hiragana?

[John A Stuart]

A fellow was asking about the meaning of this. I told him I could not make sense of it, but that it resembled hiragana. The last kana could be 'no', the second last could be a strange representation of 'ke' and the #2 kana 'ku' with a repeat sign. It really doesn't seem right. Am I wrong? John

 

Oh, and I should add that this is all I have seen of the sword so can not comment elsewise on it. J

[Ted Tenold]

Very contrived looking John. Not even scripted well in my opinion. Very obvious fake and nothing I can make any sense of, but the image isn't good enough to make out better details. I have a feeling that even if it were, it wouldn't change the answer.

[John A Stuart]

I got the same kind of feeling when I saw it. The fellow who asked has been around for awhile and should be able to tell, I would have thought. I wanted to dot the i's and cross the t's, especially after the mei that, when worked back to the origin kanji from kana, turned out to be legitimate. Thanks, Ted. John

 

I have just been told this sword is on e-Bay and a Chinese fake. I was not aware of this as that was all the info I was aware of (the tang shot). Sorry, for wasting time with it. No wonder it made no sense and rang the bells. John