Curran

John and Jean are already helping, so you are in good hands and I'd be distant third chair on this one. That CD from RogerShaw is also worth its weight in gold. (brilliant rec Jean) I only minimal interest in Hizen swords, but his book is too good. No matter how my library space may shrink, it will snow in the Florida Keys before I sell that one. <>

Dave, I am much more of a fittings collector who has owned a few good nihonto over the years. There will be club members there that can give you much better advice than me. Izuka-san (Kunio) will probably be your first stop in the room. Club info: http://www.ny-tokenkai.org/www.ny-token ... tings.html Usually 12 to whenever. January is usually the big meeting where we all go out to a big lunch-dinner. Sadly, John Prough's wife has suddenly passed away Jan 5th. He is General Secretary and long time co-leader of the group. His wife was an internationally respected and much beloved Japanese naginata sensei. One of the world's best and a woman who put the Art in martial artist. We might be a large and gloomy bunch on Jan 22nd. That said, you should come. They may or may not charge you a $5 visitor fee, but you will get a bucketload of information and someone may take a rubbing of your nakago to do further research. That is bittersweet, as it was Sachiko Prough who gave us a lecture on how to do oshigata only 2 months ago. PM me if you need any more info.

Dave, Please remember protocol to add your first name to posts. It may help some of us forgetful types if you also add at least initial of last name to posts. There are many "Dave" in my family, including both first and second husband of my aunt. Stories can get confusing. I too confess surprise at how well the polish turned out. Like being a surgeon, it is a tough call to make. Your patient turned out very well. I did not know you were in New York City. Has no one directed you to the New York Metro Sword Club? The next meeting is Jan 22nd at the Times Square location. I don't like the idea of a naked freshly polished blade wandering around the city... asking for trouble or damage. Yet club members will give you good insight into it. To protect the blade surface for short periods of travel, you can cover it lengthwise in Syran Wrap or Cling Wrap. Be sure to clean afterwards. If you are remotely near FiDi, then PM me and we can consider meeting up Sunday or Monday. We are staying a few blocks north of Wall Street. Most of my books focus on fittings and koto Bizen, but I do have some other texts here. Curran

Pleasant tsuba. later Edo revival piece without a kozuka or kogai ana, but uses several sukashi designs together well. Also, the habaki is beaten up but was once something personal. I cannot comment on the blade, but some of the fittings point towards a personal regard for the sword as more than just a tool.

Piers, Thank you. My tastes have gotten simpler with age, though I sometimes go 180 and love something Tour de Force over the top. The shape and line of this kake appeals to me. A family friend is a professional woodworker and made me 2 exceptional long tsuba kake out of hollywood. Your sword kake might find itself recreated in smaller form and hollywood for a favorite toppei koshirae and its original tanto. Good inspiration.

Definitely submit the Daruma. The iron rendering of yours reminds me of a set of papered iron Daruma menuki I had and were purchased away years ago. Had a great call to a small but desirable school. You might get a more interesting/educational call on the Daruma tsuba than the other. Or you might have lacklustre results and they go "Shoami". It is a more interesting gamble than the other one. The other one we can probably figure out in person, unless you really want papers on it. I also tend to think the NTHK is very conservative on their dating of items at shinsa outside Japan, though the fittings team has impressed me a bit at the last NY/NJ shinsa. Depending on when your shinsa slot is.... ask the opinion of some of the people in the main show room before you must surrender a tsuba at the shinsa front desk.

Grey, Low on printer paper, but I'd love a copy of that list. It would help buckets if I ever dust off my brain and try to learn my Shinto and Shinshinto schools better.

Oh, you probably won't stump him with this- but it will be interesting if he can use it well. The book did visually convey some very effective fluid uses of the weapon that I think would certainly take a fair bit of practice. Stick training: highly respected thanks to one teacher, but I never progressed very far. Some training resonates, and some doesn't.

Here is the little book someone gave me long ago: http://www.amazon.com/Spike-Chain-Japan ... 0804805407 Actually an excellent read. Small but informative. Some very good photo illustrations. I probably sold or gave away my copy since it was almost purely martial, but I can highly recommend this little bugger.

Oh, awesome. Haven't seen those in a while. Used by sentry to subdue and disarm samurai in non deadly fashion. I had an excellent book on the history and use of these, including the head (Tokugawa ?) guardsman that developed many of the techniques. Usually the weights are a little smaller and able to be used sort of as brass knuckles or in a fashion where you can poke, pop, or coerce a drunk samurai that he doesn't want to fight anymore and doesn't need to go through that gate at that time of night...

Lorenzo, I don't think (Italian) olive wood photographs properly. It is a beautiful wood and takes on some depth of personality in time. I have a picture frame we made of olive wood from where I was working in Italy almost 20 years ago. We chose particularly good pieces for the construction. It has aged incredibly well. I also remember an architect's house outside of Siena about 25 minutes or so. He'd used in in a variety of ways in the restoration of his home. It left a strong memory. In contrast, olive wood pieces brought back from southern Spain 10 years ago have not aged nearly as well. _______________________________________________________ Piers, The very first photo you listed with the plain dark wood kake- where did that image come from? Know what sort of wood that is? I'd like to see more photos of it as an aide for a small modern kake design.

Stong belief: Late muromachi or even early Momoyama Mino blade. Nice looking polish. From kissaki to the habaki I am sure the nie look as if they are being blown by a wind over the hills of the hamon into the drifts behind.

Blade only kake: https://plus.google.com/photos/10292032 ... banner=pwa There is one in Ford's photo folders above. Third row in the katanakake section. Guido: I have been told that the different Tokugawa lines had slight variations in their Tokugawa mon. Is this true? Source was a respected individual, but it may be more Nihonto modern urban legend than fact.

Adam, ___Could be. I've considered that before. Answer is I don't know. I don't know the answer. Have grown daikons, but not clove. Hence my bias is to see them as Daikons, but it may be my western eyes seeing what I want to see. If you triangulate Atlanta, Huntsville, and Chattanooga- that approximates where I grew up. Not quite the mountains, but enough so that I've heard every iteration of Deliverance joke possible. Doesn't help I was large into archery and bow hunting. I was down to Callaway Gardens often enough. Not far from Columbus. I miss the Azalea hills and lake there. Without the Georgia climate and red clay, azaleas in the other parts of the USA bloom and burst too fast. Also, something about Georgia clay and climate has the cherry blossoms last much much longer. Tree in our front yard would last forever, or until we could no longer sufficiently deter the Japanese beetles. Sencha low level buzz is the same as southern unsweetened Tea. Add the sugar the way some southern women do, and that... well... that is a different chapter. Should get back to James' sencha, which I agree with using the loose leaves. I don't know about having it with Marmite like he does. Seems plain crazy to me, and I can't figure out what a southern equivalent might be.

Guido, Thanks. I wasn't sure. It is very rare that I would do this given how Yen/USD adjusted expense of shinsa has climbed. With fittings more so than swords, is usually Hozon or Juyo. Toku Hozon for fittings is usually just extravagance, but some pieces deserve the distinction and the jump from Tokubetsu Kicho papers is within financial sanity.

Even if not by Yoshida, the painter was no hack. Bamboo is one of the easier things to do, but the artist had a decent sense of 'what to do when' and chiaroscuro. Paper is decent. I would not have dated it to Edo period. I know less about the silk hanger work. Instinct is that it came a bit later, so time from painting to mounting may have been a bit? I like. Will be curious about the translation. New Year! Must begin Japanese lessons soon.

Adam L. Guido strikes first. See: http://www.bushidojapaneseswords.com/nbthkshinsa.htm Bottom of page. Guido: If you have something with old green papers, you can submit to Tokubetsu Hozon directly.... No? I have a tsuba with old green papers that probably deserves Toku Hozon, and would like to confirm I can submit it directly to TH if Customs doesn't stop it again. ________________________________________ Toronto Newbie: As everyone said, talk to Barry Hennick. Also maybe talk to Darcy too, if he has the time. Between those two, you should be very well advised.

Well, better than the tsuba is this: http://www.choshuya.co.jp/sale/gj/1112_ ... shirae.htm I don't know or doubt the signature on the fuchi given the big name. Otherwise, price is not cheap- but much more affordable than what other Japanese shops ask for good koshirae now. I confess to being tempted by this koshirae.

Brian, I certainly agree in that regard. Spent better part of three years doing early shift work: rooftop construction & at University. Tea is more an even lift, but nothing can get you up like that warm grab and go 2x strength coffee on a cold morning. Peter, White lightning? I assume you mean Miami Snow? Most everywhere I was prior to getting that scholarship to be a Japan exchange student, the people were too cash strapped for (cocaine?), if it was even available. I don't know if I have ever seen cocaine outside of a movie or science film. Never even saw it in South America when the wife worked down there. No.... Japanese Ice Coffee is a dangerous thing. Perhaps even more dangerous than southern chuggers of that Orange Pekoe tea blend drank there. Does wash down pulled pork very well..... but you spend the rest of the day driving 90 when the speed limit says 70.... and being irritated that everything moves slower than you do. There is a reason UPS is based out of Atlanta and FedEx out of Memphis.

This thread should be revived. I have grown rather fond of sencha myself. The concept of tea wasn't foreign to me, since being raised in a southern location it is the fuel of choice. Many of you won't appreciate what I am talking about, as it is one of those things known about those living in certain southern states in the USA... but not understood until you have lived there and seen that if you cut someone from north Georgia, Tenn., Alabama, or Carolinas.... they are half as likely to bleed southern tea mix as they are anything remotely red... The irony is that I had never had coffee until Japan. Mistaking ice coffee for watered down chocolate milk one day as a teenager.... I had an interesting day after about 2 full glasses. Flight of the bumble-bee buzz buzz. Shi-shi: Shi-shi are a mythology I don't know past a certain level. I am afraid I would probably make a mess mixing what I know of them with other Asian Mountain Dog related lore. I have often seen them rendered with Peonies (supposedly King of Flowers) and Daikons. As John said, read any book on Japanese patinas and you will have a profound respect for Daikons. Read enough Korean cookbooks, and that respect will only grow. Incredibly useful. Many years ago I did pick up this nice tsuba with Shi-Shi, Peonies, Flaming Jewels (Treasure) and what I assume are Daikons.

As an experiment, I tried to find a Tokubetsu Hozon sword with koshirae that was without sizable flaw in either the blade or koshirae. ______I looked at 30 swords in Japan with Tokubetsu Hozon = True ______If True, then there was always a flaw in the blade, the length of the blade (sold as katana, but long wakizashi length...), or expensive flaws in the koshirae. Unless you negotiate strongly, it is unlikely now that you will find a Tokubetsu Hozon blade with real koshirae that is < $10,000 in Japan. There are a few that are borderline. There are some good Hozon swords with koshirae for < $10,000. Price of Tokubetsu Hozon sword is largely because Japanese Yen is +50% in value the past decade. Japanese Yen up = US dollar down. I agree with Brian that probably San Fran (August) or Tampa (February) Sword Show are best place to buy a Japanese sword.... and take a vacation too. Same sword in USA is about 25% to 35% discount to near identical sword in Japan. But new collectors often think they must by sword from Japan.

Oops. Kunisane or Kunizane Thank you Moriyama-san. I took a guess, but book says this is 10 stroke 'sane' (zane). I think Brian and I confused it with the similar (to our poor eyes) 9 stroke 'sada'. I have no additional information about this smith in my sword books.

Shooting from the hip: Kunisada. late 17th or 18th century?

Unless his plans got torpedoed, he was moving to Florida. He announced this last fall, but not sure when he moves.

Actually, NihontoAntiques moved to Florida. Yes/No? Or is in the process of joining us in the sunshine and beach state. I so take the beach for granted now that I miss snow and was excited to get snowfall in Dublin last Christmas 2010. Made the Cuban cigars all that much more enjoyable while walking around. Cost of my tsuka alone a few years ago cost $800. West Coast work. $1200 doesn't seem out of whack to me at all if you are getting a black lacquer saya with it. Shirasaya was running $300+ a few years ago.