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Hi again guys, I'm not there as much as I would want to, but Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you for the kind words and such warm comments. To be honest, i think i even shed a few tears reading your posts. It really feels good to know and be friends with guys like you. We are a community and more, a family! I can't express how much reading you was comforting, so again, thank you deeply. I still haven't replied all the messages of support I have received and i apologize again for that, but rest assured I will. Last two weeks have been busy at work with the Covid situation and we keep having meetings on how to best manage the situation. Thank you again, I love you guys! JP

Hi my dear friends, First of all, I want to express my most sincere wishes and a Happy New Year to you all and your families. I know this should be in another section so Brian, please feel free to move it if you feel like it, but I posted it here because some members have contacted me and I want to reach most of them. Not sure they all go to the Izakaya. Then I guess I owe you guys an explanation and an apology for my silence those past few months. I’ve wanted to do that for quite some time but it isn’t always easy to expose your issues in front of everyone, and I know some of you may find those issues triffle or first world problems. Anyway, here’s what has happened to me since my absence. First of all, let me tell you that I’m an animal lover… maybe a little too much ! For years, I have been doing the job of a shelter for distressed cats without help or financing. At some point, I had more than 30 cats. Costly and tiring. That’s roughly three hours of work in addition to my full time job everyday. Those animals I recover are usually starving, some of them sick, all of them scared by very difficult beginnings. I’m used to have animals that don’t live long because of that. I loose some every year. Everytime, its a tragedy for me but I’ve developped some endurance to it. This year was special. I lost ten of them in a row over the space of two months. Causes of death were different but I think that the last straw was probably the last one who was litteraly and voluntarily crushed to pulp by a car and the driver purposefully drove over him with both wheels. I know it as I saw it happen. I guess it taxed me a lot and I entered some kind of a breakdown. I was starting to recover, in September, when the secong blow came. Now, here’s the second part of my life. Ten years ago, my elderly mother suffered a stroke that left her with paralysis on her left side. My father had a hard life working in construction and carrying loads so his back is ruined and he has to use a walker. Being an only child, I took them both in and care for them. Not a light job either, but one I feel I have a duty to accomplish. So, come September, my father has to be hospitalized because he had fallen in the middle of the night. His blood count was well below normal. Diagnosis : Mielodisplastic syndrome. To sum up, a bone marrow cancer that will turn into fatal leukemla in generally something like two years. That was the fatal and final blow to me. Now it’s been three months since that diagnosis and I am starting to digest it and recover. My father is responding to treatment and so far, he is neither better nor worse. There you have it ! All tis has made me depressed and apathetic, with no real interest for anything and some sort of self pitying. So I am sorry and apologize to all those who’ve contacted me and to whom I haven’t replied, I will reply to each and everyone of you. Please just give me some time as things have accumulated and I have some catching up to do. Know that I am feeling better and will do my best to stay around. Best wishes to you all, JP

Wow, Bruce! Is this the book Ohmura published about Mantetsu? We’re you able to make new discoveries or have some parts translated?

I second that! Cold steel ,ale beasts, their sword may not look like the real deal but they cut like hot wire in butter. And they are sturdy!

Yes, a very bad repro, unfortunately. Chinese made most probably.

I also have a 98 with a central chuso.

Just found that thread. Mark, I would like to salute your courage, abnegation and wish you a speedy recovery. Incredible what you went through. One day at my school, one guy, about 17 was yelling in the hall the name of another guy, trying to find in which classroom the other one was. I was in the middle of a lesson but went out to see what the fuss was all about. The yelling guy was one of our former students that had been expelled for drug trafficking. The other guy used to be one of his friends and there was a different about a girl between them. The yelling guy said he’d come to kill the other. He was in some kind of berserk move and had a knife. I talked to him and cornered him against a wall talking to him and trying to diffuse his anger. I finally did and after a while, other people from the school management arrived and the guy finally gave up and realized how far he was gone. Anyway, I’ve always been wondering what had made me do it, knowing he had a knife and was so mad he could have used it. I guess that knowing me and knowing he could trust me made things go smoothly but it could have been bad that day. So kudos for what you’ve done. Sometimes we act before we think but you saved someone that day. I hope you recover swiftly.

I think it's real with swapped out parts. Fuchi and tsuba are wrong and the absence of the screw is probably because they couldn't replace it after the swap as the thckness was different.

yes, Nanbokucho trhen, as for the school, i have no idea but id say Mino in general.

oh yeah! i see it now, thanks Brian!

rounded i guess...

!actually, i was hesitating. the lack of tapering could have been Muromachi but the lenth made me think about Muromachi. So with the other details pointing towards Muramasa, I said Muromachi but since i suck at this kind of exercize, i knew from the start i was wrong!

Muramasa? Not that it looks like a typical one, but masame near the Hamon plus mirror image kind of conveys the feeling. That and what I think is a late Muromachi sugata, extended chu kissaki, thin kasane . The deliberate mirror tobiyaki... the almost jizo boshi... however, looking at the shape of the Hamon without the other details, I don’t think I would have said Muramasa.

I trust you gentlemen it’s a kurikata, but if so, due to the weird shape, how was it attached to the saya?

Ordered!