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Hi, Cello, looking at this image made me slide futher and further back on my chair, hoping it might get sharper By the way,I see no Kuni in the mei. A better photo would make an ID easier. Regards, Martin

Hi, Folks! Here is another extraction from Grey´s monumental JSL Index for those interested: "Nihonto Jiten" by Dr. Tokuno This is an inexpensive and helpful alternative for the Toko Taikan. It does not carry as many oshigata, but you do not need a microscope to read them! To those fellow members who contacted me on the previous indices, I`ll send new ones automatically. Anybody else interested, feel free to send me a mail. It´s in the memberlist. , Martin

This is more than just odd, Brian. He knew the kanji beforehand and played an imbecile, God knows why. This is selling the board members for silly.

Strictly speaking, a blade with machi okuri is not ubu. The jiri seems untouched though and the sword retains its beautiful original sugata. As blades of this age are usually o-suriage, I think in this case the machi okuri does not lessen the value considerably. If better pictures are at hand I would check the ha thoroughly. If it is still completely there, I would go for a Juyo Token paper. It will take longer and cost a bit more, but would be worth the effort. Regards,

Thank you, Brian. Its nice to have credit in these dark times!

I admire any expert who can tell from these pics, wether its a nihonto at all!

Thanks, Raymond, didn´t recognize it.

Nice first buy, Eric. Would be interesting to see the nakago and a better pic of the paper. I see " A Dai To" instead of the usual "A Katana". From what size on do they say that in the papers? Does anybody know? Martin

Hi, all! I have followed Grey Doffins suggestion and extracted separate indices for a few Japanese sword books. Any member interested can pm me and i´ll mail the package as a .pdf file. These are presently available: Shinto Taikan Shinshinto Taikan Nihonto Zuikan Shinto Hen Zuikan Tomei Soran Nihon Koto Meisaku Shu(Jukken) Shinto Shu Katana No Gimei Osafune Choshi Token Hen ...more to follow Dirk (Zanshin) has extracted a Bizen Den Taikan Index which he posted on this board a while ago. Also Richard Stein has a few useful indices on his site. Best Martin

I know, Martin, I am sorry and it is , too, but I coudn´t help it. Martin

"The behind of a sheep" - that was a good one! What puzzles me is the etching of the Fudo(?). Where is it located? If it is on the blade, I miss the shinogi. Is it hirazukuri? Best, Martin

Mr. Tsuruta stated it already in his description. If you read it thoroughly, he says there is no difference in the mei, only in the quality of the 2 swords! You misunderstood the term "Bisiyu" which is how some Japanese translate Bishu. So the answer to your question is no. There is no way to determine the quality of the blade from just the signature. This is always a secondary feature. If a blade is a piece of junk, I do not even bother to remove the tsuka! There is one rather simple advice: What you get is what you see. An attractive Bizen Sukesada blade, well polished with little or no faults costs good money. If you spend only little money for a "lesser" blade, why worry about the style of the mei? Best Martin

Hi, JP! As John said, shinsakuto, new swords, are way beyond the mentioned budget. Gendaito, modern swords, is a term we use for wartime blades, forged traditionally. These are within your budget and you might find one which is even well balanced. You might even find one that is already mounted in buke zukuri style by another iaido practitioner. The main problem is the length(nagasa). Usually we prefer blades around 73 to 78cm for Iaido training, while the former military blades usually are 62 to 67cm. Regards, Martin

Anthony, we have e few problems here. 1. The overall pic of your Kicho paper in the sellers album is so tiny that it is almost impossible to recognize the scribble of the appraiser in detail! 2. The blow up pix show only parts of the paper. 3. On the small pic I cannot even see if the saidan mei is in the paper at all! 4. On the nakago even with the missing gold inlay the kanjis "mon" and "haru" can be recognized. The "hachi" and the "shige" I cannot see. This can have several reasons: I am unable to translate it, the cutter sometimes used other types of kanji, my books are wrong and most of all, the world is not always perfect! So, if you spent this much money, why don´t you take the time to google the sword tester lists, buy a set of Fukunaga´s Kubikiri Asaemon books, sit down for a few hours and study the signatures and the oshigata? You will know much more after this! Probably others on the bord know more about other literature on this topic. Best, Martin

Hi, all! I closely followed this interesting discussion during which I learned a few things! Taking heads on the battlefield was obviously common practice. What seems clear to me now: A samurai did not hack away at a slain opponent with one of his precious battle swords. This was probably done by a footsoldier(commoner) and he must have used whatever shortsword he carried into battle. This could not have been a special purpose blade of nata design. On the other hand I am pretty sure such "head knives" in various shapes, also in a modified nata design, were widely used in prisons and on execution grounds. My grandfather brought back such a blade from Japan around 1912. Unfortunately he died in WWII. According to my father, it was sold to him as a decapitating tool, but I have seen a picture and I am pretty sure this one was a gardening tool. Still, the many reports of these reverse blades being headknives must contain a grain of truth!! What I was always wondering about: Was the practice of taking heads in battle an act of taking trophies or was it a kind of grisly afterbattle statistics to ascertain who was killed and who got away?

Don`t get a heart attack, Anthony, it is not that bad! I have seen a lot of beginners, also on this board, do worse with a sword! In Euro it is 4200,- + import and I seriously doubt that any dealer in France, Germany or Sweden sells a papered wakizashi with a tameshi mei(which is legit imho) and regardless which attribution, for much less than that. Unfortunately I just lost a bidding contest here: http://www.bidders.co.jp/item/bid/161693350 I hope for his sake it was nobody from this board!

Hm, there is still hope - the sellers description might be wrong. When I look at the nakago, the reading could be Ogawa Hachiemon Shigeharu (大川八右衛門重治). Would make more sense as he worked until Kanbun! Regards, Martin

Anthony, as far as I read the ebay description, the sword tester of this blade is Ogawa Hachiemon Nagatsugu(大川八右衛門長次). According to Guido´s list this guy worked between 1615 and 1624! Regards, Martin

Thanks a lot Grey and Jean! So it is clear that the 2 colours are normal, just my Shinto set is probably one of the older editions! I do not necessarily need the index for checking on on a smith, but from the collectors point of view I would love to have the integrated index in both volumes! Good thing is that the shinto books are easier to come by. The koto volumes are presently not available, not even in Japan. Grey, I already did some extractions with the help of your index on quite a few books! You explained the procedure earlier and it worked quite well, even though it is a boring work, as far as the bigger volumes are concerned. Took me a few weeks! I can scan or potograph the pages in the Zuikans koto volume. If somebody could do the same with his shinto volume without doing damage to the spine, I would be most grateful! These scans should be sufficient for reference work. If nobody extracted the names from Grey´s index yet, I can do it, but it will take a while. Grey´s idea of different people working on different books is great. We could share the effort and could swap the results! Presently I am working on Shinshinto Taikan by Iimura. Regards, Martin

Hi, folks, I need advice on the 2 volume book set of " Nihonto Zuikan" by Kataoka. My reference set is 2-coloured: The koto hen is green with a beautiful romaji index and the names of the smiths in romaji on each page. The shinto hen is blue without romaji index! 1. Is this the way they come or are they maybe mismatched? 2. Does any board member know if there is a shinto hen with romaji index? Grateful for any clue, Martin

Hi, Mark the signature of the Sukesada looks o.k., of what little of the blade can be seen, it looks o.k. too. As you already realized, this standard signature cannot be attributed to a individual among the many Sukesadas. By the way, the correct translation is Bishu Osafune Sukesada saku, there is no ju in it! There is 1 Sanjo Munechika (Shinshinto medium rated) dated 1804 which I could see at first glance. Apparently you do not have literature. So buy a set of Hawleys and work your way up to some good oshigata books which will help you to read the kanji correctly. Regards,

forgot the pictures!

Here they are! Unfortunately old bad pictures and no details visible. Both blades unsigned but hozon papered. Mokume - masame hada and gunome hamon like on you sword are quite typical!

There are several definitions of the word "den" and all of them mentioned here are correct. This article by R. Benson had been cited here a couple of times. Imho the most essential statement by Tanobe San "He stated that he didn’t think that was the same thinking in Japan but conceded that the value might be ever so slightly lower", is usually overread. The rest of Tanobe San´s very very polite and careful try to explain the meaning of "den" to a westerner unfortunately leads to a lot of wishful thinking of a lot of collectors who own a blade with a "den" attribution. The sad fact is that a blade with a "den" attribution has less value than a comparable blade wth a direct attribution to the individual smith . Even if such a blade might have interesting and unusual features not often seen wth this smith it might be of interest to some collectors but will not increase the market value! Most collectors are conservative and they will prefer a Kanemoto with sanbonsugi or a Tadahiro with suguha to other hamon variations! I had 2 Mito Sukemitsu katana a while ago. When I find the pictures, I will post them. Regards,

Sad to hear this. I did not know him personally, but I am enjoying his book which is a great help. My regrets to his family.