UNUSUAL DAGGER - MADE IN Japan FOR CHINA?

[vajo]

Cool Tanto. It's an old one in a nice koshirae.

[MarcoUdin]

Too bad the second one looks like it has a gimei Umetada Myoju signature 

[Bruce Pennington]

The plot thickens, with a signed (Katsumasa?) blade and saya that looks legit.  Posted by Newrem at Guns.ru HERE.

[Bruce Pennington]

Others posted by Newrem:

Is that a registration paper??? which of course can be faked, and this is another one using a kabutogane for a sayajiri.

 

[Brian]

Sword shop could offer anything you wanted. If you had a short blade, and wanted short fittings...cash is king. They would do it for you.
Private purchase means guys did whatever they felt like. Doesn't seem like the rules were very strict.
As for the first one...the Katsumasa, I'd like to know if it has a boshi. Looks like a snapped and remounted long sword to me. I don't see many short Showato with arsenal stamps.

[Bruce Pennington]

2 hours ago, Brian said:

As for the first one...the Katsumasa, I'd like to know if it has a boshi. Looks like a snapped and remounted long sword to me. I don't see many short Showato with arsenal stamps.

That was my feeling too, on both points.

[Shamsy]

Just a suggestion, Bruce. Take it or leave it. But there is a thread specifically on wakizashi and tanto mounted for military use. I think it's (unfortunately) called 'Crew/Pilot swords' or something like that. Would these example be better added to that existing thread so they are all in one place?

 

I've always been keen on trying to make some reasonably 'clean' (free from excessive posts) master threads for some areas of sword collecting, but whether through memory, difficulty finding them or other complications, we seem to end up with new threads that fill with info and examples then eventually get a link to the previous thread before in turn being forgotten. 

[Bruce Pennington]

Well, I agree with you on that, but most of these started as fakes and only the last couple or so have turned out to be legitimate. I could add the legitimate ones over on that thread, certainly.

[Bruce Pennington]

Just got the reply from Newrem at Guns.ru.  He said the photos are from another source and the blades aren't his, but his theory is that, at least for the Katsumasa, it came from a broken sword like the one in the famous picture:

 

At least in the Katsumasa case, he may be onto the answer.

[Ontario_Archaeology]

This thread reminds me of the short gunto thread that was active a while ago. There are some good examples posted there that have not been posted here yet. 

 

I am also looking for a blade for a short gunto koshirae that I purchased, more information in the wanted to buy section. 

 

[Bruce Pennington]

5 hours ago, Ontario_Archaeology said:

short gunto thread

BINGO!  That's the thread I had tried to dig up, unsuccessfully!  Now I'm going to have to re-post these new ones over there.  Not so hard, now that I know how to copy and paste a post-link! 

 

Thanks Matt!

[Bruce Pennington]

Found another of the "015728" fake knives at this Brand Used Works auction

[Bruce Pennington]

@SteveM @BANGBANGSAN @Kiipu

 

Any translation on the dagger above, or just gibberish?

 

@John C

Just to stir the pot a little, I was chatting with John about the fact that part of the 8th Army PX order for over 8,000 souvenir swords included 1,200 "daggers."  No one has ever proposed what these "daggers" might have been.  (I wasn't even aware of their inclusion in the order until last week).  John reminded me of these things and I've started wondering.

 

Pro:  1. Like the souvenir sword, these daggers mix army and navy; and 2. The ito wrap folds alternate correctly for a Japanese item (as opposed to the very common same-direction wrap we see on Chinese fakes); 3.  I initially assumed the "daggers" referred to would be Navy dirks, BUT the whole reason for the souvenir design was to get around the 1946 order banning the shipping of "war trophies".  The mix of army/navy fittings clearly took the swords out of the mil-spec military weapon category.  If the PX intended to sell standard Navy Dirks they would be considered military weapons and be illegal for shipping.  The daggers in this thread with mixed fittings, however could not be called War Trophies and would be legal to ship.

 

I'm not saying I'm convinced of all this, but ..... 

 

Thoughts?

[BANGBANGSAN]

9 minutes ago, Bruce Pennington said:

Any translation on the dagger above, or just gibberish?

 

小野繁應   Ono Shigeo 

Or

小野繁慶 Ono Shigeyoshi 

 

 

 

[PNSSHOGUN]

Nothing about these suggests manufacture in Japan. Why would they take the time to make new casting molds of existing parts they would have tonnes of? Let alone making them so poorly.

 

Love you Bruce but it might be time to take a step back on this one, there are better things in life to be pondering about than chinese crap!