Kikuhira

[Klaver]

Hi Guys,

 

This katana took my attention. It is signed with Kikuhira. Correct me when I am wrong but this smith was working at Hizen province, probably Kanbun era.

 

What do you think about this katana? I know the worth of a katana is how much you personally admire the piece, but I think this one is very well priced.

 

Is is pity you cannot see the blade very well with close ups to look after flaws.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Authentic-Japan ... 9007wt_923

[Marius]

Jordy,

 

This eBay seller is posting pics/description from a yahoo.jp auction. If you buy at his inflated price, he will try to buy the sword on Yahoo and if successful, he will deliver it to you. Of course you will then have paid his hefty markup, if not a multiple of what the sword would cost you in Japan.

 

This has been discussed here a few times. If you want this sword, you can get the number of the Yahoo Japan auction from one of the pics' URL, and once you have the auction, hire an agent to buy it for you at the source. I can guarantee, it will be much much cheaper.

[Ken-Hawaii]

Marius, that brings up some interesting questions:

 

1. How would those of us who can't read Kanji know or find out that this blade was for sale on Yahoo.jp?

 

2. Even if we did know, how quickly can an agent respond to a request to buy a specific blade? I used to have an agent who couldn't respond quickly enough to buy items with two days lead time!

 

3. And how would we know what a reasonable price would be, bidding against buyers in Japan?

 

Ken

[Klaver]

Marius,

 

thank you for your reply. And yes, Ken, I was also playing with those questions you mentioned.

 

I do not have an agent either, how can I find one? And even if you have one, how do you get an idea about a "market" uniform price.

 

Also the thought I was playing with, how a decent seller like AOI are getting thier pieces, they have an huge refreshing amount.

[Marius]

Ken,

 

this seller sells only stuff from yahoo.jp.

 

If you right-click on a picture in his auction, you will be able to copy its address. It will be typically something like that:

http://auctions.c.yimg.jp/c032.img.auct ... g19131.jpg

 

You don't have to read kanji to see that it is from yahoo.jp. and in this particular case you can easily guess that that the auction number is 1403514352 and the sellers nick is songyong67.

 

As for questions 2 and 3:

 

2. you need a good agent, and you need to watch yahoo.jp to identufy an item that is interesting for you

3. you need to set your own price, up to which you want to bid. Just like in a any other auction service :-)

 

I hope that helps :-)

[Klaver]

Thanks, ok, I found this katana, I unfortunately cannot read anything they wrote.

 

http://page6.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/au ... enlargeimg

 

Suguata seems Shobu Zukuri with Ubu Nakago. Period Kanbun April 1661 to September 1673, a so called Shinto Katana. I has little sori which was common in this time. It seems narrow hamon, I thought it was more wider at that time, but narrow hamon has advantante you have more soft steel so has a better shock resistance.

 

Can anyone read the papers included?

[Darcy]

This is an ebay policy violation. Doesn't seem to be possible to even report such things anymore. Ebay just gives you a drop down list of issues you can claim. Someone will just look at the listing and scratch their head and go about their day.

 

Good old ebay.

[estcrh]

This is an ebay policy violation. Doesn't seem to be possible to even report such things anymore. Ebay just gives you a drop down list of issues you can claim. Someone will just look at the listing and scratch their head and go about their day.

 

Good old ebay.

Darcy, Ebay has been made aware of this particular practice by several different sources and it seems that as long a a buyer either gets their purchase or a refund Ebay does not consider this to be a policy violation, and your right, that drop down list makes it very hard to report this type of thing. This company is just one of several that attempts to sell items that are being currently being auctioned in Japan.