Jussi Ekholm

I think it was an average length tachi as Darcy suggests it was c. 72-74 cm originally. That is very common length in Awataguchi tachi. I have measurements for the signed Kokuhō and both Bunkazai tachi by Norikuni. One of the Bunkazai is 72,8 cm and has not been shortened. The shortened Kokuhō and other ubu Bunkazai are/were longer originally. There are multiple remaining signed Awataguchi tachi that are over or very close to 80 cm, however there are still surviving tachi in original length that are around 70 cm and even few below that. I think Darcy has made excellent write ups lately on this Norikuni and Nagamitsu. The only downside about them for me is that they are too comprehensive, they have pretty much all the needed info so I don't have to dig any info by myself which I love to do. I think this is perfect example of rarity that I tried to bring up on the unpopular schools thread. As there are only 8 known signed works by Norikuni.

I agree that Taima work is generally very good and that is the reason why they achieve the high tier papers. Wouldn't mind having one in my collection. I think in general for mumei swords you can go "quality first" if you can word it like that. The quality of the sword needs to be very high for Jūyō and extremely high for Tokubetsu Jūyō. Where as due to historical & rarity factor signed swords can be allowed more leeway in their condition and quality. Even though it might have sounded funny I didn't mean average Takada swords with the comparison to Nagamitsu, as the signed & dated Tomoyuki tachi is to my understanding Jūyō Bijutsuhin. There are tons of signed Muromachi Takada swords that are historically quite insignificant and there are even multiple signed and dated short swords by Tomoyuki so they are not as rare in comparison. Same logic could be used for other smiths/schools where signed tachi are rare. Like signed Enju tachi in general are really important, as are signed Yamato tachi (pre-Muromachi). But as you said Paul we should try to appreciate swords as whole and try to enjoy the good things on them, be it extremely beautiful jihada or shape that has been preserved nearly original for really long time. Some swords just have more good things than others which elevates them above the rest (talking about high quality items here).

I think I am in same boat as Michael that I see your options 2 and 3 being the most important ones in that list. Lots of signed swords have gone through some form of shortening and alteration but I still think they are very important reference pieces. Sometimes I find it funny how the remaining few last cm's of nakago that bear the two character signature mean the world to me. Rarity depends so much about the smith/school. Like above Kunitoshi, smiths like Nagamitsu, Nobukuni etc. have still lots of signed works as references where as some schools/smiths have only few remaining signed pieces. On that occasion even though for example by artistic merits a signed Nagamitsu tachi would be more valued than signed tachi by Bungo Tomoyuki, I think due to rarity factor I'd value the Tomoyuki over just another Jūyō Nagamitsu. I just picked Nagamitsu as the example as so far I have listed 63 signed tachi by him and I know the number will still go up a lot. And for comparison I yet know only 1 signed & dated tachi by Bungo Tomoyuki. For Norishige I would value signed tachi a lot as they are rare by him but he has many signed tanto so the rarity factor on those goes down. And I agree that Norishige style work is easier to identify compared to Yamato differences and mumei swords that have strong characteristics of that (Norishige) style have lot smaller "bin" of possible schools & smiths. As we are talking about Yamato, one thing I've noticed as I'm going through Nado Zufus is that NBTHK loves Taima. The amount of mumei Taima passing Jūyō and Tokubetsu Jūyō is big considering how rare Taima swords are in general. I think for suriage mumei swords Taima and Hoshō (Just a personal observation) are considered as the top tier Yamato attributions and both are rare. My own general favorite in Yamato is Senjuin, and their signed swords have great value by Japanese authorities but when it comes to suriage mumei their range is broad. Yes there are many mumei Senjuin that are Jūyō but there are also lot below that. A favorable attribution for mumei sword is Ryūmon Nobuyoshi as that attribution for mumei sword points it towards Jūyō. For Tegai there is Kanenaga, and for Shikkake there is Norinaga but in general I think Tegai & Shikkake are being the "weaker" Yamato attributions. Of course swords should be judged as one of a kind items but the above is just general trend that seems to be (or at least it was as I've been focusing on older attributions) popular by NBTHK. We should also be aware that NBTHK is also changing all the time, and as with mumei swords they are just opinions (although perhaps the best one). What they thought in the 1960's-70's-80's might be different as we are approaching 2020. Another mumei bunch that grinds my gears is Yamato Shizu - Shizu - Naoe Shizu... I'll need to learn to really understand mumei swords but it is a slow process.

Hard to say from pictures how sloped the shinogi-ji is. If the sword has high shinogi then it could easily be just 5 mm at mune and still be very healthy. Of course it can also just be a typo too.

It has been really nice to read differing opinions. As we are discussing the artistic side of things the can be a lot of difference in opinions yet nobody will be totally wrong. I can just present a numerical fact about preserved blades in my current data amount, still have mountain of stuff to go through before I'll be satisfied. The fact that this data is extremely skewed towards top end should not be a problem considering it is Awataguchi vs. Kunitoshi Awataguchi - 94 swords - 69 signed Kunitoshi (Niji & Rai) - 106 swords - 67 signed My own unpopular opinion is not towards specific school but high/very high class mumei blades in general. Yes I know that lot of them are simply amazing but I still don't totally get it even though I somewhat understand basics behind attributions and valuations. In my own personal opinion signed swords in worse condition should be appreciated more than mumei swords in better condition, yes there is a cut off point where mumei sword is simply just very important piece of history and reference of worksmanship and in such state it will override poor quality swords with mei. I think in general one thing that makes me like Bizen so much is because they have so many signed & dated swords remaining, and same thing is making my head blow as in Sōshū after Shintogo finding a signed sword from Yukimitsu, Masamune, Sadamune is a rare occurance. Then you get to Hiromitsu and Akihiro from whom lots of signed and dated swords are still remaining. So you can get quite accurate information from signed and dated Shintogo swords as well as from Hiromitsu and Akihiro but there is just a huge gap when allegedly "the best" swordsmith in history of Japan worked. So far only signed above tanto length sword from this trio I've found is the Meitō wakizashi Torii Masamune. I'd be more than happy to find signed tachi by any of this trio so please point me towards one if you happen to know one.

I think mei is 同田貫小山上野介作 Dōtanuki Koyama Kōzuke no Suke saku. I've seen references of Dōtanuki smiths use all of those partially but never in that full form.

I've been enjoying the more theoretical topics a lot too. I agree that lot of new topics seem to be about military swords or random average items. Now don't get me wrong there is nothing wrong about that and that is the level for many of us (me included). However I feel that some theoretical debates might be lot more beneficial in advancing our "common" knowledge. Not sure if we need a new section though. I think I'd have more than few topics that I could start with a question that really puzzles me about high end collecting. I have few on my mind that I've wondered lately but I'd need to figure them out as understandable topic openings. They make sense to me in my own head but would not make a good forum post opening in the current form.

I am not familiar with university levels etc. so I'll try to give a common advice. It is tough one but try to study 1,000 hours per year. That is about 3 hours daily, when you do that year after year you will achieve great results. I would also add Japanese language to the mix. In optimal settings I'd try to learn at least 2-4 hours of Japanese per week. I would also recommend adding general Japanese art history and folklore, this is unfortunately part I seriously lack in. The study of fittings and koshirae would be so much more pleasurable if I'd even have the basics down in this. It is always so enjoyable as experienced members explain the details and "hidden" meanings in the design (which are often common knowledge for those interested in the field). Chris is correct that the playing field is not equal but you can try your best regardless. We have amazing online resources available to almost all who have access to the Internet. You can start lightly and read 15 minutes of Nihonto Message Board, browse different online dealers for another 15 minutes, when you encounter something interesting you can flip open some books and other sources for more intense study. Soon you'll notice an hour has easily passed by. Not a structured way of study but easily doable and enjoyable way of studying.

http://nihontocraft.com/2015_NBTHK_Nionto_Tosogu_Shinsa_Standards.html

I am happy that it can be useful. It is basic .docx format so I don't know what Apple products usually use for Microsoft Word files. Links are mostly working but as has been noted there are few issues with it. One major one was the fact that Richard noted that commercial sites tend to delete unused pages. Here are few that I've found bit problematic. As it's been few years of documenting for these, some of the websites have been upgraded etc. Ginza Choshuya upgraded their website last year I believe and unfortunately lots of info was lost and is not accessible anymore as it was on their old site. Aoi Art sells an incredible amount of items, and they often use the same page names they've used before. So the link might take you to example other mumei Enju sword that is different the one I listed there 2 years ago for example. Touken Matsumoto seems to now have deleted most of the info on their sold swords. I figured the format they used for page numbering and was able to see lots of their old sales as pages of the items were still up. I used the same trick on few other sites as well, not exactly rocket science. As for putting the data in excel, well I've kinda mined the relevant info I want from those links into my bigger and better database. So even if they vanish from online I still have some of the info of those swords stored up (no prices on that one). Every one can use the data in this one as they like, I mainly just wanted to have price & paper listed in this one, and I figured Word document would be a fast one to use and easy to have direct links (just noticed I could have had the fast links just as easily clickable in Excel... ). I just added the length as factor to make some sense and organization in this as there are so many mumei swords in here. Even though there seems to be lot of swords in here, the from Heian to early Muromachi span actually makes out a small share of dealed swords. I don't even want to think how many swords there would be if I'd try to add every sword sold by all of those websites over the years. Just wanted to bring this out to newer people who might have not yet watched the sword market a lot. Just to show you as most of us like to browse few popular sites, here are some numbers I counted just now from them (yes some dealers have very large inventories) Aoi Art has about 270 swords up for sale, out of those about 23 would make this list. Nipponto has about 400 swords up for sale, out of those about 40 would make this list. E-Sword has about 110 swords up for sale, out of those about 2 would make this list. Shokai has about 90 swords up for sale, out of those about 4 would make this list. About 870 swords out of which about 70 would make this list. Now I did browse through the websites pretty fast but it should give some idea how rare the early swords are.

Well as I've mentioned few times that I have a "sword database" that I am building and I've also mentioned that I have some online prices stored up. As I am not a commercial guy I thought I'd share the price list to NMB. Sharing is caring right? The idea for this came to me some years ago as I was constantly listing the few favorites for potential purchase, and that list was evolving all the time. As I removed sold ones off and saw that I started to get more expensive swords to the list that I could not even dream of getting. So I thought I should just let the swords stay in list even if they were sold. Here are few words about the price list, there are about 1750 swords listed, I have direct links to about 1600 swords that you can just click and they should take you to the sword. About 1250 swords have their prices listed. The really high end swords usually don't feature the asking price. And I have taken out some prices that I've got to know privately, as I wanted to keep this so that all info in this is/has been open to public. And private information that has been said in private should not be in my opinion distributed on open forum. The cut off point in the list is approximately around 1450's (I know I still have few dated ones in the 50's). There might be some errors that I've put a smith under wrong school or tradition (or even have the wrong smith) but I've tried to minimize them and tried to correct most to my actual database. Sometimes it is quite difficult to pinpoint the origin of some smiths. This is kinda barebones version as for example I've put mei and measurements to my real database. I just wanted to have this document as easily viewed and quick as possible. The document has headlines, so when you open it it should be 1.tier Province 2.tier School 3.tier Smith etc. Granted I didn't make headlines for all the smiths. For example there are 2 Sōshū Masamune in the list, so I thought it wouldn't be necessary to make a headline for him as he can be easily found through search or just going to the Province. Once you start using it for the first few times it should be quite easy to navigate. Especially when you use ctrl+f to get the headlines tab open. Then you can just move fast by clicking various schools. The format on the document is like this Smith or School - Type of sword (mei or mumei) - [koshirae] if there is one featured Length in cm - price of the sword - authentication paper - seller of the sword Direct link to the sword I might have messed it up in some place but in general the classification arrangement I used would be odachi -> tachi -> katana -> naginata -> naoshi -> wakizashi -> tanto -> others I hope members will find this useful Miekkojen hintaseuranta NMB version 1.docx

I think it has been in the talks for a long while. I remember that some years ago already it was thrown as an idea in Sweden aften in one European gathering, and after that I've touched the subject on few occasions with more senior/influential collectors in Europe. If my memory does not fail me some years ago there was a thread about shinsa in Europe and even discussion about how many swords members would surely bring in? I remember even writing in a thread like that but now I cannot find that thread when I search my old posts. I'm remembering Chris Bowen even adding insight about number of swords required to break even? All of this can't be a false memory, right, right? My suggestion would be (if there will be another) Samurai Art Expo as the venue, and the Netherlands is easily accessible from all over Europe. Eddy Wertheim (and others involved) did spectacular job organizing the event. I remember many of us talked about perhaps the possibility that event could be biennial (had to look that up but it means happening in every two years) in the future. Of course the optimal would be if the attendance and interest are there to support it that it could be a yearly event. However the financial risk in organizing an event + bringing in NTHK shinsa is not a small one. I think we should offer our support as collecting community if someone decides to make it happen. I know I'd try to visit that event and most likely would get another set of papers for both of my swords just for fun and to see how similar or different the different organization attributions are.

Unfortunately I don't have that book but I have bit over 300 Jūyō Bunkazai spread across my books. If the ones you are looking for are made pre 1450, I can easily check if I have them and what books of mine feature them.

The fact is still that my tracked data is quite biased. They have all been actually for sale at mostly Japanese dealer websites (and few western ones), and I should have links to about 90% of them, but as I track only certain segment that is for sale the bias is on the higher end. I think I've been going as far back as I can with Webarchive on the dealer sites, I think very few Japanese sites were listed at that database earlier than 2000 and most just starting from 2005 onwards. I'd think it would be "safeish" to say that the majority has been listed and sold in a 15 year window. I just looked bit more about my saved swords in list and it is quite obvious that it shows quite extreme bias as I seem to have little bit over 1500 swords listed there at the moment. I've done all entries by hand so I've checked most of them carefully. At Jūyō swords there should not be double entries as I have shinsa number down on about 95% of them and if they are same length I compare the pics, nakago etc (as to my surprise there have been multiple times of mumei swords with same attribution and exact same length passing in same session). I've tried to eliminate all the doubles as I've moved the data from sale list to my measurement list too. Of course there might be the weird occurance of identical length, curvature, width, ana etc. between Hozon & Tokuho swords but I've put them under one entry if the stats are identical and pics match too. 9 Bijutsuhin 34 Tokujū 628 Jūyō 483 Tokuho 361 Hozon As can be seen there is extreme bias toward higher end. In reality the number of Hozon & Tokubetsu Hozon greatly outnumber rest of the pack in swords in general. Because the time period I am focusing on features most of the highest regarded smiths in Japanese sword making history, and there is the historical age factor too. Just remembered I have 2015 and 2016 DTI indexes saved on my computer (I have not listed any DTI info on my above sales data, but on few occasions the sword featured at DTI was also featured on dealers website). Those that are really into high end swords in market/profit mind could easily track if some of them pop up often at DTI. 2015 / 53 Jūyō / 14 Tokubetsu Jūyō / 3 Jūyō Bijutsuhin 2016 / 62 Jūyō / 7 Tokubetsu Jūyō / 2 Jūyō Bijutsuhin

We got to see few of his collection at Samurai Art Expo like Michael hinted above, very nice items. I can totally understand his decision to go without prices. It often happens with high quality items.

Like many others I've really enjoyed the topics you've brought up lately Chris. I did some calculations about potential amount of NBTHK papers issued for swords last fall, and Darcy gave some pointers as my Jūyō count was bit off (I was near the actual amount of total items not just swords) Here is bit better estimate. Hozon - c.120,000 swords Tokubetsu Hozon - c. 65,000 swords Jūyō - c. 11,600 swords Tokubetsu Jūyō - c. 1,050 swords Now as Kirill presented numbers about Jūyō swords being traded, I can present facts of the online (meaning that the sword appeared at major dealers website) sales of Jūyō and above swords pre 1450. Don't ask why 1450, that's my personal cut off date as I cannot keep tracking every sword sold online and as my personal interest fades after early Muromachi that was kinda logical date. Unfortunately some items are lost soon after the sales and cannot be dug up. But here are the ones I have managed to save in my online sale info list. 671 swords Jūyō or above. 9 Jūyō Bijutsuhin 34 Tokubetsu Jūyō 628 Jūyō These are all generally pre-1450 give or take an odd one where the smith worked exactly around that time. And these all have been publically been sale online at their websites over the years. These are all different items, I think I have few of the above swords recorded being sold by 3 to 4 various dealers. While the great majority have only been up for sale once. As has come up in this thread, there are more of the private big collectors than is often publically known. As from those above swords I've listed being sold online, the great majority is not for sale anymore so they've gone somewhere. I think only Jūyō Bijutsuhin listed online currently is the Hōjōji that Iida Koendo has for sale. Now as I've started digging through the Zufus I am realizing how there is such great variety in Jūyō items. While I am not collecting at Jūyō level, nor am not sure if I ever will. I am going to throw a curve ball question to collectors. Have you encountered an item that you'd be willing to hunt? As I've documented lots of swords over the last few years there are items that really stand out for me. Kind of items that would make me want to track down the owner and ask if they would be willing to part with that given item. I know I've gotten romantic idea about those swords and to be honest wouldn't really care about "market prices" in case of those items, I'd be happy to overpay for them. For me some of those are even lower tier items (below Jūyō), they are just swords that hit a spot in me. In my current view I think that generally western collectors buy too many items. That is one of the reasons why we will constantly try to "beat" the market and get our money back or optimally profit. Of course there is really no right way of collecting as it is a personal thing. Buying stuff is easy but selling them is tricky. And like was said earlier, trying to get "rid" of the items at distorted prices can prove to be problematic.

I did understand your original premise but I didn't have anything of value to add to that. While it might be academically boring pretty much all Japanese sources agree of greatness of some specific schools and traditions. I cannot really say which % comes from historical appreciation, quality, functionality, other significance. It is logical that good traditions and schools were valued in their own time and are valued now. However like Kirill earlier I do not subscribe to Kamakura swords being functionally superior to other swords even though the era is usually considered as pinnacle of Japanese sword making. That functional superiority is somewhat romantic ideal. In general I'd dare to think that there is not a huge difference in performance between various schools or periods as long as shape and size are similar. It might be blasphemy to say that in the end they are just swords, and they are made quite similarily. Lots of things are not scientifically proven, and you can see the same amongst modern sword users today. If you look at forums where modern swords are collected and used for martial arts purposes you'll see varying opinions about cutting provenance of some brands for example. Some like aesthetic features of some over the features in others. It is quite opinionated. I sold my Yamanaka Newsletters a while ago so I cannot really comment on his views. Nakahara says quite many interesting views in his Facts & Fundamentals, I think it is good and makes you think. I cannot comment anything on Shintō swords as I don't focus on them but here are few thoughts about earlier swords. You'll see the same schools and smiths in various sources achieving the high ranks. Fujishiro Saijō-saku and Jōjō-saku smiths will have very strong presense in NBTHK Jūyō and Tokubetsu Jūyō. Likewise they will pretty much have highest valuations in Tōko Taikan and Hawleys. You'll see common source books like Nihontō Kōza, Nagayama's Connoisseurs etc. focusing on great smiths and traditions and only have short passages on mediocre smiths. When museum collections are exhibited you'll usually see the works of the great smiths presented. I am on the boring train, as I think we should try to understand why the majority of Japanese scholars agree on greatness of some things. That will advance our own learning. Still personally I value original shape and size over the quality. Ōdachi are my secret pleasure, when I encounter pre 1600's ōdachi in books it is a great moment for me. Large battlefield weapons are just historically important in my mind and I can forget quality aspect when dealing with those.

I'm not a tsuba guy but I do not think of Tōshō when I look at it.

One major style/school to appreciate would be Yamashiro (I know we have our Yamashiro fans on board). For Yamashiro especially Awataguchi and Rai have most prestige. Darcy made interesting research a while back and you'll see who came out on top of the top tier designations: https://yuhindo.com/ha/the-top-ten/ I am listing swords down as my hobby for fun and education and listing top stuff will make you learn new things. Here are some probably bit lesser known schools/smiths that are quite highly regarded by NBTHK and Japanese government bodies. Hasebe (Yamashiro) Taima (Yamato) Takagi Sadamune (Ōmi) Kanro Toshinaga (Ōmi) Katayama Ichimonji (Bitchū) Kamakura Ichimonji (Sagami) Bizen Saburō Kunimune (Bizen) Unshō (Bizen) Hōjōji (Tajima) [Even though it's somewhat bucket attribution] Inaba Kagenaga (Inaba) Yukihira (Bungo) Naminohira Yukiyasu (Satsuma)

Very interesting piece, also note the original length before suriage. As the sword is now still 72,4 cm I'd think it has been 90 cm(ish) originally, nice c.3 shaku katana.

How is the hamon near the machi? I kinda get the feeling this might be in original length or close to it. Measurements would also help with that. I'd guess the 3rd hole is the original, and the sword might be slight machi okuri (or possibly the 1st). Nakago might have been shaved a bit by looking at the hi but then again it's shape seems good to me aside from hi. I am not liking the lower hi & horimono, they throw me off. Seems like the single hi side has also originally had soe-bi that has been pretty much polished away at least few pics I am seeing a partial groove there. I think it is very difficult sword to judge. I cannot see much what is under hadori in pics but I think it is suguha based hamon. Hada might be itame to my eye. How is the patina on the nakago? It seems quite even aside from flash lighting it up in few pics. My guess might be Late Kotō, cannot say anything beyond that.

There is a big difference between NBTHK members and NBTHK officials. Anyone can be a member of NBTHK, all you need to do is join in. Just being a member does not instantly give you any secret knowledge. I do not know who are the current shinsa panel of NBTHK but that they have been chosen for the task by the organization is enough qualification in my mind. I am not a member of NTHK but I'd think they same about both NTHK branches. Just being a member of the organization is not a proof of anything but I think their shinsa panels are skilled. I think JASMK (https://jasmk.jp/) might be unknown to many but they have bit more electronical approach. Their attribution has a QR code. I have never seen their certificates in person so I cannot comment much about them. I think the idea is cool but they are still really minor in bigger picture. Any kind of authentication will bring a bit of security for the buyer, how much... well it depends on many things. The higher the level of authentication is the more research has been done to the item and the higher quality item it is in general. NBTHK publishes the Jūyō and Tokubetsu Jūyō swords and as far as I know NTHK publishes Yūshū swords (I don't know which branch has the books). These swords are high quality swords researched by the organizations. The importance of having the sword papered depends on the quality of the item. In my opinion it really does not chance too much for low end items. However on some rare occasions there can be really top end swords with just Hozon papers. In general market modern NBTHK papers are the golden standard, NTHK shares a minor share and JASMK (and similar) papers are miniscule in number. (granted I mostly only follow sites of good Japanese dealers so my view might be bit skewed) Kirill I don't think I agree with some of your statements. I think Japan included the number might be 10x but here in Europe Japanese swords are much less collected than military swords. Here in Finland Japanese swords are pretty much unheard of and most sword collectors focus on European & Russian military swords. I wouldn't say the Japanese sword collecting society is anemic, I'd dare to say the opposite. European NBTHK and sub-branches have arranged lots of good stuff over the years I've been a member (and lot before that too). Regional groups have amazing events organized, like in UK Token Society etc., in Italy I.N.T.K and there are strong groups in France, Poland, Czech and all over Europe. I hope you get a chance to visit some of the meetings and they might change your view.

I think I am seeing XX jū Fujiwara Nobutomo (cannot see the first two characters well). There was Nobutomo lineage in Kaga province, where it seems at least 4th to 10th generations included Fujiwara into their signatures.

I agree with what Jeremiah wrote earlier. If you keep digging and digging you'll find lots of really interesting things in 10k range. I think it is often heard what Michael said above that 10 - 20,000 range is a "danger zone". I think it might partially come down to that swords costing as much are difficult to realize when needed, hence many will think they got "burned" while they might have had decent deal on a decent sword. I believe that people often might have slightly unrealistic idea of the resale of their own items (I know I value my swords over my purchase prices while in reality they would be less than that most likely). I'll have here 5 interesting (in my mind) swords that are/were roughly 10k$'s from Japanese dealers. When you keep track of things at least 3 of these are sold multiple times sometimes by various dealers over the last 10 years (meaning they are not some hidden gems). I tried to dig and all 5 of these are very difficult to find in 10k range, but swords like these can occasionally be found. Yoshioka Ichimonji Naoshi: https://www.aoijapan.net/katana-mumei-yoshioka-ichimonji-nagamaki-naoshi/ Definately not the finest Ichimonji attributed sword out there. Ayanokōji Sueyuki Tachi: https://www.aoijapan.net/katana-mumei-unsigned-joshu-sueyuki/ Long Yamashiro tachi Osafune Yoshimitsu Katana: https://web.archive.org/web/20160322011247/http:/www.tokka.biz/sword/yoshimitsu2.html Suriage Nanbokuchō Hidemitsu tachi dated 1378: http://www.shouzando.com/k-hidemitsu170409.html If only that bad portion of the sword wasn't there... Well then the price would be different. Hasebe Kunishige (late): https://web.archive.org/web/20130119060859/http:/www.tokka.biz:80/sword/kunishige2.html Nice and wild one I'd have few others that are really interesting and some of them sold super fast, unfortunately most dealers delete the pages for sold swords, so I need to grab the information really fast. For example there was signed Kamakura tachi by Bizen Kagezane that sold within few days and vanished. I saved it to my phones notebook and when I tried to go to look at it at home it was already gone. There have been multiple swords that seem to sell within few days of their public arrival to websites, those are obviously thought to be good deals by at least one if not more buyers.

I just checked my "archives" and I do remember there was mumei Kagemitsu that was sold. It was Tokubetsu Hozon and asking price was 880k Yen at Tsuruginoya, http://www.tsuruginoya.com/mn1_3/a00490.htmlI remember this very piece was discussed in here too. Of course there were reasons why Japanese dealer is selling it at the price they sold it for. They've been in the game and most likely know sword prices lot better than us. I would personally perhaps go with Ray's Kozori route as you can get one in better condition compared to "higher attributions", decent signed Kozori tachi is a good possibility in that range. Or what Michael said about getting a good Shintō sword is also a viable option. It depends on what you want to collect.