fan

jean, so you are lucky one who bought that wild looking sword. how does it look in person? eric

i think i have their direct email because they responded to me once before. i have tried to contact both persons and they jstu ignore me. i included the item number and even the date of the paypal transaction, but to no avail. i think they might have sold the sword to someone else and just will not admit it. they could just as easily return my money but they wont even do that. it is not like they have no way to make this right. eric

justin, do you contact them directly? i am still after them for a sword i bought in may. after countless emails, i have had very few responses. in one earlky response the simply told me they have not sent it. i think they dont like to be told that they made any mistake and knows that most people not in Japan can do nothing about them. that's pretty dishonest. eric

hi peter, here is a pic of the ji and shinogi ji area. the grain in shinogi ji is different from the ji area. however, it is the finess of the jihada that prompted the nthk to determine the sword a hizen sword. eric

CANT really find the togari in these

hi peter, here are some pics. can really find the togari in these.

milt, i have a sugu katana that nthk put to late generation tadayoshi den. however, i almost think i detect a very mild bump on the sugu as well. and the yasuri is kesho, not typical hizen. but i kind of like the tadayoshi den attribution...... eric

hi mike, do you mean that they use sanbonsugi exclusively? the condition of the blade prevents me from seeing clearly the sugu to see if there are togari. but even if togari is present, does it still seem unlikely that the kanemoto line would have anything to do with it? eric

yes, the file mark is typical mino shinto or later. the clarity of the mei cut also suggest a nto particularly old blade. eric

hi grey, yes it is kanemoto. my question is, when i tried to match it with other signatures, the lower strokes of my "moto" does not look like the lower strokes of other "moto". the typical ones have a sharper bend at the lower right stroke. so this not one of hte big guys, but does this match up with anyone in particular? eric

hi all, i have this little wak, slender, with a suguha. the limited resources i have does not have anything that match the strokes on this signature. can anyone peg this one? thanks. eric

hi uwe, speakingof low end, i think my blade is just a low end tanto that happens to be very thin and has a maru mune. i dont think my blade is a boy's sword because while it is thin, the mihaba is of normal width at 2.5cm. eric

yes, good idea, but i gotta get the digital camera working first.

the blade is a regular shinogi zukuri shape and pretty deep mihaba, proportionally. it is at about 2.5 cm. it has a short, tanto like nakago and so does not seem suriage. no core steel showing. it has maru mune as well.... eric

thanks henry, yes, a floppy sword would not be very useful. the blade i have is definitely not pre heian or close to that age. it has about 14" nagasa and so is still stiff due to its proportion. still, i have never seen anything that thin and was wondering if it is characteristic of any particular school or style. eric

hi all, from your experience, what is the thinnest kasane that you have come across? i am trying to find out what might be the thinnest kasane acceptable that a sword may be made to. tired swords not withstanding. i have a rusty blade with about 3mm kasane and the nakago is the same and thinner, so it does not look like it was polished down. anyone else have thin blades? eric

yes, the rest of the sword seemed to be relatively healthy with plenty of niku. nice sugata and a bit of an extended kissaki. eric

hi stephen, the end of the nakago on the sword i saw was even uglier than yours. it looks like some pryed the tab that was folded and inserted into the nakago out and snipped it. what was left is about 3mm worth of the tab in a half uncured condition. eric

hi guys, i went to a gun show today and looked at a few swords that they had there. none are in great shape but one let me with a question. a katana with a removed gaku mei. would it be safe to assume that the sword may be of value? the reason i ask is that if someone bothered to remove the folded tab with the mei, could it be assumed to be genuine and removed to another sword for value enhancement? on the other hand if a sword with a gaku mei is found to be gimei, how would the removal of the mei be handled if the owner decided to go that route? would the tab be simply snipped off? eric

quang, that second word looks like water, so would that be mizu? eric

hi all, i recall a while back that there was discussion on what seems to be a clear coating on some tsubas. i even recall discussion regarding the removal of these coatings. needless to say i did not pay attention back then. so now i have found that i have a couple of tsubas ( one that even looks like a copy of the copy of that kaneie) with this coating on. should i do anything about it? is it "bad" to have it on? it seems to create this rough, tiny wrinkly surface. (or is that just the rusts underneath?) eric

hi km, i have heard of some rules and stories about owning swrods in taiwan. anything with a sharp edge over 50cm is considered a weapon and dangerous, therefore prohibited. however, in the antique market there, you can readily find those fake samurai swords from china. how they got in in the first place is another story. i know of some very rich people who own important historical swords. i guess in this case, affluence is above the law. another story is that during the 70's, an artists returning from a trip abroad wanted to bring a Japanese word back to taiwan. knowing it will be confiscated at the customs, he brought 2 swords with him declaring that one of them is a gift to the president. the customs officer could not prevent a gift going to the president and allowed both swords in. yet another story involves a friend bringing in an alloy iai sword. the custom officer assumed it was not sharpened and therefore allowed it to go in. however, it had to be registered with the local police so that the sword would be held in the police station, starting 6 months prior to any election, and returned 6 months after. according to this friend, he has never seen the sword since there are elections of various officials going on nearly every 8 to 9 month. eric

hi quang, my white paper has the nakago shape/conditino right under the mune description. is it not on yours? and how did you get the information corrected? did you call in to someone? eric

milt, the possibility of a mix up sounds ominous. has this sort of mix up happened before, to anyone's recollection? if it has to any extent, then it opens up a whole mess of things. eirc

i submitted 2 swords for shinsa and got one pink and one pass...which is better than i expected. with the trend of hte weekend i thought i was going home with 2 pink and only out $150. but i was glad to cough up the other $75. the pass is mumei attributed to den fujiwara kanemasa (omi), kyoho period. the pink is signed mori iye. the reason for pink is that it is determined to be mass produced and of poor quality andin poor condition, but worth preserving. there are a few open pockets on the blade, it is out of polish and there is an open layer in the hamon. however, there is utsuri running all over the blade. i had always thought utsuri is a sign of the good quality of the steel and that it is usually not found on poor qualy blades. can anyone give some pointers?