WWII Sword Exchange Assoc. word meaning?

[george trotter]

Dear all,

 I was talking to Bruce last year about an ink "mon" stamp on the hilt wood of a WWII Type 98 gunto I have. We were wondering about what "sword shop" this mon represented as no "number three in a circle" mon appear in any advertisments in the 1942 Japanese Sword Trade book "Dai Nihon Token Shoko Meikan". Since then I have found the mon in Hawleys "Mon" book 1976 p.89, and it is the mon of the MITSUHASHI family. I went back to the DNTSM and found that there is only one name in the book...this is MITSUHASHI TORANOSUKE listed as a member of a Tokyo (Ueno) "HACH NO HI TOKEN KOKAN KAI" ( (I attach  page 200 from this book) .which I translate as the "8 Day Sword Exchange Assoc.". which meets every month on the 8th, 18th and 28th .

This page advertises the 41 members' names and on the bottom line (2 from left) is MITSUHASHI TORANOSUKE.

As this name appears here and the Mitsuhashi mon appears on my sword wood and I know that the sword owner Lt KUME was in the 32nd Division raised in the Tokyo area, I am tempted to assume that this Mr Mitsuhashi who was a dealer/mounter/or? there in WWII Tokyo is the person who put this mon ink stamp on my sword wood.

 

My question to the NMB knowledgeable is ...can you tell me what an "Exchange" is? What it does? what type of sword related people are in them?

I'm sure Bruce would like to know this also.

I'd be interested in your ideas and replies....

Regards to all.

[Nobody]

My guess,

That is an auction market regularly held mainly by dealers.

[Bruce Pennington]

Nice find, George! Just another reminder of how multi-faceted, many-layered the sword world was in WWII.  On the government side - military staff meetings to decide on new types, to Emperor Edits authorizing them and the magazine announcements making them official, to Uniform Regulations, to Arsenal operations including blade production, acquisition, inspection, distribution, and nationwide marketing efforts to obtain civil swords.  Then you have the civil side of sword smiths, sword smith associations, sword shops and their associations, then large oversight associations, and now sword exchange associations!  Oh, and Exhibitions.  And that's just scratching the surface.

 

Sorry, got my mind seeing all the complexities!  But when I hold one of these swords, I often wonder how many lives were involved in bringing it to be.  

[Bruce Pennington]

On another note, I'll find a way to add this to the sword industry stamps we have from Chris Bowen in the Stamps doc.  Unless we get more information, seems I can only say of it "Mitsuhashi" - member of the 8 Day Sword Exchange Association, likely a dealer. ?  Or do you think it's too early?

[george trotter]

Hi Bruce san and Moriyama san,

Thank you both. 

I think it might be as Koichi san says...a regular meeting of dealers to buy/sell goods to each other  so they can acquire stock  and later sell them on  to officers.

Maybe those bought by dealer Mitsuhashi were assembled/repaired/mounted in his shop and the shop mon was put on the finished hilt just to confirm it as Mitsuhashi product when they later sold it on.

And Bruce, that mon pic and that name Mitsuhashi is OK to put together on your stamps list....but maybe best to wait a little while in case some extra/different info comes in?

 

Lots of fun....

Regards

 

 

[Nobody]

Frankly, I have doubts about your theory.

 

Just to confirm, the second picture is saying that the crest is used by Fujikake and Mitsuhashi families? I found that the crest is used by more than 50 families. BTW, 三橘 does not read Mitsuhashi but Mitsutachibana.

Ref. 丸に三文字紋（まるにさんもじ）：家紋のいろは (irohakamon.com)

 

Is the mark in the first picture really a family crest? That might be a trademark of a shop or mere memo. Trademarks and family crests are different. I do not think that a shop owner uses his private family crest as the shop’s trademark. The mark in the first picture and the crest in the second picture look different to me.

 

Therefore, there is no evidence that Mitsuhashi Toranosuke has something to do with the mark or the gunto you have.

[george trotter]

Thanks for that careful analysis Moriyama san. What you say and your evidence shows that the link between the sword and the "Mitsuhashi" sword dealer/mounting craftsman is too uncertain, so I will remove it from my file and just leave it as a "possible" connection.

Thanks for your feedback - it is best to be careful about these things.

Regards.

[Bruce Pennington]

On the point of using a mon as a shop logo.  I'm no mon expert but it seems many of the ones listed by Chris Bowen could have been mon:

Japanese SWORD COMPANY LOGOS (japaneseswordindex.com)

 

 

I see all the points made, though, and will keep it listed as "unknown".

 

Thanks Moriyama-san and George-san for working this one over.  

[george trotter]

Thanks for that list Bruce/Chris...those are the shop logos I referred to when I was forming my "theory", based mainly on that list having both a "number 1 in a circle" and an "number 8 in a circle" which made me then think maybe my ink stamp of "number 3 in a circle" fitted this list quite well.

My mistake was to not notice that the Hawley book has either mistranslated the kanji of Mitsitachibana* as Mitsuhashi, or Hawley's printer has put the wrong kanji of 'tachibana' instead of 'hashi'.

Because there is this kanji 'difference' I cannot claim that the Mitsuhashi dealer listed in the 1942 book is this Mitsuhashi in Hawley.

So, best to leave it as 'unknown' as you say Bruce.

On Moriyama san's point about the ink stamp NOT being a  mon, I just cannot say for sure...maybe the best I can say is that while the "number 1 in a circle" ink stamp is not a 'proper' printed mon, it is the same 'massage' as the mon. I just thought the mounting guy or mounting shop guy just used a rubber ink stamp of his/the shop's logo as a 'marker' for his/the shop's work. The best we can do to maybe get some 'evidence' on which is correct is wait for another such ink stamp to turn up on another WWII gunto sword mounting...maybe one never will.

 

*BTW...I looked everywhere but could not find the name MITSUTACHIBANA. Can someone post it from a book/source please? I ask this as if we cannot find the name Mitsutachibana in any Japanese name book, it might mean that the "problem" here is that Hawley's printer inserted the wrong kanji for "hashi",  using "tachibana" instead by mistake.

 

Regards to all.

 

[Nobody]

三橘 (Mitsutachibana) is an improbable family name.

But there is a family crest whose name is Mitsutachibana.

Ref. 三つ橘紋（みつたちばな）：家紋のいろは (irohakamon.com)

[george trotter]

That is interesting Moriyama san...what do you think about the number 3 in a circle mon image above taken from Hawley's Mon book?

Do you think it is likely to be the mon of the Mitsuhashi family?

Or is it likely to be the mon of the Mitsutachibana family?

Or do you think Hawley maybe put in the kanji for Tachibana as a mistake and he really meant to put in the kanji for Hashi?

Regards...

[Nobody]

As far as I know,

1. The mon is used MANY families. And most of them do not have “三” in their family names. Mitsuhashi family is only one of them.

2. As I said before, I do not think that Mitsutachibana is a family name.

3. I do not know why Hawley write 三橘 there. Only a typo?

 

IMO, I do not understand why we must stick to Mitsuhashi name in this situation.

[george trotter]

Thanks for your quick reply Moriyama san.

1. yes I understand that Mitsuhashi is only one of about 50 names who used this mon.

2. OK, good. I was wondering about Mitsutachibana as I could not find the name anywhere.

3. Yes, I think Hawley made a typo and the name IS Mitsuhashi.

 

The reason I brought this topic up is that since this mon IS the mon of the name Mitsuhashi (only one of c. 50 who used it) and Mitsuhashi is a name actually listed in the 1942 book as a dealer/craftsman in Tokyo where 2nd Lt KUME joined the 32nd Division in 1939-1942 and the ink trade-mark/mon is seen on his sword mounts, I "concluded' that there is a good chance that Kume's sword was mounted/polished/sold from this Mitsuhashi Toranosuke's business premises in Tokyo during 1939-1942.

I know this is not proved, but it is a good possibility and is worth making a note of it for my sword file.

 

Thanks for noticing the error with the kanji (I missed it) and yes, I agree that the ink stamp is very poor image of the actual mon, but I think this is because it was maybe only used as "parts ID mark" by that particular dealer.

Regards...

 

 

[Nobody]

You might misunderstand another point.

Mitsuhashi is one of families uses the mon (丸に三文字). But it does not mean that all Mitsuhashi families use the same mon. According to the linked page, a representative mon used by Mitsuhashi family is 兎紋 (Usagi-mon).

Ref. 【兎】兎紋一覧（うさぎ）：家紋のいろは (irohakamon.com)

 

Family crests and family names are many-to-many relationships.

We do not know the mon Mitsuhashi Toranosuke used.

[george trotter]

Yes, I understand what you say...I did see that usagi mon also. But just as it is possible Mitsuhashi Toranosuke the dealer using the usagi mon or some other mon is that it is equally possible that he did use the number 3 in a circle mon.

It is for this reason that I think it is reasonable to put a note in my sword file that this sword may have been mounted/sold by Mitsuhashi Toranosuke the dealer of Tokyo 1939-1942.

This is an equally reasonable position to take isn't it?

Regards...

[Nobody]

OK, let's agree to disagree.

I simply think that there are little bases to say something.

 

[george trotter]

OK that's fine. Please remember, this is just  a "possible" link - and will only be for my private notes. I will not be claiming this is correct on NMB.

Regards...

[Bruce Pennington]

What we are doing is detective work.  Until the mon showed up, all we had was the ink stamp on a tsuka.  That picture gets pinned to the top of our detective cork board.  But for a long while the board is otherwise empy..  Then a single lead comes in, in the form of the mon with two names.  It gets pegged to the board with a string between the two.  It is now our only lead.  So we pursue it.  Are there any sources of of names in the sword business that have either Fujikake or Mitsuhashi in them?  Bingo!  One with Mitsuhashi shows up!  Picture gets pinned to the board with a string.  Now investigation starts into Mitsuhashi.  But, now we have counter-evidence that the name might have been mistranslated.  "?" goes off the end ot that line.  But a parallel line starts with a post-it note that a Mitsuhashi DID use that mon.  End of current movement on the investigation.

 

Why don't we assume it was Fujikake's mon on the tsuka and chase that?  No evidence to chase.  Why don't we chase other Mitsuhashi guys?  No evidence to chase.

 

So, the board stands as is until new evidence comes in.

 

We know highly valued reference source writers have made errors in their work, based off newer information.  So, what we've discussed is no shocker.  The logo could actually be of the Three Dragons Forge for all we know.  But we have no evidence to chase in that direction.

So we wait for something new to pop up.

 

I've enjoyed having something to chase.  It's been a while!

 

 

[george trotter]

Well reasoned Bruce. You are a treasure.

NOW, I have been at work again last night....and this time I think Moriyama san was right to be very cautious/reluctant to accept that Mitsuhashi mon theory of mine.

Here's why.

It suddenly occurred to me to  check the DNTSM 1942 book again an all dealer/mounter name lists and just see how many names began with MITSU. The reason was that it suddenly occurred to me that maybe the "Mitsu mon" stamp on my sword may just have been put on by any shop/mounter who had a name that started with 'Mitsu' ....just a work tally mark.

Well, just scanning through the pages  I found that for shops/mounters listed whose name starts with MITSU (might be more) there are 10. These 10 are spread across Tokyo, Iwate, Osaka, Yamagata, Kyoto, Tottori, Kagawa.

SO...if the ink mark is just an internal use shop tally marker (not the shop logo), then this sword could have been made by any of these 10 'Mitsu' people in any of the shops listed across 7 Prefectures.

 

So, I now think it is best to just "wipe" my Mitsuhashi mon theory and just maybe keep the ink stamp on the "what is this mark?" list in case another (properly explained) example turns up.

 

Hope I am not making this matter more difficult...

 

Regards.

[Bruce Pennington]

Yes, agreed.  A good reminder of just how many angles might explain the stamp. We know there were between 1,000 and 1,200 stores, shops, forges, antique stores, operating throughout the country at the time. So there were certainly a whole lot of possibilities that could explain it.

[george trotter]

Whew, glad we got through this one Bruce....I think its time for a rum & coke on the verandah.

Regards.