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I found a bare blade at the Long Beach outdoor antique show

Christian Chaffee
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Jean

Jean

Posted
Posted

What do I see in this blade:

 

A blade which should polish fine, probably suriage, looks naginata naoshi. Kissaki has been been slightly messed with. Probably Koto. Now, out of polish, it is impossible to have the main valid kantei points. For people having attended Robert Hughes' kantei session, they will know what are the kantei points (there is a whole worksheet).

 

It turned out fine. No doubt it will paper Hozon, but upon looking at NBTHK Hozon criteria it is not a surprise or a great deed. More interesting, has it been submitted to Tokubetsu Hozon?

 

Is a blade like this educational? I am not sure, the only thing which can be say from the pictures is: it is a promissing blade (looks like it will polish fine) and being naginata naoshi, could be Koto, short on the educational way.

Darcy Mentor

Darcy

Posted
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Anyway, it's not that educational to try to analyze a sword like this from this kind of photo for a few reasons.

 

1. the most important element of kantei is quality and you can't make a quality assessment when it is like this, from photos... photos "in polish" are hard enough to work with but a rusty blade showing nothing but the shape, it is just a silhouette

 

2. the shape can imply period but as has been shown here, there will always be many valid answers due to shapes being repeated throughout time... could be a nagamaki form naginata originally from any period. Could be Nanbokcuho. Could be early Shinto. Could be Shinshinto. All of those are valid answers. Who made an O-kissaki blade? Pretty much anyone who ever made a nagamaki style naginata. It's not enough to go on.

 

So, if all answers are valid, then there is nothing much to be learned unless we are trying to teach the lesson of where o-kissaki come from, and it is something that has been encountered on the first pages of the most basic books read by the most beginner readers.

 

This is why I said I see a rusty wakizashi. That's the only legitimate answer. Because when everything else is valid then nothing is really valid because there is no way to arbitrate between those answers being provided. That is, people can offer up their answer and the justification for all those answers is the exact same fact.

 

For the same reason you don't offer up retempered mumei blades for kantei, it's not educational or beneficial in this regard.

 

As an enthusiast sharing a discovery it's welcome material to read on the board to burn nihonto minutes and wonder at it.

 

Post some nice photos after polish and with the kanteisho in hand and then you have something educational because people will have some useful info to look at and a conclusion to assess and can put that into the mental databank for future reference. As is there is nothing to learn yet. Just speculation to be made.

 

Though a lot of this kind of thing *does* end up being Shimada :rotfl: .

cabowen Grand Master

cabowen

Posted
Posted

Seems the OP just wanted to share thoughts and generate discussion. I don't believe he expected anything other than wild speculation, broad generalizations, and shots in the dark....We did learn what Bob Benson purports to think...It's all good fun....

Jean

Jean

Posted
Posted
and figured it might be educational to let guys take a guess based on what I saw in the unpolished blade

 

Darcy is right, there is nothing educational in pictures of rusty wakizashi. Only hypothesis which can vary from Koto to Shinshinto based on sugata. I hope it will become educational when we get the pictures of the polished blades. :)

Brian

Brian

Posted
Posted

You are welcome to try some of the other more educational forums out there? :|

Agree with Darcy and Jean. Post them for a bit of fun and debate. But nothing much educational until the kantei features can be seen, explored and discussed.

 

Brian

Jean

Jean

Posted
Posted

Alan,

 

There are 100 of educational posts on this board, you will see them when you have been a member for more than one year and read carefully all the posts. Read Ron Watson or Chris or Ford Hallam or Darcy's posts and you will see what is an educational post. An educational post is a post from which you are learning several things which are not basic knowledge in a given field (characteristics of smiths, school, area).

Jean

Jean

Posted
Posted

Alan,

 

You only have been here for a year, biut you will find a lot of educational posts newly created on the board:

 

viewtopic.php?f=87&t=20638

 

Ron is probably one of the greatest specialist in this field.

 

Educational posts are those who bring you information/data :)

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