Need help identifying WW2 sword.

[Stian]

Hi everyone!

I recently inherited a ww2 Japanese sword, and this really sparked my interest in Japanese swords. I am a total newbie, but I came here because every little new thing I learned about this sword came from these forums, and I was hoping to shed some light on this sword by posting it here. 
The sword has been in an attic for 60+years, and is in rough condition, but if it turns out to be a handmade sword, I will consider getting it polished.

It has a black wooden Saya with the combat leather cover. The Nakago appears to be Mumei, but has distinct filing marks, but hard to see because of pic resolution. Sadly the tsuka, rayskin, and the tsuka ito has been lost, but I remember it looked like a regular army tsuka with olive green or brown ito.
It has been polished before, or during the war judging from the Nagashi stripes. The tsuba is iron, and from similar items I have seen,maybe late Edo period?

I tried to get a good picture of the Hamon, but there is a lot of discolouring on the blade. I am hoping someone can help me in finding out what I actually have here. 
I hope the pictures are good enough to make an opinion, but if not, I will post some more.

Thank you for reading!

[SteveM]

Hi Stian,

Can you give us the length (tip to the machi) and some close ups of the boshi?

Looks like it could be much older than WW2. 

[mecox]

Stian, certainly an older blade.  Tsuba is Tempo with stamp of Dai Tsuchi "great earth".   Information of the tsuba:

 

[lonely panet]

i would suggest shinshinto

[Stian]

This is very exiting news!  I have always thought my dad’s sword was factory made during the war, but now I can see a different, and deeper history come to life!

SteveM, I will get pictures and measurements tomorrow.

mecox, thank you for filling me in on everything about my tsuba, and more! Great link!

 

lonely panet, your suggestion is appreciated!

 

I thank you so much for your time,and for sharing your knowledge. I have already learnt more in a day than I would dare hope for, and I am exited to see how much I can find out about this sword!

 

 

 

[Stian]

Hi SteveM, I have the measurement.

The blade length from tip to machi is 70,5cm, or 27,76 inches.

Here is also the pics you requested.

 

[SteveM]

Thank you, Stijn. I was hoping the bōshi would be clear enough to show something, but unfortunately the sword has been handled very roughly, and its too scratched up to see anything. It's not beyond redemption, but it will need a professional restoration at some point. No rush, just keep the blade oiled until you figure out what your next steps are. 

 

As you said, the polishing lines under the habaki wouldn't be there if your sword were a WW2 arsenal blade. Well, there were some WW2 blades that were made in the traditional way, but I feel yours is older than WW2. Those dark parallel lines in your picture from yesterday (copied below) are also something you wouldn't see in a WW2 sword. Its a bit hard to discern what exactly they are, and photos sometimes exaggerate things. Hopefully they are an intentional feature put into the sword from the swordsmith. 

 

[vajo]

The sword looks older than shin shinto. 

You should upload bigger pictures they are very tiny.

[Stian]

Thank you for the input SteveM. 
Getting a good pic of the hamon is difficult, but I could give it another shot, but I feel there is a lot of detail that gets lost because of the picture resolution limitation.

I will try harder to get a good pic tomorrow, and thank you again for looking at this!

[Stian]

Vajo, thank you for the interest, and I will try to get some better pic tomorrow, but I think the limit is 1 Mb pics.

I will do my best!

[Stian]

Ok, I’m going to try a link to my dropbox for some closeup pictures in better resolution. There might be duplicates in there, so please bear with me.

Please tell me if it doesn’t work.

 

https://www.dropbox....1py43rrfdp04x12&dl=0

[Stephen]

Don't do drop box.  You did good on your first pix.

[Brian]

12 hours ago, Stian said:

Thank you for the input SteveM. 
Getting a good pic of the hamon is difficult, but I could give it another shot, but I feel there is a lot of detail that gets lost because of the picture resolution limitation.

I will try harder to get a good pic tomorrow, and thank you again for looking at this!

Why do you need 7meg, 4000 pixel high images to show details? That's a falacy. Resizing images is not difficult, and still shows everything. You aren't trying to post a billboard, and bear in mind the people on cell data.
Here's a 7meg image of yours resized down to 200kb at 96dpi. Still plenty useful.

 

 

[Stephen]

And if cropped more you get a closer image to see detail 

[Stian]

Brian, that is fantastic! Might I ask how you did this? 
I am a little tech challenged, so bear with me please.
 

[Brian]

Well, I use photoshop. But if you Google "Free Image Resizers" you'll find hundreds of quick ones that do it online. Just reduce the dpi and reduce the height to less than 1500 pixels.