Some thoughts on papers

[Alex A]

Back to Pauls original post, are there actually EXPERIENCED collectors that will buy a sword just because its JUYO ?

 

or is this just INEXPERIENCE ?

[Bugyotsuji]

Alex, if you are surrounded by sword afficionados waving shiny blades and boasting about "Juyo this and Tokuho that", then the average punter will surely want to specify at point of purchase that it must be something to be able to brag about. Human nature, innit?

 

Not everyone is a saint like me.

 

Brag Pitt 

[Alex A]

Alex, if you are surrounded by sword afficionados waving shiny blades and boasting about "Juyo this and Tokuho that", then the average punter will surely want to specify at point of purchase that it must be something to be able to brag about. Human nature, innit?

 

Not everyone is a saint like me.

 

Brag Pitt 

 

Not something I can get my head around, as when you take it home it wont have the same sparkle, and the sparkle wears of fast..

 

Horses for courses.

[paulb]

I think anyone spending large somes of money seeks comfort that someone else rates a blade to a certain level. I guess as you become more experienced and focussed you become more confident in your own opinion. However that is very different to going out with the view to accumulate a large number of juyo certificates.

For my sins I collect swords. Am I happy if a blade I want to buy has a formal attribution from a recognised body? absolutley. Is it the overiding consideration? no not generally.

But we all have to do what we are comfortable with. Pleasure in this activity is taken at all sorts of levels and for different reasons. I think possibly the really importnat things is to understand your motivation and what gives you the greatest emotional return on what you do.

[Alex A]

Well said Paul.

[Darcy]

Honami "Kachu" ... with bad papers... I hope you are not trying to impugn Honami Kochu? If so, I have to say that's simply wrong. Kochu is held as the best and most honest of the Honami judges and what he has indicated during his time is the basis for scholarship now. Since Kachu doesn't directly match up with any particular Honami name maybe I'm interpreting this statement incorrectly. Perhaps you should clarify which Honami you are trying to attack by transliterating the name correctly.

 

Jubi being uniformly bad... again all I can say is this is simply wrong. There are of course many bad Jubi and this is the reason for the status being revoked, but the reason that many of them have high values is not because of the papers. This is the backwards facing beginner's evaluation of why something has value. A Jubi blade that retains high valuation is not because it is Jubi, but because the blade is great and rare and precious first and foremost. It got its Jubi status because of that. It has its valuation for the same reason. A Jubi blade that doesn't have great properties does not have such a high valuation in the market. The majority of Jubi are precious items and there is competition among high level collectors in Japan to get these as a result. Again: not because they are Jubi, but because the underlying blade is in general, precious and rare when they have achieved this level. The vast majority will easily qualify as Juyo and more than half will qualify as Tokuju.

 

The NTHK predates the NBTHK and any handwaving argument about the NBTHK being a monopoly in the 1970s fails to understand that.

 

The situation is then as it is now, the NTHK being a private organization and the NBTHK being a government sponsored organization.

 

There is only one reason to defend green papers in the current day and age: it is because there remains a business of trying to use these to convince people that brass is gold.

 

There is no defense of green papers. The dealer marketplace understands this and laughs at them. The dealer marketplace understands that they are for fools and for people who want to prey on fools.

 

The only ones to have faith in are not big names at all, but only on things cheap enough or unimportant enough that you don't need the paper anyway to make a decision on them. That is, the only green paper that you can have faith in is one that doesn't matter. This doesn't mean that all of them are wrong, it means that the vast majority that exist today are wrong and by simple undeniable mathematics, every tomorrow that comes means that the green papers that are left over are those that cannot be replaced by modern papers as any one that has a good judgment in it is affirmed and overridden on an ongoing basis by a modern paper.

 

When the NBTHK made a blanket disavowment of all remaining green papers a couple of years ago, that was the signal that when that institution turned its back on what remains, every collector should understand the situation. Anyone trying to sell you on a dream is only selling you on a dream.
 

"The facts are that a very solid majority of them are as honest as any papers issued today by any group."

 

That is simply laughable. Those that were reliable have in the majority been replaced by modern papers. No medium to high level dealer in Japan is trying to hock garbage onto their clients using green papers. Any collector of modest to high level education understands the papers are garbage and so any dealer who cares about their reputation will not make such a statement trying to indicate that the majority are reliable. If they attach their reputation to garbage papers like this, then their own reputation becomes garbage.

 

So, you just do not see it because everyone understands the situation. It's for yahoo auctions and people trying to sell brass as gold to fools. Or people who want to sell brass as brass and are not going to exaggerate the situation. The eye test is fine when you're going to be selling a $300 tsuba with an Echizen attribution or an antique koshirae for which the papers say simply that it is antique.

If you want to buy Sukehiro or Masamune on green papers: well you can find 3 green papered Masamune or Go Yoshihiro at any one time on auction sites in Japan. If the vast majority of green papers were reliable those blades would quickly find homes, become Juyo and become parts of top collections. They are out there trying to find idiots with more money than brains.

[Kanenaga]

In my humble estimation, shinsa papers are about two things: validating signatures, and identifying quality. All else is hubris.

[Bob M.]

The vast majority of papers (NBTHK) isuued are Hozon. These give an opinion as to authenticity , nothing more .

 

It is a continuing fallacy , especially by dealers and sellers , that hozon papers are some sort of quality standard. This only starts to happen with Tokubetsu Hozon and above.

 

One may of course decide that authenticating the maker in itself is a guide towards quality - but that is not what Hozon papers actually say.

[paulb]

Bob,

You are right except A Hozon paper is defined as meaning "worthy of preservation" so it confirms autheticity but also that either for quality or historical (or both) it is worth taking care of.

[Bugyotsuji]

I was told that the award of 'higher' ranks (especially recently) depends as much on other factors, such as historical significance, or significance (e.g. turning points) within the working life of a particular smith.

 

In other words, even if a blade is of superior quality, this alone may not be enough to give Tokuhon or Juyo.

[Guido]

I was told that the award of 'higher' ranks (especially recently) depends as much on other factors, such as historical significance, or significance (e.g. turning points) within the working life of a particular smith.

 

In other words, even if a blade is of superior quality, this alone may not be enough to give Tokuhon or Juyo.

 

What you were told is wrong, at least when the NBTHK is concerned, especially in regard to tokuho.

[Bob M.]

Confirms authenticity? I thought that was the NTHK - surely NBTHK give an opinion .

 

This probably seems like splitting hairs but, as they say , the devil is in the detail.

 

Swords or fittings submitted to Shinsa  are to be 'worthy of preservation' as a minimum but in itself that is not a qualifying standard for any particular attribute ( quality , history etc.). It means that the item in question has not disbarred itself from being papered by ,  for instance ,  bearing a gimei signature or in a ruinous state of preservation where it is not possible to determine its characteristics.

 

Any opinion at Hozon level as to quality etc has to be in the eye of the beholder. If you want NBTHK opinions as to quality , you need to submit to a higher level of scrutiny (if that is infact what you get) and papers.

 

Please note - The above are my views , I am not presenting them as facts...

 

Also can anyone remember , did the NBSK intend to provide a basic authentication service without grading ? I would have thought this to be preferable to the naked commercialism of paying way more , even after allowing for the extra work involved, for higher level papers....

[paulb]

Yes Bob again you are right. The NBTHK offer an opinion. It just happens that generally I have thought it worth a lot more than mine! One of the reasons the NTHK tied themsleves in knots in the past was their use of the term "We absolutley Gaurantee this is genuine" which of course nobdy can do. As a result they later always appeared to err on the side of caution in attributions. I don't know if this is still the case or has been anybody's recent experience 

I remember there was some dicussion in the past about the NBSK offering such a service but for a number of reasns it seemed to hit a lot of oposition (not least attacking other bodies income stream I would guess) and hence I dont think it got started.

[Hoshi]

Any opinion at Hozon level as to quality etc has to be in the eye of the beholder. If you want NBTHK opinions as to quality , you need to submit to a higher level of scrutiny (if that is infact what you get) and papers.

 

 

Attribution is the foremost statement of quality. A low quality iron Tsuba won't come back as Hozon Nobuie, nor will a poor sword return as Hozon Bizen Yoshifusa. In some cases there is substantial uncertainty and there are many good ideas on who could have made it, and then it's even more closely interlocked with a quality assessment. What is true is that judgements at Hozon level are more likely to be conservative and broad and map on quality buckets, and its an invitation for further study. 

 

So here is another variant of the maxim: Buy (and understand...) the quality assessment, not the paper

[Gakusee]

Bob, Paul

Let us not get bogged into semantics. Both NBTHK and NTHK certificates are the opinions of very learned people about swords and represent consensual views as to who might have made them. The NBTHK is said/believed to ascribe heavier weight on historic provenance, heritage and artistic aspects whilst the NTHK is believed to weigh more heavily indeed the state of preservation. Both institutions’ certificates are taken by collectors to indicate [a degree of] authenticity (in a rather broad sense I am afraid to say) and indeed if the sword has a counterfeit signature (gimei) it will not paper with it unless in very specific and rare circumstances (eg Muramasa does come to mind). However, we need to note the consensual nature of the annotation by the appraisal panel and if there is some disagreement, then the word “den” might get inserted to indicate the smith’s proximate circle/students or even the smith himself (with small deviations from stereotype) , or a school attribution could be given or one of several, equally plausible answers. If by “authentic” you mean genuinely Japanese and made in the traditional way, well yes, that could be said of the certificates. If you mean “made by that specific smith”, well that is also subject to interpretation as there are still arguments about how many generations of a smith existed, or even whether a smith made that given work or it was one of his best students (happens a lot in Rai, Bizen esp in Osafune and Hizen). So, we need to be careful how we use the word “authentic” and what is meant by it. It might simply mean “the most plausible, consensually attained view agreed upon by the panel” rather than “made by that specific smith”. 
 

I also have noticed, as Guido might be implying, that historical significance and importance of the blade starts to weigh more towards the upper tiers of appraisal (not so much TokuHo). But again, this is a dangerous ground to tread, since historic blades or those owned by important historic figures were owned by such due to their high quality in the first place. No one would give a daimyo a sword with an ugly fukure or cracked etc. So, perhaps these blades ended up with the daimyo because of their supreme quality to start with (and of course, made by the top smiths of the day and before). Well known are the stories of shogun retainers traversing the land and inspecting daimyo collections for appropriate gifts for next time the shogun decided to pay them a visit. Therefore, one cannot just conclude that a TJ is such simply because it had daimyo provenance - perhaps it had daimyo provenance because it was a superb blade made by a top smith. However, I have also noticed that all things being equal in terms of quality (well, approximately), daimyo provenance gives an edge in J/TJ, and so does the presence of a mei (contributes to the degree of preservation factor of assessment). 
 

Perhaps what Piers was trying to say was that a turning point in the career of the smith, eg signified by how he signed or where he moved, indicated a certain level of quality. For instance, Kiyomaro blades, ceteris paribus, would in the eyes of experienced collectors be more valuable than Masayuki blades, since Kiyomaro was more skilled when he signed with that mei, whilst a Masayuki mei was placed on a blade when he was younger, less experienced and not at the peak of his skill. One could go on with similar examples, smiths gaining titles etc. 
 

On Bob’s question about NBSK certificates, yes I have seen them and they look very good. Given out for contemporary smith’s oeuvre. See here: https://nbsk-jp.org/syoumeisho_top/syoumeisho_haikei/
 

[paulb]

Hi Michael,

Thank you. Views are very clear and make a lot of sense. If nothing else I think the ongoing discssion helps confirm some of the orignal points (maybe I'm being optimistic). But the greater the complexity in attempting to understand what a paper is actually telling you the more important it is that you understand what you are looking at and looking for. To state the obvious two blades with the same level of attribution, i.e. Hozon TH or whatever can be miles apart in quality. At the risk of being even more boring than usual The important thing is the sword, The paper is hopefully confirmation of what you are seeing.

[vajo]

Sorry my stupid question. Where is the difference between two swords from the same smith one with Hozon one without paper?

 

I asked this because papering is expensive and not easy. It costs from here in Germany the price of a good Tsuba for getting hozon.

 

I'm a paying NBTHK Member. I'm not asking for highly papered swords. Only for the tier that many of us have in possesion. 

 

If the question is to stupid please forgive me.

[paulb]

Chris

I don't think it is a stupid question just one that is difficult to answer. It depends so much on who the smith is.

Speaking as a non dealer I can only give perception but regarding the market today

1. A paper will make a sword more saleable. 

2. If they are by a well regarded smith it becomes more importannt the blade should have gone through some form of authentication (fakers wouldn't usually spending time faking unpopular or low value smiths)

3. An unpapered blade in some markets would be priced on the assumption it was gimei or certainly be more difficult to sell

[Jussi Ekholm]

I can't really add much thoughts on this as there has been some very good posts written already.

 

However I would think that the Japanese organizations are mainly focused on Japanese sword collecting in Japan, they might not totally understand how many collectors there are outside Japan too (although we are still very small in number). As I do personally feel that the shinsa fees are actually quite low (NBTHK Hozon 25,000 Yen, NTHK-NPO shinsa 17,000 Yen). If living in Japan I would absolutely spend 25,000 Yen to get an informed opinion of any given sword.

 

Of course it is completely different ballgame if you are sending your sword for shinsa from outside Japan, as then it gets lot more complicated. You and the organizations have to go by Japanese laws and you'll need an agent (or someone else) to handle the sword through the required hoops to get your sword from you to the shinsa and back to you. We have many great guys that are doing this favor for international collectors as they provide the service for us that would otherwise be unreachable.

[vajo]

Thanks Paul and Jussi.

I view on this only as a european collector. If i can buy a papered sword for a reasonable price i would take it, yes. But from my point i would not pay the price that papering costs from sending it from here to Japan. Thats the reason why i run in this circle. If i would be a "serious" collector who buys only top tier swords if would go fully with that argument. Paper it. If a sword costs 15k Dollar+ the price for papering is not really an argument. But if you had a low level sword (not low quality) and you must pay 25% more for a papered sword i would buy that with no paper.

Someone told me buy one good sword not ten medium or low level swords. Yes its true but i would not feel sure with one top level sword. I think its like owning a Ferrari or a 3er BMW M3. The Ferrari makes fun on some days a year. But with a normal priced car you can have fun every day.    Thats stupid - I know.

 

Btw I feel really honored knowing you guys. You all have so much more knowledge and experience and i learned every day reading here. And after all, i fall back in my old pattern and buy not the high tier swords. 

[Alex A]

Chris, if you can buy what you like and what you can afford, you will never be disappointed.

[Ganko]

Variety has been called the spice of life and  I would rather have an assortment of good josaku swords by makers from different schools than one juyo piece.

[Rivkin]

I think one of the big choices to be faced in life is whether to follow what one reads or what one sees.

Repeating what is written is a safe choice. In the worst case one shares being mistaken with many others. Following what one sees runs into danger of acting on incomplete or misinterpreted information. But its a fun choice, and tends to yeild right results in the long turn.

 

So I can only comment on my personal observations. If others have different statistics, it will be interesting to compare, and I am looking forward to learning new numbers.

 

1. NTHK - one very seldom sees any paper by them issued prior to 1980s. Given its history, one would expect it to play bigger role in the paper market, especially in the very early yeas, but whatever the reason, this is simply not the case. Today NTHK combined has about 5-15% of the market, in 1970s it looks like it was 0.1%. The international outreach may have been the crucial choice in NTHK history.

 

2. I can't say anything for green papers with shinto names - I am bad in kantei for this period, and don't have a lot of experience with them. But green with mid range koto names with a very great probability will repaper to something roughly the same. I am puzzled when people are concerned with papers to Kaifu Muromachi "because they are green". Look at the blade. What are your concerns about it?

Koto the very top names - with substantial probability will repaper notch down. Irregardless wheather its the head office; absolutely the same goes for the blue papers; same goes for Dr. Sato's sayagaki, except in this case I would MAYBE replace "substantial probability" by "reasonable probability". I personally would estimate the validity of juyo judgements from the period as "substantially worse" than that of Dr. Sato's sayagaki, and at about the same level as other papers to the same names.

 

Practical case in point:

https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/k466533601

 

What do you call in "modern paper language" Dr. Sato's sayagaki and green papers to Soshu Yukimitsu? Yamato Taima.

 

But one very seldom repapers Juyo - so its hard to back up the conclusion with hard date. I can make a bet regarding some particular pieces, but that's about it. Well, it went what - to three volumes per yearly shinsa and then suddenly to one thin booklet? I certainly have the two volume years on my shelf, but too lazy to check whether my recollection of three volume version is right.

This being said, I did not have either green or blue repapering in a different ballpark. Very substantial portion of the let downs were due to choices made relatively recently by NBTHK to not paper to Hasebe, for example, any tanto with kasane above certain thickness. Shimada it goes, or Tsunahiro if its more along his style. This also creates a rift with NTHK papers, where the shinsa team(s) do not have a similar strong rule. Which can be interpreted as the modern (2005-present) NBTHK shinsa being overly conservative. Or not. If you buy Muramasa with NTHK you have to be aware the criteria used for judging him differ from those used by the current NBTHK.

I am not going (qualified?) to argue here which one is right - in part because it sort of needs to be analyzed case by case and arguments for each judgement to be presented. 

I will just note that it is often omitted that dealing with NBTHK can be long, hard and unpleasant. Dealing with Japanese customs can be randomly long, unpleasant and hard. To send the sword out of the country is sort of ok, because there is a well known procedure and paperwork. To get the sword in, sometimes does not work out as you expect.

All while NTHK NPO essentially gives you one day turnaround judgement. In the US shinsa - with a possibility of more extensive explanations, which really helps folks with failed submissions.

 

3. Any Honami papers produced prior to 1690 is a rarity among rarities. One very seldom owns one. One actually seldom sees one. There is no uniform opinion regarding how some of those should even look like, i.e. what can be accepted as authentic. 1700-1735 - everybody who wants to own one can really get one "right away", with Juyo blade or not. Its a question of money, not of luck. Similarly, there are plenty of them in historical, unaltered collections, where they reside from the moment they were written.

These are the papers largely responsibly for the Masamune craze. 

The craze, which in terms of the "ten students" legend does not seem to be let go by the "united choir" of the nihonto world.

 

Kirill R.

[Gakusee]

Kirill

 

So on the green papers, perhaps we could sort of agree that for innocuous middling or low level smiths there is hardly much danger in having the paper, PROVIDED THAT the buyer/user is experienced enough to know what they are doing. Forgers make a lot of money from the mid to top named smiths, and not your usual chusaku smith. The green papers are disavowed, but for someone who is experienced and good at kantei, one could buy such a green papered sword , as though it was not papered, relying purely on one’s own skills and not the paper. In other words, own knowledge, skill and discerning eye lead the way. 

The danger comes when inexperienced collectors place reliance on the disavowed green papers and then get disappointed due to their lack of understanding of what they have bought  and sole reliance put on [potentially] fake green papers. That is what we are trying to clarify and this is where the nexus of what Paul is saying (buy the sword, not the papers, provided you know what you are doing) and your long-winded response. 

However, I cannot at all agree that green papers are as honest as any other papers or that JuBi are more questionable than green papers. As Darcy has explained and in line with the law of diminishing returns, as people have repapered most of the legitimate green-papered swords, you are increasingly more likely left with the fakes. It is simple statistics. 
Also, JuBi have their bad apples in there but these swords are rarer and usually still of great quality, even where there might be an attribution overstatement. Furthermore, from one of the biggest collectors in Japan and the world, someone who owns kokuho, JuBu and JuBi , I have heard that his own estimate is that around 30% of JuBi are questionable. And when someone owns 15,000 swords, you listen to him as he has the empirical data right there in his own warehouse with swords. In my view these [30% unreliable / 70% reliable] are still better odds than the green papers. 
 

Next, you make the statement that green papered assessments today will paper a notch down from the green papered appraisal. What about Brano’s Naotsuna (see thread http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/32065-blade-attribute-den-naotsuna-genuine-koto-or-not/?do=findComment&comment=331189)? I dare say Naotsuna is several notches down from Masamune. A notch down in my book will be Go, Yukimitsu, Norishige, Kaneuji. 
 

Onto Sato Kanzan sensei. Well, we all know that: 1) his sayagaki have been forged very skilfully many times (refer to Brano’s sword again in the linked thread above); and 2) even if the sayagaki is genuine, it is not that difficult to adapt the saya to fit a different sword. So, one can have a perfectly legitimate sayagaki fitted onto a fake sword pretending to be what the sayagaki describes. 
 

Onto the Taema / Yukimitsu example on Yahoo Japan. Well, personally when I looked at the photos, to me they indicated some Yamato blade even without reading the detail. I just didn’t get the feeling of refinement that comes from Yukimitsu plus that big, unusual, un-Yukimitsu o-kissaki of a nagamaki blade construction (very, very atypical for the smith although a handful of Yukimitsu examples exist). But also, we know that some Taema blades look very much like one of the styles of Yukimitsu and vice versa. One needs to look very clearly for supremely fine hada, clear jigane and rich nie to differentiate the two. And then for subtleties like the size of kissaki, the mune etc. 

I have to say that example was a bit disingenuous. 

[Alex A]

Variety has been called the spice of life and  I would rather have an assortment of good josaku swords by makers from different schools than one juyo piece.

 

Don't forget, there are some excellent swords by chu-jo rated smiths too

[Hoshi]

Next, you make the statement that green papered assessments today will paper a notch down from the green papered appraisal. What about Brano’s Naotsuna (see thread http://www.militaria...ot/#entry331189)? I dare say Naotsuna is several notches down from Masamune. A notch down in my book will be Go, Yukimitsu, Norishige, Kaneuji. 

 

It's Oei Den Naotsuna, which means second or third generation. So that's two more notches down. The Sayagaki is fake, that seller only sells fakes. You can't generalized your experience on Sayagaki by sampling from Yahoo JP. That "Hasebe" you mention must have came up in the fakery mill as "MASTER WORK HEIRLOOM OF HIROMITSU" and Hasebe would be indeed, one notch down. The fact that it comes down as Mumei Sue-Soshu is basically third-rate and, I dare say, a disaster. Now you can say the system is rotten and your blade is really a Hasebe, and here are all the anecdotes which constitutes proof, or roll the dice with NTHK, NTHK-NPO, FUJISHIRO, and basically "p-hack it" as much as you can, to use the academic expression, until the desired result comes out. But I don't think that's a very wise path to thread, but the results are interesting nonetheless.  

 

The seller that sold the "Masamune" and fakes Sayagaki also makes acid polish on all his blades. And that's something one needs to live with. 

 

Koto the very top names - with substantial probability will repaper notch down.

 

Extraordinary claims do require extraordinary evidence. I would like to see a few of of those "one notch down" blades you found in Green Papers. It's a very dangerous notion to be promulgating here and the sort of claims which generally serves only the self-interest of sellers of green-papered blades. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. It may be the case you really found some "one notch down" pieces at a fraction of their worth, but that's risky business and not something we should be clamoring in case beginners read it the wrong way without the proper caveats. 

 

I personally would estimate the validity of juyo judgements from the period as "substantially worse" than that of Dr. Sato's sayagaki, and at about the same level as other papers to the same names.

 

I'm not sure I'm understanding this correctly. Do you imply here that Juyo Judgements, from the weaker sessions (~19-24), are less reliable than Sato's Sayagaki, which are less reliable than ...Green papers? That's the world upside-down. I mean this with the most respect, and I am a big fan of your books on Eastern Weapons. But some of the assertions you provide here, with the authority you carry from a different field, can lead to substantial confusion among less advanced students, and big mistakes down the road. 

[paulb]

 

Members

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Posted Yesterday, 10:20 PM

I think one of the big choices to be faced in life is whether to follow what one reads or what one sees.

 

Well funnily enough I do both on the basis that within the books I read there is a great deal of information written by people who have spent their lives studying swords that I don't have access to. I have also taken the opportunity to study every good quality sword I have been able to see over rather more years than I care to remember, although I accept I havent had access to some of the collections you appear to have enjoyed.

Regardless of this and what is becoming a challenge to war and peace in both length and tedium can we actually draw a conclusion along the lines:

1. At all levels and throughout history there have been papers with inaccurate attributions.

2. Some of these were errors others deliberate attempts to mislead.

3. While green papers for lesser works may and I say MAY be valid those attributing blades to high level smiths have been discredited by both the authority that originated them and the vast majority of the market. Because of this the safest course of action was just to say Green papers are not valid. period.

3. As in all fields of art and antiques it is important to gain knowledge and experience and seek alternative opinions when making a buying decision. A modern paper offers another opinion.

[Mark C]

Great topic Paul and very interesting reading.

 

After reading through I remembered a mumei Tanto in my collection that has an  NBTHK Kicho paper (white) issued in 1979.

The paper attributes the tanto to Aizu Kanetomo (school, I’m assuming).

 

I had sort of forgotten about the paper as I regarded them as not reliable.

 

What are people’s thoughts on NBTHK Kicho (White) papers?

[paulb]

Hi Mark

I really dont know. All the negative comment I have heard have been around green and blue papers no-one seems to have mentioned white before. At least I haven't heard anything. Maybe it was like the point made earlier about green papers to lower level smiths it wasn't worth faking them

I believe  the NBTHK pulled the plug on the whole system and then introduce the newer version that we are familar with today. Their offer to repaper any previous submissions was not limited to green papers I think it covered any.

While the white papers may be correct I think they would still fall in to the "Without value" grouping as the others.

[Mark C]

Thanks Paul,

 

I will keep it with the Tanto as I consider it part of the swords history.

 

I'm not to worried about having it re papered as I didn't pay much for it and it just would not make financial sense to send it to Japan.

 

If any Shinsa group ever comes to the UK again I will put it in.