Any thougths on this blade?

[Gasam]

Hi again all,

 

A gunto-mounted blade markeded as a "Colonel Katana with Battle Flag" is for sale in my hometown. It is not an auction but a fixed price of about USD 2.500,- (15.000 Norwegian Crowners).

 

The pictures are not the best, but in one or two of them I think I can see old battle mark on the mune. That makes me think it could be older blade...

Can someone more knowledgeable than I am at present take a look at these pictures, and see if it is at all possible to hazard a guess as to age of blade based on the shape?

 

Edit: And also if it bears any telltale signs of oil quench, if such signs exist. Bad pictures of the hamon though.... they are the sellers pics....

 

Thanks

[lonely panet]

well were do we start,

 

theres no tassel to display the rank of the original owner so you can dismiss that salesman rubbish,

 

the blade isn't shown well, but I think the hamon near the habaki looks alittle like a showato ( out on a limb there)

 

so if this a showato, why is there a cut on the mune???

 

sound abit hight for me!

 

just my thoughts Regards Hamish

[Gasam]

Thanks for reply.

 

Just noticed he is also selling a wak that has fairly much kitae-ware for about 6.000 USD converted from Norwegian crowners.

 

That makes me a bit wary as he might know a lot more than he is letting on about nihonto (as he has more than one item) and the prices seems really high particularly for the wak, although it has a mei and some sort of papering is shown i a pic but no mentioning as to what papering it is.

 

If anyone wants pictures of wak let me know and I will upload them.

[Jussi Ekholm]

I think it's quite common to ask bit higher price out here where we live. Not that many Japanese swords are probably sold in the Norway (I would believe it's the same as in Finland ). I know when I'm selling replica swords I'm asking a small premium as swords are not common sale object here (and I'm trying to earn small profit too ). So even though you might see items cheaper in larger markets you have to take account the prices of importing them, for example we have 24% VAT here, I don't know how it is in Norway. Add to that how the seller might want a profit of varying margin too.

 

Not really helpful as I just rambled some thoughts out. I think you can get help with that wakizashi too if you want. You can for example post a pic of the papers and get an identification to those.

[Gasam]

  Jussi Ekholm said:

So even though you might see items cheaper in larger markets you have to take account the prices of importing them, for example we have 24% VAT here, I don't know how it is in Norway. Add to that how the seller might want a profit of varying margin too.

 

 

Hi again!

 

Thanks for reply,

 

We have 25 % VAT, but luckily, not for art and antiques over a certain age, I think it is 200 yrs old. So last time I imported a blade from Japan, there was hardly any tax/toll :-) Waiting now for a blade made in later half of the 1700s that I kind of went a bit overboard with budget wise, so hopefully I am right about the 200 years limit

[Gasam]

Just for anyone interested, here are some pics of the around USD 6.000 "Katana Wakizashi (sic) in Tamahagane steel with papering" Wak mentioned in one of my posts above.