Authenticity Of Nbthk Papers (Green Paper)

[Vince6]

Dear all,

 

Hello to every one. I am new here and I apologize if this topic had already been discussed .

Recently purchased a Nihonto with NBTHK green paper dated Showa 50.

I understand many, if not all, collectors have serious doubt regardingi the authenticity of NBTHK papers issued during this period of time.

People think that those NBTHK branches issued paper cautiouslessly or with some other motivations, and the owners of real Nihonto would send their swords to NBTHK again for a second assessment and yellow paper.

However, what if the green paper was issued by the headquarter? is it also not trustworthy? A further question is, how can we tell whether the paper was issued by NBTHK headquarter or branches? (Call them is no-no, I can't speak Japanese, unfortunately)

Thank you very much to those who answer my questions and who just join the discussion, the only way I can express my appreciation is to share the sword I just bought with you.

 

Vincent

[paulb]

Dear Vincent

This has been much discussed not only here but in most sword groups around the world and there are differing opinions. The following is my opinion nothing more and others may differ in their view

You are correct that the problem originated around lower level papers issued by branch offices of the NBTHK. There are many theories as to how and why but basically inaccurrate, optimistic or just plainly wrong papers were prodcued.

It is unlikely that these were produced in large numbers. However the fact they existed at all cast doubt on others to the point where some seem to believe that all and every earlier paper was fraudulent. I seriously doubt this to be the case. However the lack of confidence in the earlier papers led the NBTHK to introduce the current papering system and invite swords to be resubmitted.

I think you are right in assuming that papers issued by the HQ are more likely to be accurrate than not. Also higher level papers were faked less ( I am not aware of any Juyo papers being discussed in this context)

I think many, in fact most, green papers are accurrate. Especially those issued in Tokyo HQ  but as collectors in general become increasingly to reliant on papers to confirm authenticity the fact that fraudulent ones exist destroys confidence and credibility.

The best way to reach a conclusion is to study the sword in detail compare it to published examples in literature and if possible in hand. Or resubmit it for repapering.

[Brian]

I think Paul stated it perfectly. I do think the matter is slightly exaggerated personally, and would be of more concern with high level swords and less with standard swords. Papers will always remain an educated opinion, but I suspect that more papers would have to at least match the sword characteristics, which puts them close to what the sword is showing anyways.

Some collectors might disagree, but I don't panic over old papers as much as some, and concern myself more with TH and JT level sword papers.
Then again, when buying, you should price a sword with old papers about the same as unpapered if you are concerned with financial aspects.

 

Brian

[Fuuten]

Agreed on the above, more or less. Its always more of a gamble with unsigned blades.

 

Just my two cents though, i highly doubt the blade you showed wouldn't re-certify as Hozon at least.. Looks like a nice sword and package.

[seattle1]

Hello:

Sometimes other things that come along with the sword such as a sayagaki by a leading sensei can dispel some doubt, perhaps even a torokusho which is illustrated by you if for the blade in question. I cannot see the date: what is it?

Arnold F.

[cabowen]

The papers that are worrisome are generally those that confirm a signature, usually a well known one...Yours, on the other hand, is simply an attribution to a group, Edo Hojoji, not a smith. As an attribution to a group, one is about the same as another. The sword looks like it certainly could be (from what is visible in the photos) Edo Hojoji. I wouldn't worry in this case.

[Darcy]

Definitely needs to be looked at on a case by case basis. The problem is more than just one of confirming a signature, but basically if the old paper is making some statement which is going to support a high valuation of the sword, then it needs to be looked at with great skepticism. 

 

Your nice Inoue Shinkai being offered today with green papers? Gimei.

Mumei Sadamune with green papers? Naoe Shizu. 

 

The other thing to worry about when you see a green paper is that there is a game theory problem being executed by any owner of this sword. Send it in for papers, keep the better attribution of the two. So there is a worry then that even with a mediocre attribution that the owner got an even worse attribution when sending it in for Hozon, and threw the Hozon paper away. 

 

Those are all situations in which the old paper was exaggerated due to poor skill or nefarious intent. 

 

Poor skill is poor skill and means old papers can be inaccurate. *Sometimes* this works in your favor, where when you send it in for Hozon you might get it upgraded. A lot of people will look over something with green papers with a low attribution assuming that because it's low, it must be right and they are not interested in the blade because of what the attribution says. 

 

There are *always* opportunities then for someone who practices and trains their eye. This applies at auction too, I bought a blade billed as Senjuin that was in a museum as Senjuin and that blade was so good, I felt that it was a higher level make than just a broad Senjuin attribution would have it be. Bidding against me was lukewarm because it was billed as Senjuin. I sent it in and they put it directly to Ryumon Nobuyoshi and it passed Juyo like that on the first submission in a hard year.

 

So the lesson is that these green papers can burn you or they can benefit you, if you take the time to be the smart person while everyone else is walking by. Mostly they will burn you though. Blades that have continued to carry these papers all the way to the present now are not likely to have legitimate readings in those papers. Just because every time a dealer touches them they know they will be receiving pressure back from customers and eventually one of them is just going to clear it to Hozon to relieve the issues. The fewer there are and the older the papers get the more likely someone is to clear it up. 

 

Today these papers are mostly in use by people to rip someone else off, on the big named blade that is sold to a... let's call it a "naive buyer" for a "good price" because said buyer has been shopping and is certain that the market is not efficient and they can find that bargain on a Shinkai or a Kotetsu or a signed Koto masterpiece if they just look hard enough. When it finally reveals itself the "naive buyer" wants to believe so hard in their own methodology and their greed is also a factor because they want to get something without paying for it, that they do not need a whole lot of coaxing in order to buy it. So the blade sells for 10x its true value. 

 

That naive buyer will eventually learn the status of his blade and bring it back to the seller who says something along the line of, "I would take it back from you if I could but I have no money. So let's just put it up for sale." These guys usually do not want to take the hit so are happy to get out for whatever they can get for it. And the bad blade with bad papers gets passed to the next guy.

 

Now if the naive buyer would just take good advice in the beginning, or not be so greedy, then he wouldn't have fallen into this trap. Or if he would be honorable and destroy the paper and remove the signature from the blade, the evil would end. Also if the dealer were not so greedy he'd destroy the signature and the paper too. The whole thing is a bag full of tears and failure.

 

Everyone wants a good deal if they can get it, and some good deals do happen and sometimes you get lucky, but usually it comes with study and work and those special deals do not come with a lot of red flags attached to them. So the experienced guy will really know when something special dropped into his lap. 

 

There are though a lot of people that start out as the "bargain hunter" and stay on this track without ever really improving their scholarship. They are the ones that end up with a collection of gimei things, bad papers, swordsmiths who never existed and so on. Sometimes through sheer luck they end up with a good blade. I am thinking of one guy in particular who has since died, but had amassed many things like a Soshu Akihiro, some signed tachi with big names on them, and so forth. I visited him to view these treasures which he said were all papered. It took me a long time and a special trip. 

 

They were all papered. 

 

He wrote the papers for them.

 

But the guys around this man, they always talked up what he had. "Yeah that's a great Akihiro, be sure never to send it to Japan because the Japanese will never let that blade come back to you". The more this trick is done the more the idea circulates (and it's still out there) about the Japanese repossessing nice blades just because they are good when you send them over. In this case the Akihiro was so gimei it had the wrong character for Aki on it. Everything else was gimei. One or two of the blades were nice but with so many horrifying mistakes around them, it was hard on short order to have any faith in what one was looking at. The prices on all of them were $80k and $90k and so on and they were just gimei junk. 

 

This guy through sheer luck had found some good items. The sharks had told him about his heroic Akihiro, please don't send that to Japan, but this unsigned rusty piece of junk ... well why don't you sell this one to me. And they would relieve him of something that might end up being a legitimate Rai work. 

 

This is kind of derailing the topic a bit but it goes hand in hand with these green papers and the negative effect they have on the market at this point. Because they give a place for these people who's hope is stronger than their knowledge, and instead of ponying up for a real Kotetsu they expend a huge amount on a fake one, but to them it seems like they did so well buying it at 50% of the cost of all the others they saw.

 

It just... doesn't happen. Dealers don't sell Kotetsu for 50% of the going price. They have no reason to do that. I get asked things like (using a hypothetical name), "Hey if you find a signed Masamune that has good papers and history for about $20k, please let me know and I'll buy it from you." 

 

To be 100% sure if I find a signed Masamune with good papers, completely legitimate and with history and it falls into my lap for $20k I am not going to pass this on to the person who has inquired for a 5% brokerage fee. I am going to keep it. Or I am going to sell it at the market price for a signed Masamune. 

 

That's what the guys who are treasure hunting on the green papers with the big names are failing to understand. The Masamune is a ridiculous exaggeration but I have been asked variations on that question multiple times.

 

If you're buying a Shinkai or a Kotetsu or a Tadayoshi or a Sukehiro and it has green papers, looks like great condition with nothing obviously wrong, and the price is 50% of the going price for these smiths, so many red flags should be flying in front of your eyes that you should walk. Now if you find that sword at a garage sale... the context is much different and that's the time to be speculating. Otherwise the market is efficient and if a discount is happening you need to understand why and you need to clear all the possible negative reasons in advance. 

 

Context is everything with the green papers and the big names. 

 

Getting to the conclusion, I agree that in this case the attribution is low and I wouldn't worry at all about it and that's why nobody has upgraded these papers, because it's being looked at in each instance as a waste of $500. The attribution could change but it is probably going to go to something parallel in meaning and value and ultimately this blade should be selling based on how much someone likes the blade. The papers just confirm it's not going to anything elite. It though does fall into one of those buckets where someone should look long and hard at the blade to be sure it's not one of these that was misattributed due to poor skill and might actually get an upgrade. 

[YOJIMBO]

It is possible to let authenticate green / blue paper by NBTHK?

[Vince6]

To be honest, I am happily amazed when seeing the discussions above. You gentlemen are knowledgeable and I can really feel your passion for Nihonto. Especially I have to thank Darcy for his time and energy, his article is harsh but literally educational to beginners like me.  I also agree with Paul that we should spending more time to study the swords, papers should be something just like references.  Fortunately, I just knew that NTHK (Nihon Token Hozon Kai) is having an overseas assessment this month at Chicago, I guess I will send this piece for their assessment, not because I want a certificate to guarantee its value, but just to solve my curiosity. Besides, NTHK's certificate will also include descriptions of Hamon and Jihada characteristics on its certificate, which is also helpful to learn more about the sword.  I will keep you guys posted when receiving the assessment result from NTHK (probably early May). Again, thank you very much, every of you

 

PS. The pixel of the picture of Torokusho is not high enough, it looks like Showa 6th year to me. And Japanese government takes those Torokusho back before the swords were exported.

 

Vincent

[seattle1]

Hello:

 I do not think it is Showa 6 (1931), but 26 (1951) is more likely. That is usually given as the year the postwar torokusho were started, though an earlier version or two have been reported. The Occupation, which ended in early 1952, was in the process of being phased out. It is sometimes said, and I am not sure whether the contention is right or wrong, that during Showa 26 blades form older collections, temples and shrines, were called in for registration. All blades could not possibly have been done in the initial year. There may be some factual truth in the call in story as blades with 26 and 27 torokusho seem to command a small premium.

 Arnold F.

[seattle1]

Hello:

 As sheer co-incidence would have it I visited Danny Massey's site a few minutes ago and found a new feature headed Japanese Sword Q @ A  Archive, in which the issue of Showa 26 is raised towards the end. A number of torokusho are shown and the author (unidentified) states that elite groups were called in, but ordinary owners also participated so the Showa 26 year is not in itself proof of some notable prior ownership.

 That discussion as much else attached to Danny's site is well worth a read. Nihontocraft.com

 Arnold F.

[Darcy]

The daimyo were asked to submit blades when licensing began, both to set a precedent and probably to show people that this was not a Hideyoshi style gathering of the swords for destruction.

 

As Arnold says it is not necessarily exclusive. But I see it a lot on very high level blades that are most likely matched up to high level families.

 

Most recent example I have is attached below. The blade is very healthy late Kamakura Aoe with Honami Kokyu kinzogan mei to Sadatsugu. It has a full Tokugawa duty koshirae, 100% to specifications and showing signs of use. The kinzogan mei dates to about the time that the koshirae was made, late 1700s. Koshirae are severe black lacquer with no mon on the saya, but very high quality kozuka, kogai, menuki all with Aoi mon, and polished black shakudo tsuba, horn kashira, shakudo fuchi with no adornment other than nanako. So it was clearly a high ranking person who had it and it stayed together like this, I am guessing in the same family, up through the period of licensing. This is typical of what I've encountered with the Showa 26 license.

 

[seattle1]

Hello:

 Darcy's discussion of the Sadatsugu above adds additional confirmation for those who would argue that Showa 26, and while it does not necessarily mean that all blades reviewed then came from some higher status owner, it does add validity to the belief that there is a reasonable chance that some special significance is conferred, and thus there is likely some financial premium to be incorporated into the price. The Japanese literature probably deals with the issue somewhere, and if given Ministry co-operation, some researcher could probably discover some really interesting modern sword history. The more anecdotes we have the better, as gradually enough data could be gathered to allow for more certainty regarding the Showa 26 year. Further to the foregoing it is interesting that yesterday Aoi Art listed, item AS15179, a (Sue)tsugu, Naminohira den very long sword with both a Tanobe sayagaki and an NBTHK paper showing an initial torokusho date of Showa 26 to which Mr. Tsuruta adds: "... the sword was stored as dediction by famous Daimyo family." Whether that information is inferred by Mr. Tsuruta from the registration date or whether it is incorporated into Tanobe sensei's sayagaki I do not know.

 Darcy wrote earlier in this thread about the suspicion that accumulates around an old Tokubetsu Kicho paper, and that cannot be denied, however there are some other wrinkles worth considering. I think it can be safely said that all old TK are not bad and that the overwhelming fraction of those issued are good, particularly if issued at Tokyo. Swords that cycle through the collecting community will in all likelihood be submitted to another shinsa. If we knew that the original paper was TK and the subsequent one Hozon, we should remember that many dealers are just either cheap or cautious and do not ask that it be pushed as far as it will go, i.e., to the Tokubetsu Hozon level, and we cannot infer anything about the prior TK paper from that. Swords that are outside the collecting community, perhaps a single family heirloom with a TK, may never be resubmitted prior to sale in some venue. It is also rather ironic that the first couple years of the NBTHK's history saw only the Kicho white paper issued. Some of those blades might well exceed the standards used today to set the minimum criteria for Tokubetsu Hozon.

 Just some off hand thoughts.

 Arnold F.

[Vince6]

Dear all,

 

I've sent the sword to Chicago Swordshow for NTHK's Shin Sa, and hopefully they will inform me the answer next Sunday.  On the other hand, I also email the seller in Japan to ask him check the issue date of torokusho, unfortunately he didn't reply...I am a bit frustrated because normally those Japanese sellers are very friendly and eager to help...but anyway, will update the result of the NTHK Shin Sa next weekend.  Oh, I almost forgot, is there any way we can tell whether the paper is issued by the HQ of NBTHK in tokyo?  The envelop of the paper has their Tokyo address on the back, but I guess they use that kind of envelop for every papers no matter it is issued by Tokyo HQ or other branches.

 

Vincent

[Vince6]

Dear all,

 

Good morning.

The Japanese seller finally kindly replied with the picture of Torokusho, however, it just made me even confused...

The issued date looks like Showa 6 to me(though the first few words are kind of blurry), but the whole sword registration system was not implemented until Showa 26, the year discussed in the thread as "Daimyo Toroku."  On Showa 26, the year that Japanese government introduced the registration/management system of Nihonto, "daimyo" (feudal rulers, elites, big families) were firstly invited to turn in their swords for registration. This fact somehow supports Darcy's viewpoint that people may be able to find more important swords turned in on Showa 26, but it doesn't mean the swords turned in on other years are less valuable.  Anyway, thank you for sharing your knowledge and thoughts here.

[Darcy]

Agreed on the remarks...

 

1. just because it's Showa 26 doesn't mean it's a treasure.

2. treasures can be found with other than Showa 26.

 

Everything as always needs to be looked at in context of the sword at hand. It's just that a lot of major collections with great works in it were processed in Showa 26 so there is a bulge at this point of great blades being handled.

 

About the old green papers and so forth though... as years go by the chances of any particular sword having green papers being good goes down. Every year from now will only be worse than now. So the doubt needs to increase every year.

 

The reason is only due to greed. If your sword has a good green paper, it will devalue still because green papers are held in skepticism. If you have a legitimate Kotetsu with a green paper, what are you going to do? Put it on ebay? People are going to think it's a fake, or enough will think that it's a fake that it affects the market price.

 

Therefore, if you want to achieve top value, you will convert that legit green paper into the new system. Legitimate swords tend to lose their old papers as a result.

 

If your Kotetsu was already fake, you have this green paper which you can use to sell it to a sucker, or else you need to remove the signature, and now it gets appraised to a much lesser smith, plus it is mumei Shinto, so it is bottom of the barrel value wise for a lower smith. This then tests the moral fiber of the owner, do they do the right thing (remove mei, Hozon it, and sell it with a legit attribution) or do they do the wrong thing (sucker someone into buying it at a higher price, speculating that it might be OK).

 

A lot of people pass their mistakes on to others. There are some blades that have been bouncing around the community with these bad papers for a decade and nobody will eat the mistake and remove the signature and destroy the paper. They all give into greed and try to recover as much of their money as is possible. Because of this, bad blades with old bad papers tend to keep their old bad papers.

 

Over time then the transfer old good swords + good papers -> Hozon system, bad swords + bad papers -> status quo.

 

This is what the monetary incentive is. There are exceptions where a blade may have been out of circulation during the fiasco and is completely legit, it resurfaces then needs to be considered legit even with the old paper. And then there are bad swords that the owner will eat it and do what is necessary, reducing the blade in potential value but giving it an accurate attribution.

 

I bought only one sword in the pat 8 years or so with a green paper and I did what I would advise anyone else to do in this situation. Get a guarantee of Hozon. For me of course it failed to pass, which is just one data point but agrees with the theory. I am selling it as gimei. But I pretty much knew that when I bought it, because of the paper. The guarantee was to just keep my options open and hope for the best, while planning for the worst.

 

That's a good strategy.

 

Anyway one has to look at it as a filter that is constantly running, like a filter in a fish tank. Over time good swords are getting filtered out. There will always be some left, but if the filter keeps running, more and more will be removed from the system.

 

Juyo is something similar, at some point in time they're going to filter out enough that making new Juyo will be very difficult. If you skim the cream off of the milk constantly, eventually you will have all the cream. So Juyo and Tokuju are systems that have an end point. Where that is, is not clear yet.

[Vince6]

OK...the outcome of the mail-in Shin Sa of NTHK turned out to be not passed...They said the blade was re-tempered...Hopefully NTHK will still provide some more information about the sword, even it is not passed.   BTW, what is the possible incentive to re-temper the blade? To make it look like product of other smith or school?

 

Vincent

[paulb]

Dear Vincent

Blades can be easily damaged if they are heated. In a country where buildings were primarily made of wood and paper and where there was almost continual conflict over the centuries fire was a major problem. As a result many blades were damaged in fires. Taking a blade above 500 deg c will destroy the hamon so it was not unusual for blades to be retempered. In Markus Sesko's book on Masamune I think there is at least one  blade that was retempered by Yasutsugu on instruction from the shogun.

The problem with retempering (re-hardening) a blade is that the resultant shape and hamon are no longer the work of the original artist. It is a little like having a severely damaged painting restored by more than 50% by another painter. While it may be competent it isnt original. Therefore it is not regarded as being completely authentic.

I know that very important blades which were fire damaged were retempered. I am guessing that it was also financially preferable to have a sword retempered rather than replaced, which would explain why what might be considered as lesser works might also go through the process.

I am not aware of this being done as an attempt to modify or disguise a work in an attempt to make it look like something better. While not always easy identifying saiha blades is not that difficult to a trained eye and immediately devalues the piece. therefore I doubt it would be undertaken unless it was really needed.

[loui]

Please don't all your faith in the grading system, if you submit a mumei blade 5 different times to the same organization over a period of time you will probably get 2-5 different attributions - i think this has been tested:)  Of course when the blade papers to a higher ranked smith we tend to put more faith into that attribution though.  The fact it was judged as being re-tempered this time around and not on the green papers does lead one to speculate certain things.  As with doctors please do seek a second opinion and then just enjoy the sword and mounts...re-tempered or not.

 

Cheers.

 

louie

[Darcy]

Mail in judgment of retemper... well... it's about worth what you paid for. Maybe right, maybe wrong, it's a leap any time you're dealing with photos instead of the blade. But it would agree with the green papers being sketchy. They will only ever get more sketchy.