Looking at Tanto

[Ooitame]

Hi all,

 

I was recently looking at a few Tanto and was surprised by the prices. Is the high price on average from lack of supply, makers, ownership restrictions, etc...?

[AlexiG]

1 hour ago, Ooitame said:

Hi all,

 

I was recently looking at a few Tanto and was surprised by the prices. Is the high price on average from lack of supply, makers, ownership restrictions, etc...?

Hi Eric,

 

are you asking why the price jumped of a specific tanto you are interested in? Or are you asking why a tanto you like is expensive? My cursory look as of late is that only prices in USD jumped as the USD/JPY exchange rate changed substantially over the last month, but the prices in yen are still the same, from what I can tell.

 

As you probably know, a tanto from a well-known smith/school may cost you very dearly depending on quality and condition. It indicates you have a good taste

 

Best,

Alexi

[Ooitame]

Hi @AlexiG,

 

 

Thank you for your reply and cursory search. I do like Soshu and Bizen, which does not help with price. Rather, I mean overall, for example most Tanto rival or exceed prices of Wakizashi. 

[nulldevice]

25 minutes ago, Ooitame said:

Hi @AlexiG,

 

 

Thank you for your reply and cursory search. I do like Soshu and Bizen, which does not help with price. Rather, I mean overall, for example most Tanto rival or exceed prices of Wakizashi. 

Simply put katana, tachi, and tanto command the most money and are the most collectible items typically. Even though they’re smaller than wakizashi, many top smiths only made tanto and many national treasures are tanto. 
 

the same can’t be said for wakizashi. Hence the difference in price. It’s not about the amount steel but the original intent and artistic/functional execution of the smith. 
 

tanto usually are ubu and retain their mei and we don’t have to imagine much if the tanto is healthy. It’s all still there. 

[Ooitame]

Thanks @nulldevice, that makes more sense.

[Bugyotsuji]

Also tantō were only made in certain eras, e.g. not much during the Edo Period when wakizashi were more common. More likely made when they were functional. There’s a Masamune tantō in the Hayashibara Museum of Art that allegedly cost more than a million US, if my memory serves me.

[Bugyotsuji]

Yes, just found the photos from 2013.

Named blade, the “Kuki Masamune”.

 

On display at Hayashibara Museum of Art, Okayama.

 

 

[ROKUJURO]

They will probably offer a discount in case you take two of them! 

[Lewis B]

Unfortunately, unlike for modern blades you're not paying per mm.

[Bugyotsuji]

A long blade can be a wonderful thing, but with a Tantō you can get some of the Smith’s finest work concentrated in one place, a sort of cameo, with no repetition. 

[Hokke]

At the end of the day I think it all comes back to charging what people will pay versus a scale based on attributes contained within in a length and weight. Im not saying thats right or wrong, just how it seems to me. Imagine though if nihonto had specific pricing based on the total length an attribute was present. Yikes

[Mikaveli]

Just looking at one Japanese dealers (TM) website:

 

Tanto price range, 250k - 500k yen (these happen to all be shinshinto).

Wakizashi, 350k - 1.2m yen

Katana, 600k - 3m yen

Tachi, 6.5m - 20m yen.

 

Admittedly a micro-benchmark, but data none the less.

 

If we compared similar era and smith, does it hold that tanto are more expensive?

 

Or, are people just looking at older tanto, more comparable in price to tachi around the same age (and quality/ maker)?

[Rayhan]

Some of my favorite Tanto smiths on one page 

 

https://nihonto.com/category/for-sale/swords/tanto/

[Mikaveli]

2 hours ago, Rayhan said:

Some of my favorite Tanto smiths on one page 

 

https://nihonto.com/category/for-sale/swords/tanto/

 

4.6m yen for a Nambokucho, Juyo tanto...

 

Tempting, can someone lend me 4 million yen! 😂

 

[Mushin]

In general, as an obsessive daily visitor to dozens of dealer's websites, I notice that top-class tanto are increasingly difficult to find, especially Oei and earlier. They occasionally pop-up, but the quality is often less than good. And finding zaimei tantos in decent condition even from the Muromachi and Keicho periods with really nice koshirae that weren't thrown together as an afterthought are also difficult to come by. Not saying that they aren't out there, just that they seem nowhere near as "plentiful" as they were even five years ago. Scarcity as rule doesn't generally help pricing. What lies behind this apparant shortage, I am not sure. Don't know if this is true, but I have heard that over the last decade, many older Japanese collectors have traded in their daito for tanto as they are easier to store and enjoy for aged hands and eyes. Might partially explain the shortage in addition to the fact that just fewer were made compared to other sizes. As I am a mainly a tanto collector, I have long ago embraced the idea that ofttimes less really is more. In the meantime, here is a great example that Fred Weissberg just posted on Nihonto.com, a mumei Juyo Sa Yasuyoshi with wonderful koshirae. I was fortunate to see this in hand in Chicago. Wonderful piece and a great package, but at a price.

[Lewis B]

The 3 on Nihonto.com are some of the best currently available online. 

 

 

 

 

[Bugyotsuji]

Of course you could say, and many do, that a wakizashi is a good way to enter the field. You can often find excellent work by a good smith but in a relatively affordable package. If the blade itself is everything to you, find something in shirasaya.

 

When you feel more confident, or when your slice of bitcoin has gained tremendously in value, you can branch out into longer or shorter.

 

Bobby above mentions why older people in Japan might be collecting tanto. Certainly it was traditional for households to have a last symbolic tanto. And I too have found myself gravitating towards tanto, my 'collection' now down to one last koto wakizashi, plus one koto tanto and three shinto/shinshinto tanto. All with koshirae, and all bar one papered.

[Mushin]

Not shilling for any dealer, but thought in the spirit of sharing and illustrating my point, here is one of those really nice Keicho Shinto pieces that I was saying rarely comes around these days. Like I said, they are still out there just harder to come by, especially at this price. Though Hida no Kami Ujifusa is loved for his wild-feeling midare hamon, he did do lovely work like this in suguha as well, often copying works by Rai smiths. I think the package is extremely nice and I can honestly say this is more or less a price you would have been asked to pay 10 years ago. Not a bargain basement deal but decent bang for buck. 

https://eirakudo.shop/203187

[Mark S.]

It was many years ago, and I am sure I have missed a bit of meaning with my poor memory, but at a Chicago Show presentation of blades, Bob Benson once said something like “a smith had to put extra care into making a tanto because you can see the quality or flaws all in a single glance.  A long blade may vary a bit along its length, but a tanto must be perfect.”