who did gimei

[mizuta]

I was wanting to know if any study has been done on who carved gimei ? can we name a carver of gimei from his gimei style

Bernard

[mizuta]

Can the cutter be ID ?

[sanjuro]

Since there is only one mekugi ana then I am assuming that someone has enlarged the existing one with a drill and then removed the burring with a file. Most unfortunate...... However, to the point of your post. Why would you want to know who cut the gimei? If it is gimei then it is by definition of no consequence.

 

Sorry.. Not being a wise ass..... Just wondering why it would matter.

[Icepic]

I have read that sometimes talented smiths were engaged in gimei or making copies to decieve, like Yasatsugu of the Echizen Shimosaka school and the Gendaito smiths Shigetsugu and Okimasa. ( the book "SAMURAI" by Clive Sinclaire) In these cases it might be nice to know. I would even like to have one or two in my collection.

[sanjuro]

Mark

 

Chris Bowen would know more about this than I do, but I'm sure there has been and probably still is, a small subindustry where professional mei cutters forge signatures on blades. Most of these would not be swordsmiths but little more than forgers. I am aware that there were such people and practices during the Edo period and indeed long before that, ever since swords by illustrious makers were considered valuable. Its shameful but its a fact of life, hence my original question. Forged signatures as a collection would indeed be novel. You certainly wouldnt be short of collectable material. Actually there are collectors out there who have such a collection at least in part, but they dont know it. :D

[mizuta]

I was sent a page by a friend Kindai gimei of kurihara nobuhide what is kindai?

On one gimei is stated work of skilled counterfiter from niigata area

the other kindai gimei that was made in the tokyo area so i take it from this that some thing is known about these counterfeiters.

And this interests me as it is part of this blades history. much better not been gimei though but it is.

Yes some fool drilled the peg out and enlarged the hole.

was told buy a polisher the blade was made same time as nobuhide.

Is this gisaku or a unsigned blade made gimei

Bernard

[Toryu2020]

Bernard -

The Nihonto Koza translations by Watson contain an excellent article on gimei by Kajihei, a legitimate smith in his own right who was forced by circumstance to make fakes. There was also a thriving business of knock-offs at Kuwana, it seems this was a place to go to earn your stripes by cranking out swords for tourists. Not unlike art students copying the great masters in Paris.

 

The problem being that they were copies, so they did their best to produce swords in the style of another artist, you'd be hard pressed to identify the original artist from the workmanship - if you could you'd have a gimei and it would take some pretty twisted logic to value something that is meant to look like Kotetsu but was made by Gassan at Kuwana with a bad signature...

-t

[Jean]

who did gimei

 

A lot of people as everywhere and in any times and for the same reasons