nulldevice

The koshirae really is fantastic. I really like the 2 tone theme repeated on the kogai and tsuba. Its a wonderful package overall that I think you'll enjoy. Don't discount a suguha hamon at first glance. Many extraordinary blades I had a chance to see in Japan had a "simple" suguha hamon but really came alive with activity when viewed in the right light.

The photos don’t show a great angle for the boshi. It kind of looks like it may run off but the lighting and angle isn’t ideal for the boshi in any of the photos so I see what Tcat is saying. The oshigata doesn’t really show much either. It shows the boshi but it doesn’t really turn back towards the mune. I tried to compare the oshigata side by side with the blade pics but I think more pictures will be required. Sometimes the hamon runs right close to the edge but still stays in tact on older swords that have seen a few polishes. But it shouldn’t run off the blade.

I don't have the contact of the guy that sold them to me at the SF show. However, if he is at the Vegas show here in 4 weeks, I'll get his contact information and pass it your way. He had 4 or 5 of the 47 ronin set among other Kuniyoshi in his items for sale.

I wouldn’t. It has green papers and the description and title don’t match up with measurements. For $4k, I’d rather get something with modern papers. You could get a signed Edo period sword with Hozon papers for that price.

That's 100% eBay

What are your tastes? Are you looking for a TJ to be your first purchase? You could get a number of amazing Juyo swords for that much. Going for TJ just because its TJ might leave something to be desired IMO instead of owning various high level Juyo for the same price that cover a wide range of schools, periods, styles, etc. From a study perspective, that's the route I'd go with 20M sitting around. Not saying TJ is bad, by definition, it isn't, its some of the best work ever. But many Juyo aren't far behind and you could have a very well curated collection of a few pieces for the price of 1 TJ.

https://www.tsuruginoya.com/artwork.html Has 5 TJ currently available: Bizen Osafune Tomomitsu - 18.5M Osafune Chogi - 20.0M Osafune Kanemitsu - 17.5M Soshu Norishige - ??? Saeki Norishige - ???

I'd guess Omi No Kami Tadatsuna (1st Gen) My reasoning is it looks like the 1st gen Tadatsuna and the 2nd gen (Asai) both split the Tsuna kanji, but the 1st gen Mei examples I can find seem to have more triangular shaped "punch" like strokes on the small lines of the kanji where the 2nd gen looks to have slightly longer lines if that makes sense.

https://nihonto.com/the-yasutsugu-school-康継系/ This link has the chart as well as good photos of various generations

Looking at the Soshuden Musuem site on the Hon'ami monograms it looks like this is one is purporting to be the 12th gen. http://www.nihonto-m...on-ami-monograms-kao

Looks like 濃州関住兼時之作 Noshu Seki Ju Kane mochi toki (Kore Saku)/(Kore Tsukuru)? I'm not entirely sure about the Mochi(持), but Ray will be along shortly with a better translation! Edit: It's KaneTOKI 時 and not Kanemochi 持, I was at least close I suppose!

Good point, I don't imagine there are swaths of blades being found under floorboards and in attics any more. Sure there are some hidden blades and I'm sure a number of WW2 bringbacks that are being found each day by grandchildren but to get those polished, and find Juyo quality blades is a very small probability of swords found. Most WW2 veterans are gone by now and the few surviving members' possessions will be handed off within the next decade or so. We hear that Juyo is a competition but there is still a quality "floor" for what qualifies to even be considered for that competition. In some perfect world, every blade would be submitted for shinsa and the Juyo-worthy blades would pass and those that aren't up to snuff (competition aside, just talking quality only here) would stay at TokuHo or Hozon. I wonder what that number would look like and how that compares to the current tally of Juyo blades? Coming back to reality, how consistent is that "skill floor" over the years? If the overall quality of submitted blades goes down, does the skill floor required to pass Juyo go down just a little bit compared to years prior? They've been doing Juyo shinsa for 66 years now with many different shinsa teams and presidents over the decades. Admittedly I am still only a beginner with this whole thing but the statistics side of my brain is fascinated by the concept of Juyo being competition based and the human element of it as the years go on and on. I wonder if we'll still see 50+ blades passing in Juyo 80 or 90?

Do we know how many swords were submitted in total? Only 52 swords passed shinsa which seems like a low number. I wonder if that means it was a good year or a bad year to submit for shinsa as someone with say an old Rai or Ko-Bizen sword to pass? Do the low numbers signify little competition, or rather lots of competition and a very strict shinsa year? Thanks again as always Jussi!

Rai (Niji) Kunitoshi

Looks like: 永延元十月 __ (Unsure on this) 備前國包平 (Bizen Kuni Kanehira)