Arsenal Stamps.

[BANGBANGSAN]

15 hours ago, Kiipu said:

 If possible, have the owner look for a 江 on the nakago mune.  Keep us informed of the results of your investigation.

 

Thomas

I got more photos of that sword, It has 江 Mark indeed. It's in the Kai gunto mount.

 

[BANGBANGSAN]

18 hours ago, BANGBANGSAN said:

@Kiipu

Thomas

Do you think the mark on the blade is  the same mark as the 大 Mark？It says on Fullers Page 226, Dai(or Tai) stamp. Significance unknown.Has only been found on blades dated 1945. Very rare.

 

 

 

 

I think this 大 mark is Izumo Taisha (Izumo Grand Shrine/出雲大社) 。Hence:Slough's book, page 82: Tai stamp appears on late war blades made by smiths associated with the Izumo Seiko steel works. Located in Shimane. The forge was located near the Izumo Taisha shrine and by 1945 the country was in dire need of divine assistance.

@Bruce Pennington@Kiipu

[Bruce Pennington]

35 minutes ago, BANGBANGSAN said:

大 mark is Izumo Taisha

Correct.  And the 江 is the Matsue Supervisory Unit inspector of Kokura Army Arsenal.

[Kiipu]

9 hours ago, BANGBANGSAN said:

I think this 大 mark is Izumo Taisha (Izumo Grand Shrine/出雲大社).

 

Trystan, while looking at the Wikipedia page on Izumo-taisha, I spotted a picture with a similar logo off to the left.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Izumo-taisha#/media/File:Izumooyashiro03.JPG

[BANGBANGSAN]

Anyone knows about this 甲 mark?

 

[Bugyotsuji]

I know nothing about arsenal stamps, but 甲 could stand for 甲州 Ko-Shu, or it could be an indication of quality, as 甲,乙,丙 stand for A B and C quality, rank etc. (Just to get the ball rolling.)

[Bruce Pennington]

I know I've seen that kanji discussed someplace before, but don't recall the place.  Is that on a dai-seppa?

 

I have a Type 98 tsuba with a similar stamp, unknown meaning.  May not be the same, or maybe the one on the 98 tsuba is poorly struck of this same kind?

 

[BANGBANGSAN]

1 hour ago, Bruce Pennington said:

I know I've seen that kanji discussed someplace before, but don't recall the place.  Is that on a dai-seppa?

 

I have a Type 98 tsuba with a similar stamp, unknown meaning.  May not be the same, or maybe the one on the 98 tsuba is poorly struck of this same kind?

 

That is 中 mark, maybe middle grade？

[Bruce Pennington]

On 8/13/2020 at 7:34 PM, waljamada said:

Here's an interesting hot stamp ww2 blade signed Tadahiro in kai gunto mounts with a family mon.  Not sure what the hot stamp means.

Pulling this one up from the past as a good friend has just sent me a very similar one, but it's on a Kumazuma Kanetoshi blade!  Slightly different as this one is surrounded by a "gourd" shape.  @mecox @george trotter or anyone else know if these two smiths worked for the same forge at some point?  @PNSSHOGUN, John, earlier, commented that the image might have Buddhist significance.  Anyone know?  It might explain why the same image is on blades by different smiths.  Maybe it's not a kao, but simply a religious symbol/meaning?

 

[mecox]

Bruce, in Sesko is :  KANETOSHI (兼俊), Shōwa (昭和, 1926-1989), Gifu – “Kanetoshi” (兼俊), “Ikkōsai Kanetoshi” (粋光斎兼俊), real name Kumazawa Shun´ichi (熊沢俊一), born April 20th 1899 (Meiji 32), his  gō was  Ikkōsai (粋光斎), he worked as guntō smith and was from Seki-machi, Kifune-cho.  He registered as a Seki tosho 21 October 1942.  The kakihan stamp does have Buddhist association.  It is probably a stylised ken straight sword with a "handle", possibly called a sanko-tsuki-ken or sanko-zuka-ken.  The ken (or suken) can reflect the incarnation of the deity Fudo Myoo, and the "handle" appears to be a rendai, the lotus petals put beneath an image of the Buddha. This Buddhist symbol is to chase away the devil.  But I dont know anything about the smith, how he trained or his relation to Buddhism.  He produced quite a few blades, most with Sho/Sakura or Seki stamp, but some with no stamp, and did produce some gendaito.  He is also listed in Slough page 70 (which shows he is not Murayama Kanetoshi).

[george trotter]

UPDATE ON FUKUSHIMA TANG, FITTINGS NUMBERS on

Tsukumasa Masakazu RS sword of 4/17 (no star).

He was one of about 11 RJT smiths/15 polishers etc  working in Koriyama City, Fukushima. They had a GUNTO KUMIAI (association) there, but I don't know if star/non star works were treated differently by the scheme or the  mounters/polishers.

 

Bruce I finally remembered to take pics of ALL the parts on this sword that are numbered (I think I promised you). Pretty amazing that they numbered every part.

Tang is numbered 1129 - can't tell if it had a 'code' letter 'ni' in front as there is a patch of rust/pitting there (dang!)***.

Every part is numbered 'ni' 1129 , even the wood, but can't really read this properly. Maybe 'ni' will turn up again and show it is a location code?

Anyway, here for your files...hope it helps.

 

***PS I just gently cleaned the rust spot on the tang and it definitely looks like there is no "ni" mark before the number 1129....so, just on fittings.

[Bruce Pennington]

7 hours ago, mecox said:

The kakihan stamp does have Buddhist association. 

Thanks Mal!  I'm going to change that one in my Stamps Doc.  I had it listed at the kao for Tadahiro, but I think it would be better listed in the Buddhist markings page, now that we have 2 unrelated smiths with the symbol.

 

5 hours ago, george trotter said:

UPDATE ON FUKUSHIMA TANG, FITTINGS NUMBERS on

Tsukumasa Masakazu RS sword of 4/17 (no star).

George, thanks for checking on that.  Considering the date, Feb '42, I'm now not surprised there is no kana.  That early, the only kana/number blades are the Matsu on the Yamagami brothers.  I have a Masakazu marked "フ 37" with Star, in RS fittings, but no date.  It was likely made in '43 or '44.

I'm slowly gathering files on fittings that used kana + number, but it's pretty random, and doesn't seem to be limited to RJT blades or particular areas.  Still too little data.

 

Thanks for the help guys!

[vajo]

This is such a great reference Bruce. Thanks a lot for your work.

 

 

 

 

[Bruce Pennington]

I've got the next revision in the works.  It's only been 5 months since the last update, so I'm trying to make myself hold out till March for the next. 

 

Thanks for the kudos @vajo Chris.  It has become more of my love of the hobby than the swords (WAIT, no I didn't say that! Delete if I've broken something!!! Ha!)

[Bruce Pennington]

An interesting development concerning the "Kobuse" or wrapped steel stamp

 

- I have 4 on file now, and all 4 are undated, Showa-stamped Kaneshige blades!  They are sourced from: BenVK, Slough, Japaneseswordindex, and 1 undocumented.  If anyone has a blade with this stamp, especially if it was made by a different smith, please post.

 

I should add that none of the Kaneshige have the added "Shingani Iri" or "Genuine Core Steel" stamp like this one:

 

Sadly, I didn't document the smith name on this one.  If anyone can tell me the name I would appreciate it!

[Kiipu]

The one I downloaded came from the thread Any help would be appreciated .

 

Here is another one for the database that comes from Hot Stamp .

[Stephen]

Nagoya on a Ichimonji

 

[Bruce Pennington]

2 hours ago, Stephen said:

Ichimonji

Thanks Stephen!  Couldn't believe there was a smith with that name!  Found him in Sesko's list though.  I assume no date?  The stamps put the blade in the '41-'44 range, with the likeliest date of '43.

[BANGBANGSAN]

On 1/7/2022 at 3:05 AM, Bruce Pennington said:

Another update on the Circled Anchor vs Anchor with no circle - Re-reading my Stamps of the Japanese Sword doc, pg 21, I realized one of the stamped blades had an anchor with no circle - @Kiipu = and an unknown stamp below.  As far as I know (for now) it is the only example I have on file:

 

 

@Bruce Pennington

Maybe that mustache is the city logo of Nagoya.

https://www.city.nagoya.jp/en/category/202-4-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0.html

[Bruce Pennington]

2 hours ago, BANGBANGSAN said:

logo of Nagoya

That has possibilities, Trytan.  As we have seen, many of these stamps are geographic in nature. 

[Kiipu]

Ah, I see the mustache is back in the news again!  I thought Stegel identified that as being Bruce's logo?  More research needs to be done to find out just how old Bruce really is.

[Bruce Pennington]

[Bruce Pennington]

Not sure where to post this @Stegel @Shamsy @BANGBANGSAN @Kiipu (and anyone else interested!).  I've seen the extra numbers on copper 95s, but this one has a katakana in front:

 

[BANGBANGSAN]

39 minutes ago, Bruce Pennington said:

Not sure where to post this @Stegel @Shamsy @BANGBANGSAN @Kiipu (and anyone else interested!).  I've seen the extra numbers on copper 95s, but this one has a katakana in front:

 

 

Thanks, Bruce
This is one of the factory-reworked Copper 95.Ser# on the blade is 5869/ ホ2023(Army Arsenal Kokura First Factory) it's in Dawson's data.

 

[Shamsy]

Thanks @Bruce Pennington. One of my coppers has the same stamp, so assuming most of the double numbered coppers have the stamp.

[Stegel]

 

On 3/2/2022 at 10:49 AM, Bruce Pennington said:

 I've seen the extra numbers on copper 95s, but this one has a katakana in front:

 

These also vary in size and can also be found under the habiki.

[george trotter]

Bruce,

just referring back to my Feb 15 RS numbered parts photos of sword by Masakazu of Fukushima  Apr 1942 no star. 

I said all parts were marked ni 1129 even the wood and showed a pic of it (but it was upside down and hard to read) - here it is right side up and you can see the wood is marked ni 1129 - but in kana and kanji (only part not numbered in romaji numbers). Reading R/side first NI, L/side top to bot: 1, 1, 11, 9.

Just in case you hadn't sorted this out yourself.

Regards....

 

[Bruce Pennington]

For those who like their own copy, The latest Stamps of the Japanese Sword, ver 8.6 is now available in the Downloads section.  The screenshot still says "8.3" but that will be changed shortly.  The document is in fact, now, 8.6.

 

The update includes:

- Newly discovered "KI" stamp of the 2nd Factory, Kokura Army Arsenal

- Added variants of the Chrysanthemum, Kiku

- A new section to encompass Buddhist stamps; we recently discovered a hotstamp, thought to be that of Tadahiro, on a Kanetoshi blade also. It is likely a sword image tied to Buddhist symbology

- A section showing the discovery that the "diamond" stamp was, for now, solely used by Kuniyoshi and the "delta" stamp was used by Masayasu

- Several RJT blades are marked with prefecture-specific katakana/number.  A map was added showing the locations of these prefectures and their kana

- 4 "unknown" koshirae stamps added

- A sections added showing the various "punch dots" on blades, still reason unknown

 

I printed a color copy for myself, and have 2 extras.  PM if you want one of them.  Printing cost is $40 US plus shipping. 

[robinalexander]

 

I find this a fantastic (growing) reference tool...thanks Bruce.

[Bruce Pennington]

@Kiipu @BANGBANGSAN and anyone else who charts - I found I had 2 charts running at the same time for number stamps on mune.  I combined them and cleaned up some other stuff there.  I'm attaching the entire document to replace the ones I've sent you previously.

 

stamp survey (1).docx