rematron

It looks great, Colin! The color differentiation really adds to its appeal. Thanks for sharing the before and after.

Here are some thoughts from Darcy in the link @Brian shared. Another relevant and interesting thread. https://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/22402-gimei-swords/?do=findComment&comment=227379 Here is a bit of what Darcy said: "The problem is always that books are not exhaustive and treating them as a canonical set of signatures "or else it's gimei" doesn't allow you to ever change what you know. Once written the book can't be updated. If science is frozen in time at any point of time, a lot of bad ideas remain with us. The nature of science is that evidence contrary to the theories when introduced, if shown to be true, forces the theories to be discarded or updated. The nature of swords is that when evidence contrary to the theories when introduced, causes the evidence to be destroyed. This is a bad habit. The main problem is that this process is iterative: we discover new swords. If it doesn't match the book, erase it. Keep looking for swords. This guarantees erasing of outliers. But if you got 10 outliers together in one shot and put them down and they all confirm each other, you'd have to update the book. This is the whole problem then, the process of selecting them one at a time and destroying them by pronouncing them as not matching the book."

Alex, Me and some other "You guys" are merely proposing a different way to 'certify'. You and some other people have stated that there is a reason that NBTHK does not certify gimei blades but have not stated the actual reasoning. To answer your question: I would certify that the signature is false or questionable or whatever conclusion me and my panel came to when we looked at the sword and at the same time I/we would give the sword an attribution. DONE. What I want to know is why the NBTHK does things the way it does. There have been some good guesses as to why. There are also responses that are dismissive and blaming the questioners with statements like: "This thread seems very suited to folks that own gimei, looking for a reason for some acceptance. The "everyone's a winner" mentality." Speaking for myself, that is absolutely not my state of mind. I believe that the current social environment of "PC" and "Everyone is Special" is extremely problematic for society. But, in my opinion, that doesn't have anything to do with this thread or the reason I'm asking questions.

What is the reason?

me: “why is this the way it is?” you: “because that’s the way it is.” The thickness of a person’s skin has nothing to do with the acceptance of an “answer” or response such as this.

What are the NBTHK to do? I will tell you: They certify that the mei is false AND they give it an attribution. It IS difficult to understand why a false mei must be removed before they can legitimize the sword. The attitude of “it’s neccessary to remove the mei” is destructive and I doubt very much the NBTHK would recommend such an act yet that is exactly what people are *wink wink* told to do.

Of course, I realize this. The question remains: Why are their rules the way they are? This is a topic for discussion and dismissive statements are not constructive.

Not based on reality? Well the NBTHK might not state officially that gimei swords are unworthy of preservation, but they certainly aren’t helping with their preservation and are at least partly responsible for collectors tampering with many a nakago. So what if the sword does not confirm the mei? - State that in the paper and then treat the sword as mumei and give it an attribution. The NBTHK will still be advocating for the actual sword maker by saying that the mei is a forgery. Then the blade can be papered and respected and preserved on its own merit.

Thanks, Chris. That's interesting. The 'tradition' factor makes sense as much as it can given the Japanese culture, but I fail to see why people are worried about the attributions they make when that's essentially what papering a sword is in general. I seem to remember stories of mumei blades that are given one attribution and later submitted again receiving a different attribution. Wouldn't that also be embarrassing and best avoided? In that case, why allow the papering of mumei swords at all? My point is that papers in general are very knowledgeable and trustworthy opinions but they're all still opinions and thus susceptible to mistakes. So, ultimately the risk of being "caught on record" is already present with the current system.

To possibly help answer my own question (albeit, with a very Western and collector point of veiw): I could see that for buyers who can't read Japanese yet wanting a legitimately signed blade, papered gimei blades could muddy the waters of the nihonto market.

Why do they require the removal of a gimei signature in the first place? I've heard members state that a gimei signature is still part of the history of the blade. Again, why would they even require this approach? My novice mind tells me that people should be leaving the nakago alone always. Why won't the NBTHK merely add the gimei information to the paper?

I think the base question here which hasn't been answered is: Why won't the NBTHK paper a gimei sword? The comments on the paper could state that the signature is gimei and an attribution of the smith who in their opinion was the actual smith can also be given.

Hi Adam. I'm sure some people will pipe in, but I'd recommend searching this sight for "togishi" or "best togishi" or "good togishi" in the meantime. It's all been said before. A lot.

Daniel, I hope you have a great time in Japan! FYI, for people (like me) that use the dark setting for this website, your text is black on black. If you copy and paste your text, try pasting it as "plain text" when given the option. Cheers.

I love that design curled up doggy design.

Nice job, Chris! Looks great!

That waterfall tsuba at the bottom is lovely.

Since the mei is only one aspect of a nihonto, I'd say there is plenty to learn from any blade in decent polish. What activities does it have? How do they look in hand compared to photos online or in books? How do the parts work with each other to keep the sword together? What are the parts shaped like? What are they called? I think it's important to keep in mind that there are different levels of experience in collecting and studying nihonto. Even a gimei blade if carved traditionally can open the novice (shoshin) mind to the process of adding a mei to a nakago. My own preference is not to own a gimei blade because it might be more difficult to sell in the future if and when I'm done with it.

@GeorgeLuucas, I agree with your reasoning for following this thread. I like your suggestions and might try them. I have a mid 1500's katana that I'd like to clean up as carefully as I can. I don't think it's quite worth a polish but I'd like to at least remove some of the black and that might give me a better idea of how to proceed with it, short of sending it away for a professional opinion. But, if I can't do this in a way that is not harmful, I will not.

Thanks for the confirmation, Steve. I know sometimes the green papers are accurate but I'd never gamble with bidding on something like that not having your eye and knowledge. One of those situations when you have to ask yourself why a papered Yamakichibei is being auctioned off on yahoo... I already have one gimei Yamakichibei (first tsuba purchase that I got in Kyoto before I knew anything at all) and I like that one just fine. Cheers.

Really neat piece. The detail and pose make it seem as if he's gonna start moving any second. Makes me feel anticipation when I look at it. Looking forward to seeing more photos of it.

I like the activities of this blade, Mark. Wispy like fresh snow being tossed up from the ground by a breeze. The angled pictures look like a hadori polish but the pictures looking straight down on it look more like sashikomi. I'm wondering if it's an old hadori polish that is reverting to sashikomi. But I feel silly saying even as much as I have. I'm curious to see what the experienced people here say. My katana has similar differences when held at different angles so maybe I'll learn a little for myself as well. Thanks for sharing.

This one looks promising. Fun auction to watch anyways… https://www.jauce.com/auction/f1111866630

@SpartancrestThat 2nd tsuba is wonderful. It really speaks to me. Thanks for the link.

And this is okay to use on nihonto?