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Gensui-to

cabowen
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cabowen Grand Master

cabowen

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It says that after the abolition of royalty it was bought in Ginza around Showa 27 and that it is a cultural asset. Cultural asset is used in the broad sense, not the government designated sense.

Brian

Brian

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I cannot read the Japanese, so can someone advise on who made this one (surely not machine made blade?) and who not a single pic of the nakago?

Any way you look at it, it is a beautiful piece. Absolutely stunning.

 

Brian

cabowen Grand Master

cabowen

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Yes, the price seems a little ambitious then again one wonders when the next opportunity will arise to purchase a mint condition, fully documented unicorn with a josun Sadakatsu blade inlaid with a gold kiku?

george trotter Grand Master

george trotter

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If I read it right it was made for Fushimi no miya no Hiroyasu o (Prince Fushimi Hiroyasu). he was Admiral and remained in a high office until the end of the war...died 1946. Quite a historical sword...I'd be interested to hear from Jacques on his opinion of the place this sword fits in history/art/value...?

There is a bit about Prince Fushimi Hiroyasu on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince-Fushimi-Hiroyasu

 

Unless I'm wrong.....

 

Edit to add: don't know why the link won't work...type in Prince Fushimi into google...he is the first one up.

J Reid Proficient

J Reid

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Yep thats a very attractive package. If I had that much to blow, I wouldn't think twice about buying it.

 

EDIT: Well it would be one of many on a long list of purchases.

Eric Santucci Collaborator

Eric Santucci

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Brian asked this same question and I am curious too: Any ideas as to why the seller would not post photos of the nakago? (Note: this question is not meant to imply the sword is not a genuine Sadakatsu; I am merely curious).

 

Thanks

Pete Klein Grand Master

Pete Klein

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I must say, even though I don't focus on swords, this is something special. I cannot comment on what it 'should cost' but it's something special from a bygone era which is quite unique and obviously of 'value'. Oh, to win the lottery... :glee:

Brian

Brian

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:laughabove:

 

Pete..when you see one top end tsuba in Japan that is going for over $50K or more..then I guess something of this rarity isn't way out there. I mean, if it was a painting, it wouldn't even be a top one at that price. Relatively speaking, $180K isn't that much for a top end work of art that is one of a kind. I know it is out of most of our budgets, but if you are an art collector, I suppose that isn't a lot of money for what it is. We are spoiled in our art field, top end stuff fetches the prices of bottom end other art pieces.

It may not be a Heian tachi, but I think it's stunning. I wonder who did the fittings? They are really beautiful, and I assume hand carved?

I may have to add some pics here directly for future reference for when the auction is over.

 

Brian

Darcy Mentor

Darcy

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Well that's a huge relief, now I don't have the most expensive one evar.

 

I think if one were to look at this gensui-to this way, that if you went to Gassan Sadatoshi now and asked him to make this sword you would be set back probably 5-6 million yen or so (I think 5 million is the list price for one of his works with all the bells and whistles). Assuming without seeing the sword that it represents Gassan Sadakatsu at his all out best.

 

Now go to someone capable of making this koshirae and ask them to make it... maybe you get set back 2-3 million yen for that.

 

And you'd have a modern made copy.

 

Consider that it's an extremely rare and complete artifact with provenance that bridges standard sword collecting into WWII and militaria collecting and there you probably have the price coming in around double.

 

I would love to have such a thing, but for my dollar of course I would rather go pick up a nice Juyo Norishige plus an Ichimonji with the change. But I can see how whomever is selling this would ask this much.

 

The big question now is: will someone step up to the plate???

 

As Chris says above, the thing when you are the guy who is selling a unicorn you kind of make the market. There aren't any others that you can price compare against and it's not a commodity by any means. When there's only one you can't tell the guy he's asking too much. Kind of constrained supply when shopping for unicorns.

 

Probably someone with very deep pockets and interested in "only the best" will step up.

cabowen Grand Master

cabowen

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It is an interesting concept to ponder what this might cost to reproduce today....I do think though that conservatively, the koshirae would easily cost as much as the blade to make today. I would not be surprised to see $100,000US to have today's top craftsman reproduce this...

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