is a story for it. In my understanding the short version would be that two relatives wielding two giant ōdachi Tarōtachi and Jirōtachi, were stalling the enemy troops while wielding these on horseback. The enemy finally killed both of them but they gave time for others to get to safety. I believe they were dedicated to Atsuta Jingū in 1576. Atsuta Jingū has three ōdachi in similar koshirae Tarōtachi, Jirōtachi and Kanetake ōdachi made in 1620. As there is historical story and provenance I cannot discard the fact that the giant sword could indeed have been used in battle. In my brain I just can't figure out what would be the benefit in having these extremely long blades compared to very long blade with slightly longer handle. The post came quite a bit longer than I originally intended and had to do some fact checking as I hate making errors.

I think my first guess would be Yoshifusa (能房) from Kongōbyōe (金剛兵) school. Could you perhaps take clearer picture of the signature? Of course it might be very difficult as it is bit worn down.

Does someone have pictures of the sword in its current state? It looks absolutely spectacular. I saw this one at Tokyo National Museum in 2024, can't deny it is splendid sword just in overall not to my liking. I can understand why it is highly praised even though it doesn't click for me.

Hopefully it gets solved and the item gets back to you. It is such an extremely rare item it will be easy to spot if it pops up for public sale somewhere.

I was on the highway bus on my way home when reading this and has to wait until I get home to really reply. It is so rare we get discussion about the more rare schools such as Mōgusa. I have felt liking to northern swords for a long time maybe just the reason for it is that I live up north, that might have been the initial connection that clicked for me. I originally planned to see Hōju and Mōgusa swords this year in Japan but as my love for ōdachi is even greater I needed to adjust places I will visit so I can hopefully see several ōdachi I have not seen before during my month in Japan (currently I have seen 30 ōdachi). So perhaps I will try to do northern swords in 2027. Unfortunately there is not a lot of information about Mōgusa or Hōju schools in English. Many years ago, probably over 10 years ago when Paul Martins thejapanesesword site had a forum there was an amazing thread about Mōgusa, I still remember that dearly to this day. Unfortunately I believe all of that info is now gone for good... back then I didn't understand the need to save information as much as I do today. However I do have few Japanese books on Mōgusa, that have information that might be difficult to find. This might be bit controversial opinion but I don't think NBTHK might be the best authority on Mōgusa and Hōju swords... I am very long time NBTHK member but I think there are groups in Japan that know more about these specific swords than NBTHK. There is actually Mōgusa sword research group that publishes their magazine/publication. At one point I intended to start getting them but I am so backlogged with books and magazines I have more than enough to last for my lifetime. I know NBTHK is regarded as "the" high authority and with well earned reputation, there are still other groups with narrow focus that in my mind surpass the NBTHK knowledge in that particular field. Even though it does nothing to sword financially I would rather have the opinion of these people focusing on the specific field. Currently I think I have 11 signed Mōgusa swords in my references. Sometimes it might be difficult to judge if the smith was actually a Mōgusa smith but these are all northern smiths. I will put the swords out in my own order starting from what I presume to be the oldest (of course I might be wrong on some of these). Fusachika (閼寂) tachi - early Kamakura Tomoyasu (友安) tachi - early Kamakura Kunihira (国平) kodachi - early-middle Kamakura Mōgusa (舞草) tachi - middle Kamakura Toshiyasu (世安) tachi - late Kamakura Shigenaga (重長) ken - Nanbokuchō Mitsunaga (光長) tantō - Muromachi Mōgusa (舞草) katana - Muromachi Yukishige (行重) wakizashi - middle Muromachi Tomonaga (友長) katana - late Muromachi Tomonaga (友長) wakizashi - late Muromachi

Wakizashi by Suketaka was the kantei item of Tōken Bijutsu 825 in October 2025. Scroll down the page to read the kantei explanation, includes bit of historical information on the smith and his workmanship. https://www.touken.or.jp/english/nbthk/swordjournal_December.html I think as you have done the research Jared you have noticed that only very small portion of Japanese smiths are often considered as the important ones in traditional Japanese sword appreciation. That is bit unfortunate but you usually always just find the works and information of these top tier smiths featured in every publication. Finding information on lesser known smiths is a lot more problematic and requires lot of digging.