cabowen

Takayama to Masahiro ? saku Made by Masahiro. WWII era.

rub some baby powder or the like in the chisel cuts...

Definitely not shinshinto.....I think muromachi is a safe bet....Odawara soshu was known for their horimono and the jigane is a little more refined....I would look at Shimada.

April, 1943 Looks like "Uji" 宇寿 ??? No listing in the meikan... Very clumsy signature. No stamps, may be a gendaito. Needs picts of the blade to tell...

This is a non-traditionally made blade with an oil quenched hamon. It is not considered a nihon-to.

I don't have many details about the machine cutting of horimono during the war in seki...I wonder if they used something like a dremel and then finished things by hand???? Wish I could find more info on this...Guess I need to talk to some of the old timers in Seki or some of my horimono-shi contacts... It is hard to tell the quality in the lower shot because it is a bit out of focus but I suspect it is not fully hand cut. I agree that I have seen far worse examples... Horimono were added for various reasons-from the nefarious -hiding a flaw, to the religious-icons of faith and protection. To the unknowing, a flashy carving often inspires awe and is a great sales point on the cheaper blades; Japanese swords are not immune from the usual marketing ploys.

The top one was done by hand by one of the top horimono-shi of the war era. I have heard that they were machine cutting horimono in Seki during the war. Is it possible the bottom example was machine cut?

I would be happy to post picts but unfortunately I no longer own the sword. I do remember it was made by Tsukamoto Okimasa, with clear star stamp, and received NBTHK Hozon kantei-sho....

How do these compare, on a craftsmanship basis?

I have had a star stamped blade pass NBTHK shinsa and I know of several others.

I think this has been answered at least a couple of times already...Once more, with feeling: Showa stamp= not gendai-to=non-traditional blade=not nihon-to=no kantei-sho=no import into Japan

swords at ejapaneseswords.com

Of the roughly 200 or so people making blades in Seki, you have named three worthy of attention. There may be a couple more but I can't think of them, which tells me something...Subtract Watanabe Kanenaga who was an old man making few swords during the war, and you are down to 1%-1.5% of Seki blades were made by quality smiths. To me, that makes it a safe bet for those less knowledgeable to simply ignore Seki blades in general.

Firstly, through experience. Second, by knowing the background of the maker. None of the professional smiths made their living making non-traditional blades. There are those that did experiment (even Kurihara Akihide made some blades with electrolytic steel and so marked them) but this is a handful at most. One always needs to go to the blade. If it is an excellent blade with top quality workmanship and you can't tell then maybe it doesn't matter. If it is a mediocre blade, why be concerned? Again, most of the trouble comes from Seki. Avoid Seki blades and you are nearly out of the woods....

In some circles, at one point in time, anything with a Showa date was called a Showa-to, which was a term of derision. Then, after a little enlightenment, only blades with a Showa stamp were called Showa-to. Since, as has been noted, not all non-traditionally made blades bear a Sho stamp the term Showa-to seems inappropriate. Gunto is another term used and comes with a negative connotation. We know not all gunto were created equal, with both non- and traditional blades made during the war as gunto. The easiest terminology may simply be traditional and non-traditional. Non-traditional can be further broken down into machine made and hand made. That about covers it, doesn't it???

Sagami no Kuni Goro Nyudo Masamune Most famous Japanese smith....would be interesting to see the blade!

Seki and Showa stamped blades are both non-traditionally made, regardless of hot stamps, custom order mei, longer than standard gunto lengths, horimono, hada, etc.

But was that because such groups had easier access to tamahagane, and therefore no need to find alternative steels? Yasukuni, for example, had its own tatara. No problem of supply there. Professional smiths and schools had access, the others didn't. When the Jumei Tosho program started, the military provided tamahagane to those smiths. Oh agreed. They are non-traditional in some way, and therefore not nihonto. I was just pointing out that the construction of some (not most) was a bit more complicated that it might seem; one smith, by his own account, may have been using puddled Western steel in orishigane. There's also the reported reason behind the introduction of tang stamps, which suggests some were good enough for the authorities to fear that they could be confused with nihonto. They were afraid people who didn't know better might not be able to differentiate, like your average Japanese soldier....

That makes sense.... Not all, surely . Sure, there were a lot that were machine made, such as the NCO swords, and factory production is going to be more prolific than other methods. However, not all showato are equal. There are still plenty of surviving stamped swords made by smiths. Slough has got more than a few listed as making both gendaito and showato and some were quite productive. There's that frequently quoted line about certain smiths making both good and bad. Now if they could make gendaito, they had no difficulty in doing a differential hardening using water - so why did they also use oil hardening? Perhaps we need to look at the steels they were using. Kevin There were some trained smiths running factories that produced showa-to but there were indeed very very few professional smiths making showato. There was no reason for them to make showato when they could make traditional blades, which fetched much more money. When one surveys the work of smiths from the Gassan group to the Horii smiths, from the Minatogawa Yasukuni Jinja smiths, Nihonto Gakuin, the Denshujo, and all the classical smithing schools and groups, you don't find any of these smiths making showato. I can't say I have ever seen a showa stamped blade made by a first class, or even second class, bona fide smith. I would be most interested in any oshigata showing the contrary...I agree some showato are nicer than others but the bottom line is none of them are considered nihonto. There may have been some Seki smiths who made both but there were again, very few trained, professional smiths in Seki. Most of those making showato were blacksmiths, tool makers, and the like who switched to "sword making" during the war because of the income it produced. These were not professionally trained sword smiths and when looking at a showato, it shows. I suppose it is entirely possible that some of these people actually made some traditional blades as well but there is little chance they would be on the level of professionally trained smith's work. I hesitate to say this because of the work that it took to produce, but Slough's book is not exactly a definitive reference.....

Japan actually imported large amounts of steel from the west prior to the war. Key words are "competent" and "skill". Most, if not all, showato were made in factories by people not trained as traditional swordsmiths.....

You may be right, but I've read a bit differently. Oil doesn't put nearly as much stress on the metal as a Water quench and therefore tests the construction to a lesser degree. It doesn't cool the metal as quickly, thereby reducing the stress. The blade not cracking during the quench is a sign of good construction. During the war, there was less time for them to break, and oil does get the job done. I've also read that tool steels react better to oil, so that may be a contributing factor as well. Im no expert, just sharing some info I've read. Hamon formation depends on several factors, one of which is the cooling rate during the quench. Different steels require different cooling rates to form martensite (hamon). Some steels will form a hamon at a slower, less stressful, cooling rate, obtained via a quench in oil. Water quenches produce a fast and stressful cooling rate which leads to more cracked blades-thus smiths needs more skill and experience to water quench blades without failure. Even mukansa level smiths today will have cracks in a good portion of blades. The western steels used in gunto quench well in oil, thereby reducing the skill level while increasing repeatability and the success rate. This is but one reason why they were used. Oil quenches do not, in general with the steels used, produce bright, active hamon compared to water quenched blades. They are usually quite devoid of activity.....

Look at the thickness of the blade just above the munemachi in comparison to the thickness just below it. If there is a noticeable thinning of the blade it may have been polished quite a few times already.

Polishing is always a gamble as you never can be sure what lurks beneath the surface. Flaws can appear and make the blade look worse.... A lot depends on how many polishes the blade has had previously. You do not show any photos of the nakago mune which would show if the blade has been polished extensively already. If the blade is still healthy, there is no reason why it could not be polished. If there is deep corrosion, again, hard to tell without seeing the blade, a lot of steel might need to be removed, potentially causing the above.

In my Japanese dictionary it is pronounced kofu........Perhaps one of the Japanese members can clarify....

During the war they were experimenting with all different types of steels and construction methods. It is usually thought that a traditionally made sword, or nihon-to, must be made of tamahagane/oroshigane, forged and folded repeatedly, and water quenched. A blade may be made of western steel, folded a few times (called hantan), water quenched, and look like a traditionally made blade, but not be. There are many possibilities. One thing to look at is the mei-buri and the nakago finish. If the mei is poorly cut and the nakago poorly shaped and finished, it is usually not a blade made by a professionally trained smith and thus odds are it is not a traditionally made blade.