Japanese Sword

[Fireluvr48]

I have come into possession of a Japanese sword and am trying to find out what the characters are.  I have tried to trace them but some are faded and hard to read.  Is there anyone that can decipher them for me.  Unfortunately the file is larger than I can attach here.  Thank you so much.  

[Bruce Pennington]

Try this:

Compress images online - Reduce your image size online and for free (img2go.com)

[rematron]

Jackie, if you're using a phone, go to the photo you want to post and take a screen shot of it.  That will greatly reduce its size.  You can then crop that new photo to get rid of your phone info like time and date and cell reception bars, etc.

[Stephen]

[Ray Singer]

Bizen (no) Kuni Osafune Sahyōedayū Fujiwara Yoshimitsu
備前国長船左兵衛太夫藤原義光

[Ray Singer]

I see this record in Markus' book:

YOSHIMITSU (義光), 2nd gen., Enbun (延文, 1356-1361), Bizen – “Bishū Osafune-jū Yoshimitsu” (備州長船住義光), “Bizen no Kuni Osafune Sahyōedayū Fujiwara Yoshimitsu” (備前国長船左兵衛太夫藤原義光), “Bishū Osafune Yoshimitsu” (備州長船義光), “Bizen no Kuni Osafune-jū Yoshimitsu” (備前国長船住義光), first name Sahyōedayū (左兵衛太夫), he worked completely in the style of Kanemitsu (兼光), sometimes he also hardened a notare but mainly he hardened a kataochi-gunome which can also show ko-nie, the signature is rather small and chiselled on the shinogi-ji of the tang, wazamono, jōjō-saku

That is not to say that this inscription is authentic, but at minimum that is who the mei is purporting to be.

[Jacques]

I'm not optimistic about the validity of this mei, it should be close to the mune and the characters are too large for the time.

[John C]

  On 9/19/2023 at 4:54 PM, Jacques D. said:

the characters are too large for the time.

Expand  

Jacque:

That's interesting. It seems that it would be easier to copy a shorter signature than a longer one.

Has there been any specific research on the characteristics of gimei signatures? For example, do they tend to favor well-known smiths, or tend to be a certain length?

John C.

[Jacques]

The gimei is part of the history of nihonto, and has been performed in all eras, although not all of them were intended to deceive. The most famous is that of Kagemitsu by Munetsugu.

Signature length has nothing to do with gimei

[Baba Yaga]

With all the Gimei I've seen, very very few I would consider actual forgeries. Art forgeries are masterful copys which are intended to fool experts. These look like they weren't intended to fool anyone. meaning something else.