Help With Mei

[Inaka no Shonen]

I'm trying to learn ways to determine if a signature is genuine. Just a preliminary assessment to find out if I should have an expert take a look. (Don't need translation, I know it.)

 

Here are my best attempts at photos. I printed out some verified examples and set them beside mine (saw it done online and it looked helpful, the printouts are B&W and not to scale but not too far off.) I see a few strokes that don't match and wonder how much variation is normal. Also, the aoi leaf mon is not present on mine and I wonder if that would indicate gimei.

 

 

 

Here is a link to my original post:

 

http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/26133-not-sure-what-i-have-here/

 

Thanks for having a look!  Scott

[mywei]

Not very familiar with this Smith but from your pic the 水、原、清 characters appear most different to the references provided

[Jacques]

Likely gimei, the two right dots on the ji Kiyo are not well oriented (should be more horizontal) compared with shoshin mei. 

[Geraint]

Dear Scott.

 

As this is a well known smith there will be abundant evidence available however, while comparing mei is useful what does the rest of the sword tell you?  If the sugata is right for the period and the work in the blade corresponds to what you would expect to see from the smith then it's worth showing it to somebody.

 

All the best.

[Surfson]

Are the file marks at a different angle?  The shoshin examples appear to be almost perfectly horizontal and the test tang seems different to me.  

[Vermithrax16]

Side by side comp via Paint. That said, last 2 years have seen many swords/tsuba get NBTHK papers from reference sources I clearly have no idea about, so you just never know.

 

 

[Inaka no Shonen]

Thanks for the responses, especially Vermithrax for working on the Paint image! On my photo I tilted it to the left to avoid glare and that throws off the angles for the file markings and the writing a little. Having it in hand, file markings match up nearly perfect to reference photos.

 

I'll work on finding a way to have someone knowledgeable take a look at it. I've seen an upcoming event in Minneapolis and I could get to that. In the meantime, I'll work on my blade photography and post better shots in my original post (linked above.)  Scott