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Posted

I had been wanting to get an Emura for a while now, and when I saw this one on Aoi-Art, I just had to have it. It is the nicest Emura that I have seen. I won the auction today for it, and am now the proud owner. Now comes the hard part; waiting for it to be shipped to me! Here is a link to the site, and I will post pictures when I receive it.

 

http://www.aoijapan.com/guntokatana-emura-saku

Posted

Congrats. A lovely sword. Emura is one of my favorite Gendai smiths.

You should have years of enjoyment from it.

Rich S

Posted
  cabowen said:
  pcfarrar said:
You should get Aoi Art to put it in for NBTHK Hozon papers whilst the sword is still in Japan.

Why?

 

Additional cost is peanuts with the sword still being with Aoi, so might as well have them especially as Aoi will give you your money back if it fails.

Posted
  pcfarrar said:
You should get Aoi Art to put it in for NBTHK Hozon papers whilst the sword is still in Japan...

 

Additional cost is peanuts with the sword still being with Aoi, so might as well have them especially as Aoi will give you your money back if it fails.

 

 

..I'm not sure I understand the fundamental rationale in spending anything for kantei-sho for this sword as it is clearly genuine.

I thought perhaps you had heard of gimei Emura blades floating around. With the large number of hands involved making Emura blades, it would be quite difficult to establish a gimei blade in any case....

Posted
  cabowen said:

..I'm not sure I understand the fundamental rationale in spending anything for kantei-sho for this sword as it is clearly genuine.

I thought perhaps you had heard of gimei Emura blades floating around. With the large number of hands involved making Emura blades, it would be quite difficult to establish a gimei blade in any case....

 

When I've bought swords from Aoi in the past and had them papered you just have to pay the pass fee so it's only something like 25,000 yen. Really is pretty insignificant compared to the cost of the sword.

 

In the UK having papers does help assist with customs clearance if you run into problems. Customs will accept them as additional proof of the sword being genuine etc.

Posted

I agree that the amount is rather insignificant, I just didn't understand the reason for doing it. If it helps with customs, that is reason enough. Thanks for that...

Posted

Thanks for all the kind words everyone. I had thought about having them submit it to shinsa for me, but I did not know if it would be worth it. But if it might help with customs, I'll have to think about it. I'll email them to see what the cost is now and then make a decision.

Posted

Thanks for the confirmation Gray. If it won't help with customs, then there is no reason to do it. I'm happy to hear that because it will be in my hands that much quicker. :)

Posted
  takakage said:
Hi,

 

Is Emura a left hand swordsmith ? Look at the yasuri mei.

 

I had not noticed that. Googling Emura, I found another one that has the same mei as mine, and the yasuri mei on that one slants down to the left also. http://www.samuraisword.com/nihonto_c/g ... /index.htm Looking at the Emura oshigata on Richard Stein's site, I see examples that slant both ways. I assume that it depended on if he did the yasurimei or one of the prisoners. At this point I guess it would be impossible to know whether Emura was left-handed.

Posted
  celt72 said:
  takakage said:
Looking at the Emura oshigata on Richard Stein's site, I see examples that slant both ways. I assume that it depended on if he did the yasurimei or one of the prisoners. At this point I guess it would be impossible to know whether Emura was left-handed.

 

Exactly. Since it was "sword by committee" so to speak, there is much that is impossible to know....It does looks like an interesting blade and rather atypical for the group.

  • 3 weeks later...
Posted

I once owned a custom made Emura blade that was signed tachi me: Toshu Chounsai Emura saku. That is: made by Chounsai Emura of Tosa and on the other side of the nakago: Ojite tomioka Shi Motome, meaning in accordance with the request of Mr. Tomioka. Apparently Emura either came from or was living in Tosa at the time and made the sword on special order for Mr. Tomioka. The yasuri were sujikai with kesho in the normal manner, sloping down to the right. Since it was a custom made blade, I have to assume the yasuri where done by Emura himself which suggests he was right handed, or at least followed normal convention. I would suspect that if the yasuri run in the opposite direction, the work was NOT done by Emura himself. Therefore, the yasuri might be an easy way to know if the blade was made by Emura or one of his students. I believe an oshigata of this blade can still be found on Dr. Stein's site in the discussion about Emura. Hope this helps.

Posted

Hi Stephen,

Yes, the yasuri on mine were slanted the same way as the sword on aoi. However I think the kesho yasuri on the aoi blade are fancier than on the blade I had. The oshigata of the blade I had is still shown on Dr. Stein's site in the discussion about Emura. The nakago on mine wasn't in as beautiful a condition as the blade on aoi so it was harder to make out the kesho yasuri on mine except for seeing that there were some horizontal file marks at the top of the right slanting yasuri.

Posted
  Stephen said:
Martin

 

Still waiting on the sword? I didn't get to see Aoi page.

 

Hi Stephen. As of today, it was released from customs in San Francisco, so hopefully I will have it here in Seattle on Monday. I've got my fingers crossed!

Posted
  Ed Harbulak said:
I once owned a custom made Emura blade that was signed tachi me: Toshu Chounsai Emura saku. That is: made by Chounsai Emura of Tosa and on the other side of the nakago: Ojite tomioka Shi Motome, meaning in accordance with the request of Mr. Tomioka. Apparently Emura either came from or was living in Tosa at the time and made the sword on special order for Mr. Tomioka. The yasuri were sujikai with kesho in the normal manner, sloping down to the right. Since it was a custom made blade, I have to assume the yasuri where done by Emura himself which suggests he was right handed, or at least followed normal convention. I would suspect that if the yasuri run in the opposite direction, the work was NOT done by Emura himself. Therefore, the yasuri might be an easy way to know if the blade was made by Emura or one of his students. I believe an oshigata of this blade can still be found on Dr. Stein's site in the discussion about Emura. Hope this helps.

 

Hi Ed. I would be inclined to agree with you. Hopefully a custom ordered blade would have the yasuri done by the smith himself. Of course, I would like to think that my new blade was done by Emura himself, and that he was left handed, but that is just wishful thinking on my part. Either way, I really like the blade I bought and won't loose any sleep over it. Of course, from an academic view it would be nice to be able to decide the issue one way or the other. I'd love to see pix of your old Emura if you still have them. I'll post pix of mine as soon as I receive it in the mail.

Posted

Hi Martin,

Sorry, I don't have any pictures of the Emura I used to own. I purchased it in 1998 at a garage sale from the vet who brought it back after WWII. That was in the days before digital cameras were as common as they are now. I then used the Emura in partial trade two years later for a nidai Hizen Tadahiro katana in gunto mounts. Enjoy your new Emura and even if he didn't personally make it, I'm sure Emura at least examined and approved it before either signing it himself of allowing one of his prisoners to sign it in his name.

  • 2 weeks later...

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