Kevin

A very wide angle lens and a low angle of incidence light source? I'm still trying to perfect ordinary pictures of swords. :-) Getting there slowly. :-) Kevin

- John Ruskin I used to live in what was his family's back garden. :-) Kevin

Reminds me of an old armourer I knew 20-25 years back. He made a lot of plate armour - definitely wearable, following actual historic designs and made using old manual techniques. Anyway, I dropped in to see him one day and go for a drink. I found him highly amused. A little earlier in the week he'd attended an auction and was a bit startled to recognise one of his sets of plate armour. It was being sold as the real McCoy. He didn't draw the auctioneer's attention to the fact, and it went for quite a large sum of money. The whole episode amused him, though he did say that he wished that he had been paid half the money it finally went for to make it in the first place. Mind you, he was also rather chuffed that his workmanship was good enough to fool the resident experts. :-) Kevin

I emailed the seller, since I know him, and that's pretty much what he said. The sword has a registration card. If the stamp isn't noticed (dirt, rust, it is the end of the day, somebody is tired and doesn't notice etc etc), it gets a registration card. If it has a registration card, it is legal. Kevin

Well, finally solved it. It's a Gifu or Chimata stamp. Looks like a sho stamp, but much smaller, which makes it difficult to read. Thanks to Bruno, John Stuart and George Trotter for their research and the info. :-D Kevin

I'd always understood that the sho stamp was discontinued in 1941-very early 1942. Which makes a shingunto signed by Kanetatsu (Tatsuo Kanemura) I picked up interesting. On the mei side of the nakago it has a sho stamp. However, on the other it has a very small Seki stamp (small enough to need a magnifying glass) and an inscription that dates it to Showa 20 nen 4 Gatsu i.e April 1945. Anyone else run across sho stamps later than 1941/42? Kevin

Well, nodachi were used in military campaigns and their blades were about 4 feet long. If you mastered it, it was a valuable weapon in the field. Folks who did this for a living were also likely to be remarkably fit, and quite capable of handling large blades. One might, by comparison, note that, in Europe, the commander of the garrison during the Siege of Malta in 1565 , Jean de la Valette, wore plate armour for the entire duration of the siege, even during sleep, even at the height of the Maltese summer. He was 80 at the time. These were fit, strong folk who had been doing this all their lives, and were thus likely to be considerably fitter than a lot of modern martial artists. Carrying and use in military campaigns weren't going to be a problem. I don't think a 30" katana would therefore really present much of a problem for carrying and use to someone who had been training hardfor several years. Come to that, as I recall one of Musashi's opponents was known for using an ovesize sword. I must admit to having tried some katana with 29-30" nagasa. They weren't a problem to use, though personally I prefer a 26" blade or even a wakizashi. The ninth wave was the limit of the land. If you banished someone, you sent them past the ninth wave. Their fate was thus in the hands of the gods or God, depending on your viewpoint. Ah, mine's a little more complex, though one branch of the family appears in history, sometimes exhibiting spectacular chutzpah in tweaking the tail of the English authorities and getting away with it. :-) Kevin

An interesting phrase - of Irish origin and relating to the Brehon Laws. Kevin

Historically there were much longer blades, the most obvious example being nodachi. However, as I recall, there was a law under the Tokugawas restricting the maximum length of blades so 'overlong' blades were cut down. However, to judge from swords I've seen, longer blades became a bit more common just before the Meiji restoration. BTW Elizabeth I passed a similar law restricting blade lengths. Now I am aware that there is a general rule of thumb along the lines that the taller the swordsman, the longer the sword should be. Whether this is applied or not depends upon the strictures of the school, the style used and the preference of the swordsman. Nevertheless, there appears to be a demand amongst Western students for slightly longer swords - 28-30". I gather that there's also something of a demand amongst those students of the sword who can afford it for getting a shinsakuto. As for weight - there's plenty of exercises aimed at beefing up the appropriate muscles. Weight itself isn't actually a problem - its balance that matters. It is, for example, quite possible to handle a massive sword like a medieval claidh mor very quickly as long as it is balanced right and the user has the right technique. Kevin

That was my thought as well. Though why someone should try and patinate the nakago is beyond me. Trying to pass it off as shinshinto in the hope of extra wedgie? Or some nitwit who just thought that the nakago would look nicer patinated? I've run across folks doing unlikelier things than the second idea. Kevin

That is hardly misdescribed. All that something of the level of a microscope or a hell of a macro lens has revealed are wear marks, presumably from cutting, rather than nicks, which are visible to the naked eye. Kevin

I've got an idea of a possible approach - a few years of having worked in a press office - but it will have to gestate overnight cos I'm fighting a bug off. Kevin

Don't forget to make it very public. No organisation likes to be made to look a fool in public. Kevin

There's a Swedish customer of mine who hadn't heard about the restrictions (till today) and is now hopping mad over this. He's going to research the issue himself and if it comes out as expected, he's going to make waves. Want me to put him in touch with you, Amon? Incidentally, I could go through my Swedish customers and contact them about this, but I think it is more efficient to put a little notice on my website for the benefit of Swedish customers and flag up this thread. I'll do that asap - however, right now I'm fighting off a bug, so I need sleep and strange potions. :-/ Kevin

I phoned them a couple of years ago and had a categoric refusal. OTOH, they have no problems delivering swords picked up in the US. You can try Fedex, but I've long since gone to an international shipping firm specialising in fine arts. Kevin

In the UK Fedex or UPS won't carry swords on the grounds that they are weapons. Both companies scan all exports to see if there's anything in there that shouldn't be. If there is, they'll send it straight back to the despatcher, which is why I no longer use either. In fact you won't be able to get a sword carried by the UK branch of either firm. UPS in Japan won't apparently carry them either. I would imagine that the Swedish post office is using the same technology. It is fairly ubiquitous, and you just put things on a conveyor belt, like at the airport. If such technology wasn't available, the Swedish post office would not have the resources to check every parcel, so they'd be unable to impose a blanket ban on items. I'd imagine that they argued for introducing such technology for 'security reasons' to fight 'terrorism'. Lots of things got introduced that way. Also makes money for the firms that make the equipment. Kevin

I'vr been having a chat with a Swedish customer. It appears that airmail from Japan is reaching him faster than airmail from the UK. In fact it is frequently taking as long for an airmail packet to reach Swedish customers as it does for one to reach New Caledonia in the Pacific. We can get post to Bulgaria and Moscow faster. It is not just sword items either - my partner finds that haberdashery items sent to Sweden take forever to be deliverd. Other on-line sellers have their own similar stories. Now Japanese items have a Customs form. The Swedish post office can see what is inside. Mail from the EU doesn't need a Customs form, so they've no idea what's inside. My guess is that they are running the whole lot through a scanning machine to see if there's anything inside of which they disapprove. Result - backlog. Kevin

Worth while sueing them for the value of the sword? Kevin

Hmm! Not quite. Poison Ivy isn't used at any stage in making urushi, which isn't surprising, given that Poison Ivy isn't native to Japan. Urushi is made from Toxicodendron vernicifluum, which is native to Japan, not Toxicodendron radicans (Poison Ivy). That said, the oil of Poison Ivy and the sap of Toxicodendron vernicifluum both contain urushiols, and urushiols cause an allergic reaction in lots of people. OTOH, some people just don't react to urushiols. Raw urushi can cause bad rashes - technically, it is a form of contact dermatitis. However, when urushi dries the urushiols polymerise by reacting with moisture in the air. It is a chemical reaction that consumes the urushiols that cause the allergic reaction. Consequently, once hardened, urushi is very unlikely to cause any allergic reactions, although it is theoretically possible since there might be a trace of unreacted urushiol in the lacquer. Mind you, this is possibly extremely unlikely with old urushi, since it will have had several centuries to polymerise any remaining traces. It would still be an idea to use a facemask. It's not a brilliant idea to go round inhaling fine dusts. Kevin

They did - it's called nihontoden.com. No one wants to use it, even though it is now free. I considered doing some time ago and looked at the software to do it. However, Henry announced that he was starting nihontoden.com, so I thought that I'd wait and see how it did. After all, it would require me investing money in the project that could be used elsewhere. To judge from Henry's experience, there is obviously no demand for an auction site for nihonto other than Ebay. Kevin

Have updated the info on my page. 2011 will definitely be able to give any help needed with imports. Kevin

Ah, that's OK. :-) Kevin

Thanks Brian. Not that I'm aware of - but then I wouldn't know if folks assumed that the name Masamune must, of necessity, indicate a scam. :-) Wouldn't mind selling the tanto soon though. :-) There are however bigger hassles if you're a seller. There's the damned scammers, frauds and fakes that get everyone tarred with the same brush. However, the people who do annoy me on Ebay are the ones who message you only to insult you whilst telling you that they have no intention of buying the item in question. I mean - why? What is the point? I had a couple recently. My response to the last one was along the lines of "Thank you for your message. Err, what was the point of telling me that you have no intention of buying and that you are looking elsewhere?" Some folks don't believe in courtesy, apparently. Or perhaps they need to build up their egos. Lack of courtesy ticks me off. And then there are the folks who buy but don't pay or respond to any communications. If they said that they had a problem, we could come to an arrangement, if possible. If they made a mistake, then we could reach an agreement to cancel, which would mean that they wouldn't get an unpaid item strike. But sometimes you just get no response to messages, so you have to go through the unpaid item process, and they get a strike. OK, they could have been run over by a bus, but I've no way of knowing. It is not plain sailing, selling. :-/ Getting a good reputation is everything. Fortunately most of the folk I meet are great - but now and then you get the others. Kevin

Just because there was one exceptionally famous smith called Masamune, it doesn't mean that there were no other smiths by the same name. Nor does it mean that every blade signed Masamune purports to be made by the very famous smith of that name. Now it would be, to say the least, highly dubious if the listing said that it was made by the famous Masamune. However, it does not say that. On the contrary, it says that the mei is that of a Sue-Mihara smith of the same name and gives Hawley references for folks to look up. According to Hawley, there were five Sue-Mihara smiths using the name 'Masamune'. I haven't checked to see how many smiths throughout Japanese history have been called Masamune. It is always a good idea to read the write-up rather than jumping to conclusions based on the title. After reading the write-up, go away and do your own research. It is my listing, BTW. Kevin

I've had some of that. My answer is that I'm not going to make a false declaration to the Customs of the country concerned. It will be properly declared, fully insured, trackable, and with the correct harmonised tariff code. After all, Customs would be entitled to ask questions if the waybill says that it is insured for £2k but is only valued for £100. They ain't dumb. Furthermore, if there are potential Customs problems at the other end then there's no point in ignoring this. I'll check it out with the relevant authorities to find the risk-free way of shipping it. In the case of Singapore it took a rather lengthy conversation with the relevant police department before we had an agreement, in black and white, on their requirements. The alternative was the edge being ground off. The relevant email, with a named senior officer, was included for the benefit of Singapore Customs, along with all the required paperwork. In the event, it went through like clockwork; the buyer recieved his sword whole, and without official vandalism. :-) Now most buyers are happy when I explain this to them. However one guy threw his teddybear out of the pram when I told him that I wouldn't make a false declaration. He additionally instructed me to ignore the fact that swords were on the list of prohibited imports for his country. :-/ As it happens, there was a loophole for nihonto, but by the time that I confirmed that (about 2 days after the sale) he wanted his money back because I wouldn't do what he said. "I've done this lots of times" he said, which suggests that he's overdue for getting caught. Worse, some seller is likely to lose their sword, he's likely to reverse his transaction because he hasn't recieved the sword and, with his procedure, the seller is not protected. Anyway, he got his money back and didn't get his sword. Had he shut up for a couple of days and not been such a silly person, he'd have been informed that there were no problems as long as the right paperwork was filled in. It doesn't pay to be impatient. :-) Kevin