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New Member Introductions


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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Greetings to all,

 

Happy to see so many people here that have extensive knowledge on these magnific treasures. I am probably the newest member to join NMB although have followed as a guest for a while. I have been keenly interested on Japanese culture since I was a young boy and as a outdoors/military person I have also been interested in sharp and pointy objects, and probably from the day my grandfather taught me how to make whistles with out traditional Finnish puukko. :)

 

My own collecting of nihonto has started just few years ago, 6 if I remember it correctly and have few katana-sized and some wakizashi-sized blades. Eras respectively from Muromachi to Showa. Have also picked up some fittings during my collection sprees.

 

I am also quite interested in polishing and restoration of nihonto so I have slowly started to acquiring of "junk" blades to practice on, hoping to be able to keep these pieces of history in presentable condition one day. (in 20-30 years from now probably... ;) )

 

But there, "short" and sweet.

 

Glad to be here!

 

Antti Mäkinen

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Welcome Antti,

We have a few Finnish members here, so you are in good company.

Good advice is to avoid the whole subject of amateur polishing. We are pretty rabid about trained polishing only ;)

Enjoy, and hope we can be of help with your collecting.

 

Brian

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello,

 

my name is Jan, 40 years old, and I am looking around trying to get educated on Japanese Swords.

 

I will try to refrain myself from posting when I have no clue and try to advise about things I do know about, like IT systems and software.

 

My current collection consists exactly of one book, "The Connoisseurs Book of Japanese Swords", which I bough while it was still in print. Maybe one day I will be able to get myself a sword or other related pieces of art. But to do so, there is still a lot to learn. Well, and money to earn :-)

 

 

Regards,

Jan N.

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Long time interest in Nihonto, and hope to be making my first purchase from a friend of mine who is a collector. I have studied JSA for a little while now, and am actually hoping to start a Sengoku Jidai living history group. I've been reenacting various time periods since 2001. Looking forward to new things to learn!

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Hi Alex..thanks a lot for your warm welcome.

Yes...i do have one nihonto in my 'radar' and will post here soon so i can get opinion,critic,advice or sugestion from all members here before i make decision to buy it or not.

Sorry for my 'bad English' and have a nice weekend....

Teo

 

 

Welcome Teo, you will find much useful information here and members are (almost) always willing to offer an opinion. Have you any ideas for your first sword? Good luck collecting!
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  • 3 weeks later...

I never did a proper introduction in 2007 when I first signed up and only left one post. Now I'm back.

 

I started studying Nihonto around 1990 when I bought Leon Kapps' book, 'The Craft of the Japanese Sword. Throughout the 90's I owned various antique blades and made friends with a few other collectors along the way. Then in 2000 I sold off my collection for two reasons, first to buy my first house I needed a good size deposit and the swords were an easy way to cover it. Second I was feeling like I was getting in over my head, I was starting to get emails from collectors offering me swords in excess of $25k! Seems that most of the collectors I knew were doctors, lawyers, or dentists and had way more disposable income than I did. Recently I've been training in the Martial Arts again, I'm a black belt in Hapkido, but now I'm focused on Aikido, Iaido, and Jodo which has re-awoken my dormant love for the Japanese sword. Now I find myself looking for a good quality Shinken as I've never owned a true Japanese Samurai Sword of the modern era, only Samurai "style" swords.

 

Thanks in advance for putting up with my questions in the other threads regarding how to buy from Japan.

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Hello everybody. I am new here. I renewed my interest in swords when a few weeks ago I wondered what I'd done with my humble aquisitions of twenty years ago. Well, I finally found them, and discovered quickly after looking at them that I was in fact the famous Jack in the beanstalk guy who trades beans for cows. Oh well. The good thing is that now, thanks to this forum and a growing pile of books, I'm starting to actually learn (I hope). Thanks for having me here.

My name's John Irwin

I'm 64 years old and I live in New Jersey

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As a lurker here I thought I might of gleaned some of the basics of understanding tsuba manufacture, but how I was wrong.

 

I recently acquired one for a song. The patina seemed ok so I though, "What the heck." Seemingly unremarkable, under a jeweler's monocle at 40x magnification it became to clear to me just how skilled the people who manufactured these objects were/are. It's maru gata with kozuka hitsu ana, an unsigned, worn flat disc of iron about 68mm in diameter about 2mm thick and has the most amazingly detailed inlays I could to have ever imagined - a mixture of gold and brass on one side and silver on the other, it seems to me. I shall endeavour to post some pictures when in daylight again tomorrow and hope I can do this object some justice. And hope you experts might be able to enlighten me as it's origin. I have searched some sources but remain utterly clueless as to where, when and by whom it could have been made.

 

Until then I wish to thank you all for sharing your knowledge so freely and passing the bug onto me.

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