Jussi Ekholm

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.

There were actually a lot more smiths with titles during that time period. As I said it is outside of my interest so I cannot dig up the date when each got the title as some are very minor smiths with very little info on them. Now out of these I would see Masayuki, Motohira, Tadayoshi, Suketaka and Masashige as the famous ones. Toshinori - 1785 Yoshimori - 1786 Masayuki - 1789 Motohira - 1789 Tadayoshi - 1790 Hirotaka - 1796 Suketaka - 1798 Kinmichi - 1800 Yoshimichi - 1802 Masashige - 1803 Kiyohiro - ? Kunifusa - ? Kunihide - ? Kunishige - ? Kunitora - ? Masahisa - ? Masanori - ? Munemichi - ? Nagayoshi - ? Shigehide - ? Sukekane - ? Tadakuni - ? Tsuguhira - ?

Chris wrote excellent post and information like that will take some time to process. It is actually quite complicated stuff. I was giving an introductory into Japanese swords during the weekend, and I briefly mentioned about the difficulties in looking at prices as there can be so much variation that is very hard to understand. This does happen at all levels, not just at high end. Sometimes it can be really difficult to say why one sword is listed at 500,000 yen and another one for 700,000 yen. I was about to dig up some reference example where the same seller has listed blades from the same school at various price points. As a fun fact I have recorded Aoi Art selling 46 different mumei Ko-Mihara blades. Here are 3 blades from my cherished northern Hōju school that all have been listed at Eirakudo and all papered as Tokubetsu Hozon by NBTHK, and all are in shirasaya so koshirae does not complicate things. As a fun fact N. 1 & 3 have also been at other dealers at different price point. 1: Tachi 78,1 cm : 2,000,000 yen : https://eirakudo.shop/token/wakizashi/detail/368087 2: Katana 79,1 cm : 2,600,000 yen : https://eirakudo.shop/806442 3: Katana 72,8 cm : 1,300,000 yen : https://eirakudo.shop/099872 If all items were equally priced I would pick them in order 3,2,1. I do like the number 3 most because of the strong shape. It has the strong Nanbokuchō profile that I like. I think the description for this one is good and there are of course some rougher areas on the blade that don't look that nice. There is one bit nasty delamination in kissaki that pop ups a bit, I could live with stuff like that but for many it might be annoying. Number 3 has also appeared on Samurai Museum for roughly 1,800,000 yen https://www.samuraimuseum.jp/shop/product/antique-Japanese-sword-katana-unsigned-hojyu-nbthk-tokubetsu-hozon-certificate-2/ and at Winners for price unknown to me https://www.winners-auction.jp/productDetail/99960 2 is the most expensive one and one that I have not yet seen anywhere else, it is recent 2025 Tokubetsu Hozon. This one has long length of 79,1 cm and in the sales ad it is mentioned this is ō-suriage. Long supposedly ō-suriage blades like this are always making my brain hurt. As then this would be an ōdachi originally and to me this does not really have the general vibe that ōdachi have. This is quite narrow sword in profile with little curvature. I know there is a hole at the bottom of the nakago but in my mind I see the middle most likely area for the original hole, so I would just see this as suriage sword and not ō-suriage. I would see this being bit similar to sword number one and both being late Kamakura period tachi originally. I am just comparing because I do have plenty of reference Hōju tachi that are in 80 to 88 cm range. I could very well see this being bit over 80 cm originally but struggle to see something like 95 cm. This does seem to have best polish of the bunch and most details are visible compared to other 2. To my eye sword also seems to be of the best quality out of all 3, the forging seems much finer than on other two. Even though you can see the pattern well it is still well made. I know Hōju often gets touted off as rough looking but Tokyo National Museum has Hōju tachi that has very fine forging. Number 1 is a decent tachi. I just can't personally see it desirable at this price point. Of course I have looked at Hōju tachi for probably over 10 years now and seen many nice ones pop up to market and going usually rather fast. I don't agree with the age estimate that is written on shirasaya and what sword shop also states 元暦 (Genryaku was 1184-85). I don't think this is late Heian - early Kamakura sword. In my opinion this is rather late Kamakura - early Nanbokuchō sword. I know that Hōju swords get often touted as really early ones, however as I have done research on them I believe there are only extremely few of the that actually date to early Kamakura. The one that I believe would be the perhaps the oldest one is the Jūyō Bunkazai tachi of Seikadō Bunko Art Museum (unfortunately haven't seen that one in person yet). The majority of Hōju school works are from late Kamakura period to early Muromachi period. I do think in the pictures this looks "hazy" and bit difficult to see the details. This tachi was later at Aoi Art and was listed for 1,200,000 yen https://www.aoijapan.com/tachi-mumei-attributed-to-hoju-nbthk-tokubetsu-hozon-token/ unfortunately Aoi now removes their listings (I can totally understand why they do it but it is too bad for saving information). Even though this is ubu tachi and in general I cherish original size, I just can't see myself liking this sword a lot. Now this is just a one opinion and other people might feel totally different and that is the fun part of the hobby. We don't need to like the same stuff. I think number 2 is the best item out of the bunch, number 1 closest to original, number 3 is the lowest in quality but to me best in form.

Hello Rixcy. You can try to check Events tab here at NMB. Brett @MassiveMoonHeh has been updating it with ongoing and upcoming events.

I am almost as far away from high end collector as you can be but I have spent lot of time with Jūyō data. First of all as a disclaimer I have to say I don't really like either of the swords. The den Gō should in my mind be a slam dunk for Jūyō - Date family ownership, excellent polish, Kanzan Sayagaki, Tanobe Sayagaki. Still every year I know that items that are in my mind bound to pass fail, and some other items that are unimpressive to me pass. The mumei Shintōgo Kunimitsu katana just passed Tokubetsu Hozon in 2025. Now take the following what I will write with a big grain of salt but I have sometimes really felt that way, just as a disclaimer I am not quality focused collector but historical. If you throw away the NBTHK papers attributing to Shintōgo Kunimitsu, would you pay 7,500,000 yen for that mumei sword? In my own opinion the NBTHK attribution sometimes carry too large value but market works how it works. Of course the fine workmanship of Shintōgo can not really be seen in few pictures. Still if I saw that mumei sword looking like it looks on the pictures I would just skip it without really even second thoughts about it, even if the price would be extremely lower than it currently is. I know it is a controversial take but hopefully it can get the discussion going.

Thank you for the picture of kissaki-moroha Yoshifusa tachi Piers, that got me really puzzled last summer.

I think currently the highest ranked Ozaki Suketaka swords are the 4(5 as one is daishō) that have passed NBTHK Jūyō evaluation. They are dated 1794, 1802, 1802, 1803. Shinshintō in general are outside my knowledge range but I think he was a good smith and produced good quality swords before and after receiving the title.

It is nice looking item, and an interesting one. I am definately not a Sōshū fan, so I cannot identify the small details. However I am shape and size guy and to me the hi at the bottom is throwing me completely off. I do think in my references I should have hundreds of examples of this type of horimono and I cannot remember single one that would have another hi under the main carving, as usually the placement for this type of horimono is pretty standard. The presence of the lower hi would also indicate the sword would have been much longer than it is in it's current form. I am liking the item but I admit the carvings have me completely puzzled out.

I am not a fittings guy but my guess would be it had been fitted for wooden sword, bokutō/bokken.

I do think it is a tricky item. It supposedly has a Hon'ami Kinpun mei to Horikawa Kunitomo. However I don't think either organization sees that one as legitimate. You have the old NBTHK papers just stating there is a kinpun mei Kunitomo, this often (not always) sees them questioning the authencity of the kinpun mei. Likewise NTHK mentions the kinpun mei in their paper but in their opinion their attribution is to a different smith. Horikawa Kunitomo is very good smith, and unfortunately I wouldn't see this as his work either. I do like the size and shape as I like big hirazukuri blades but the quality and details for what I can see from the pictures would not push me towards good smiths of Horikawa lineage. I am not good at kantei and I think most of my references are for the very good smith 1st Sadakuni but they specify 2nd generation in their attribution.

@Wah Thank you for this information Stephen, I have not heard about these magazines. They seem extremely interesting and it could be a fun project trying to get these magazines from Japan. This thread is wonderful, so much information that is not easily available. I believe this one would be the tachi you posted above. The 99,1 cm length listed in the Japanese site: https://www.bunka.go.jp/seisaku/bunkazai/torimodosou/kunishitei/106.html would actually be the total length of the item and not the blade length as I thought it would be.

Very interesting information Brett I had not heard that before but that is extremely interesting. All of these 5 seem to be privately owned in Fukushima prefecture and they are indeed the last swords designated as Jūyō Bunkazai. I have visited Futarasan Jinja several times and have been lucky to see many of their amazing ōdachi and naginata. I have visited few times since they have made these naginata Jūyō Bunkazai as part of the Mikoshi set. Unfortunately so far both times I have just seen the 2 Hōjōji naginata on display, haven't yet seen the other 3. Hopefully some year I can see them too. Still I must say that individually I wouldn't think these items would be quality or historical importance needed to achieve Jūyō Bunkazai but as a part of the set I understand it. I do think the Jūyō Bunkazai panel could also be extremely biased. Ōyamazumi jinja is one of my favorite places in Japan and they do house the most impressive naginata collection in the world. However all their Jūyō Bunkazai naginata are just all grouped under weapons dedicated to the shrine category in 1966. Yet all viable swords are individually classified as Bunkazai or National Treasures. Of course as a ōdachi and naginata fan my view is biased but I would see their naginata as extremely important historical items, even more so than the swords the shrine has. Yes they do have several ōdachi too, 2 of which are National Treasures. Yes both of them are absolutely wonderful swords, but still there are some amazing unclassified ōdachi in the shrine collection too.

It is actually sometimes very difficult to track down info on some of the old swords that are currently missing or unknown. As I have the 16 book set Kokuhō Tōken Zufu that was complied in I believe 1936 to 1938, for many years I have thought it had all the former Kokuhō from the old designation. However I now understand that it is missing some former National Treasures. For example the above posted Hotarumaru was made National Treasure in 1931 but it is missing from this book. Likewise the Norishige that was found by Ian Brooks is not featured in this book either even though it was made National Treasure in 1918. And there might most likely be other former National Treasures that are not featured in this book set. Here are picture and measurements for the Tadayoshi tachi that Brett posted earlier with the story how it was stolen. Nagasa: 74,5 cm Sori: 2,4 cm Motohaba: 2,8 cm Sakihaba: 1,6 cm Kissaki: 2,5 cm I was trying to read the old entry from 1930's but there might be few kanji that are not commonly used anymore so I hope I got the modern versions correct. There seems to be lot of history for this sword if I understood correctly. It was dedicated to the shrine by Tokugawa Tadateru (忠輝) in 1667, and the sword has/had itomaki tachi koshirae. However during the years it seems to have been mixed as the property of 大祝 (Ōhōri) family. From wikipedia I was able to understand the Ōhōri were lineage of high priests that were connected to Suwa shrine. It is written that in Tenpō (c.1830's/40's) it changed ownership from the family to someone else, then it changed hands many times until it was returned to the shrine in 1906.

Also taken from Aso Jinja after WWII is the famous Rai Kunitoshi ōdachi dated 1297, named sword 蛍丸 (Hotarumaru), it was former National Treasure. You can find info in Japanese for example at these sites https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/蛍丸 https://www.tsuruginoya.net/stories/hotarumaru/ Nagasa: 101,4 cm Sori: 3,4 cm Motohaba: 3,7 cm Sakihaba: 2,1 cm Motokasane: 9 mm Sakikasane: 5,7 mm Nakago: 34,2 cm Unfortunately there are extremely few images of the sword surviving. There has been a replica sword made for the shrine by modern smith. Here it is featured in Youtube video

What an amazing project Piers, I'll send you a PM

Tachi by Osafune Hidemitsu, dated 1371 designated as Jūyō Bunkazai 31.3.1953, item number 01658. Nagasa: 81,6 cm Sori: 3,0 cm Motohaba: 3,7 cm Sakihaba: 2,7 cm Motokasane: 6,5 mm Sakikasane: 4,5 mm Kissaki: 6,0 cm Nakago: 23,9 cm Nakago sori: 0,6 cm Item is featured in Nihontō Taikan, Tōken Bijutsu 362 as feature sword, Tanobe big book, Osafune Chōshi, Jukken Historically this sword has been in collection of 村上 (Murakami) family. This is just my type of sword and seems to be absolutely wonderful item. It is fun to look into these and probably the first time in 2 years I opened the big Tanobe book.

Tantō by Shintōgo Kunimitsu designated as Jūyō Bunkazai 27.6.1959, item number 01825. Nagasa: 27.6 cm Sori: uchizori Motohaba: 2,3 cm Motokasane: 6 mm Nakago: 11,1 cm Nakago sori: slight (some books have 0,2 cm) Item is featured in Nihontō Taikan, Tantō Book (1969) by Suzuki, Tōken Bijutsu 127 as the feature sword, Tōken Bijutsu 574 as the feature sword. Historically this sword has been in collection of 山内 (Yamauchi/Yamanouchi) family.

Looking at the mei I would think this would be from quite unknown group of makers who resided in Fujiwara area in Yamato. By extremely unlikely timing coincidence you should take a look on this thread that was started yesterday:

Another good post Brett, I really enjoyed reading about Buzen-Gō I took a quick look and I think I should have pictures/oshigata and old information on 42 of the still missing swords. I do think Agency for Cultural Affairs know a lot more about the items than they wrote out on the page. I think they protect privacy of people & shrines.

I think there are always compromises that you need to make in sword viewing unless you can hold the actual item in person. I am happy I am not interested in small details so I can easily enjoy displays in museums & shrines even if the lighting for example would not allow viewing finer details. Most often we can only view one side of the item in museum displays. I really like the displays where you can view both sides but then the backside is often not lit well. I am not a photographer but I would think you would need several videos to capture the various details because you would need to film at various angles. As you will often need to perform lot of moving around and shifting positions when looking at items in museums. Sometimes the museums in Tokyo for example can be crowded and in good manners the view time for a sword can be bit limited in one go. That is why I love some of the rural shrines as they have items I love and I can spend the whole day looking at them if I want. One extremely good thing about oshigata is that the published ones are mostly made by experts with an expert eye. They can identify small details that I don't see or grasp and feature them in the oshigata. In ideal world I could see all the things featured in oshigata but in reality I am not at that level.

Maybe Bruce is referring to this 本阿 (花押) - Hona (Kao). I dont know my Honami lineages too well but I believe one doing the kinzōgan was family member 光温 in 1600's.

Video that Brano took of the sword is incredible. I have viewed the sword in its normal residing place and it is a wonderful sword. The video shows the details very nicely. I think sometimes with high quality video I can see more details than with my own eyes. However as for me the size and shape is the driving factor with swords, seeing them in person can create different effect than seeing oshigata, photos or videos.

I feel one big problem on featuring the item in publications is item accessibility. Some items just don't get much exposure to public and for some I think it might be a rare occasion even to sword experts in Japan to see the item. Aizu Shintōgo on the other hand is on the easy viewing side, as it is on display. I've seen it and it is remarkable sword even though I am personally not a huge fan of that very fine workmanship, I prefer rougher items with more "character". Of course hands on viewing of a such an item is probably only possible for very selected few experts.

Thank you for another wonderful article Brett. I have seen the Chōgi at Tokyo National Museum and it is marvellous sword. I wondered how a sword like this did not have a high national designation but as your other article explained that these former Imperial collection pieces are above designating them, it all makes perfect sense.