Nihontocollector752

Not sure it is viable to kantei this in this polish but looks more Yamato or sub mainline Yamato rather than Aoe or Horikawa, even the sugata is a bit off for Aoe or Horikawa. But, as said, there are exceptions to every rule.

And this is a great way for Aoi to ruin their business. Letting everyone know they do things the absolutely wrong way.

Easily going to pass juyo

Wise is good too 👍

Xe.com is ok but the charges can be gnarly, check rates before sending. However with the strength of the greenback now its a good time. Western Union is convenient Paypal, depending on the method cash/credit

True Kiyomaro in every way, amazing and congratulations!

Masame on the shinogi and itame/mokume in the ji, is it an Edo (shinto or shinshinto blade?)

You have the beginning of a mei which states Bitchu so points to Aoe, is it a true mei remains to be verified with shinsa. It is signed on the katana side so could be Aoe as they did that even when making tachi. The sugata is Nanbokucho so could be Chu-Aoe. I think the jigane is promising but with Aoe you'll want chirimen with certain areas popping itame and some mokume very subtle with activity in the hamon also and as mentioned loads of nie like stardust. Looks like a nice sword, hope to see pics after polish and results after shinsa, fun one to follow

Is this on a polished blade? The crinkle or crepe style hada are found on very high quality Aoe blades and known as Chirimen hada but its very hard to see exactly what this is from a single picture and that lighting angle, more pics please

Well sorry, it looks like plant from a dealer to hype up marketing, just a thought

Oh wow, so this is a marketing plan 👏

https://yuhindo.com/sasayama-tokuoki-fuchigashira/ I must be remiss, you are the buyer of this, interesting?

Yes but kenjutsu involves tameshigiri and some 7th+ Dan in Japan use older swords, not Nanbokucho, but still.

That is a very broad assumption that 99% of the members here are not practical users of iaito or study kenjutsu....

@YOJIMBO wow this guy is fighting in the Kamakura fields 🙄

I think we should examine a few facts: @Barrett Hiebert you initially intended to use a Nanbokucho blade for practice and yet claim that we on the board are being oppressive and elitist? I can't imagine anything more elitist than an individual with no formal training and a delusional sense of martial way who intendends to use a traditional sword for their amature purposes. That is the epitomy of elitism, for you to assume by some measure that you sit on the same platform as the warrior the Nanbokucho sword was made for centuries ago, a student of war who lived by a philosophy not many in the modern martial world can comprehend. It is an insult to the tradition and the generations of care takers that have helped such items exist till today, only to come into your hands for a swift end. Then your narcissism extends to switching your stance to the Gassan and finally a Heisei blade until there is some form of acceptance that fills the void in your ego and fundamentally your shoes. I do not presume that there is much depth to your character after this series of events. You are simply a person who is lucky enough to claim to purchase highly valuble antiquity in order to inflate and reinforce your ego and share that with people you know will conflict with your intentions in an effort to validate practices you know are wrong. Hence, Nanbokucho to Edo to modern. I will not blink if the next thread you post is on foreign made swords for practical use. "Is this okay for cutting, Hanwei sword?" Everyone agrees, and the void is filled till you need another fix and find a forum where "surely one person will agree with me (that is the voice in your head) Everyone here has tried tirelessly and patiently to point out your errors, but as i said previously, people like you live in delusional grandeur and it is pointless to keep asking you to empty your glass just a little so it can be filled with fresh water rather than the stagnated pool it currently is.

I think it's pointless trying to convince someone like @Barrett Hiebert that he should or should not do something. We should wish him well and since his glass is full we should probably let him learn in his own way. At the end i also feel he enjoys provoking the collecting and martial arts community to get satisfaction from disarray, this is also known as narcissistic tendency. These people exist everywhere and we cannot change them.

@Barrett Hiebert The direct answer is yes. If you have the height for this blade, as it is 80cm on the nagasa it was made for someone over 6ft 2 inches in height, but judging from a previous thread i think you mentioned your height is well under 6ft?

So the issue here is that we are discussing a relatively modern sword, but trying to bucket it into a traditional classification, like Bizen, etc. The problem with that is simply the more modern sword smiths would not just adhere to traditional forging but add in their own interpretation or experiments. Is it Jizo based boshi, yes in my opinion, but what was the smiths intention, we will never know. Perhaps delving more into his training, what were his traditional focusus, Bizen, Soshu? Then if his intention here was something new?

Could be a form of Jizo boshi Try for some light reading on the Markus Sesko site, he covers all the basics and then some. https://markussesko.com/2015/06/10/kantei-3-hamon-boshi-3/ After a polish it might lean more to a Mishina boshi?

I might be really wrong here but this looks more like a katana thatbwas broken and formed into a Tanto. I would like to see what Tanto collectors say on this one....

Nice sword! Try for NBTHK

The most valuble Daisho are papered together such as this example: http://www.sanmei.com/contents/media/H1461_2__S2228_PUP_E.html So if you have confirmed swords produced as a couple and koshirae produced as a couple then you know it is a "true" Daisho. But, regardless if the koshirae matches then in general we accept any combination as a diasho. Ladder theory

Ah this topic of swords as an investment is a great starter to discuss where the market is going and in general how to establish what makes a sword a valid opportunity for investment. The yuhindo.com site actually has so many great posts that when put together will establish a pathway to what a collector should be looking for in an investment grade sword. I do not agree with the 5% appreciation rate as above because you would have to have entered the SP at the right time to realise these gains and this is not always possible. On swords first I have been told that when it comes to swords we must, like any other investment, know what we are investing in. There are very lucky individuals who have come across, either by luck or by knowledge, specific pieces taht have gained immense value. Examples on the NMB like the Kiyomaro or recently found Norishige. These things happen and that makes them equivalent of investing a small amount in a startup that rises to unknown heights and the exit is grand, very rare indeed. To invest in swords, following the yuhindo.com articles would mean: - knowing what is the acceptable foundation for a puchase across a given timeline. Like mumei in koto is generally accepted by collectors so you would always have a market. Now what that market capacity is depends on the quality, condition, school, size, and provenance amoungst other aspects. Take a smith as an example for focus: Reference http://www.sho-shin.com/ikkanshi-tadatsuna.html Ikkanshi Tadatsuna is a smith that gets thrown around so often as a big name. This happens with later smiths like shinshinto Kiyomaro, smiths in his same timeline of Shinto like Sukahiro or Yasatsugu, etc. I will not touch koto because i know little of Koto and the subject there is so vast it would be like trying to discuss a commodity like gold as an investment. Tadatsuna, like many smiths made swords in many styles but if you want to look at an investment piece then you need to look at certain criteria that make it an art investment or an investment for the aesthetics a smith is known for. Like any artist, Monet for example, they have a style and a criteria that sets them apart as a master in their own right. For Tadatsuna it is the combination of his flamboyant hamon encompasing Choji coupled with a tight and discerning jigane to exemplify his main proposition of Horimono executed in perfection by the smith himself. So if you were to find a sword by Tadatsuna without these figures then it is nice but not investment grade. The reason i touch on the Tadatsuna is because his most wonderful and investable swords are Wakizashi, like so: https://iidakoendo.com/5592/ To place this in a modern and affordable perspective. There exist masters of the modern age in swords. There are people on the NMB with knowledge of modern and WW2 smiths that dominate the collecatble categories and are still affordable. Because, like any art, we want to buy the next rising star, Monet is up in heaven and shining like Tadatsuna. For example buying exclusive and very well known examples of WW2 or pieces from the Gassan schools of Meiji which will reach their 100 year age barrier soon and eventually fall into a cycle of mass apperciation in pricing is going to happen. Especially for the still reasonably affordable WW2 pieces, i myself have been buying in that region recently. But, you need to keep it Archetypal, it needs the originality and quality associated to be viable as an investment. Koto is Koto and far from many to be an investment. To give you an example or an anecdote, koto is like going to JP Morgan private wealth after having built an emipre in disposable income and giving them $X and saying manage this for me and give me 5% a year guaranteed because i am already ok to take the risk and i am looking for wealth preservation with a small upside, rather than investment with a bigger potential. More recent smiths that will break thei 100 year mark and paper with the NBTHK eventually to Juyo ( they will and it it will eventually happen for younger blades, eventually) are like investing in Tesla at the beginning and seeing a greater upside. But, you need to do the work, the analysis and the hard work of hunting the right ones. Market segmentation For Monet the market is the global rich, like Koto, the global rich know Masamune, Bizen, Norishige, etc. They just do and they have fancy advisory that tells them to buy here and there. But the biggest market opportunities for Koto still remain Asia and primarily Japan. The Japanese know what they are buying and they will place preference on what they aquire. Chancese are that the forigners that have been buying big Koto have an avenue in which to sell, they are prepared. There is no such constraint for newer smiths, you can spread the word and educate on newer smiths that are affordable without running into the pain of explaining that Masamune is the the great smith to own ..." if you have a million dollars to drop" Everything is subjective to analysis, hard work and patience. Look for investment grade with the right parameters and as long as you are willing to wait you will reap a return. However, if you invest 25k USD in the right places today with good advice, you will most likely end up with far more income in 20 years than investing in a sword. Fact of life i am afraid. This is our curse as collectors, we need some justification for our burning need to claim a piece of the past.

Take all comments with a neutral view. There is the possibility of having a window on the sword polished to reveal the exact nature of the hamon and hada to confirm what you see. The fact you describe masame in this blade could also point to a Nanbokucho Yamato sword but you also describe 2 to 3 different characters of jigane which is characteristic of later period (measuments taken to account). If you want a window polished to see it clearly then talk to your local society or wait till it's the right time to send it to Japan (which your society or club will also be able to assist you with, i think) Also, better pictures will be a big help if you want to discuss this here further. Plenty of threads on how to get that result exist on the forum.