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Kai Gunto Tang Questions


DonC

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Hello!

 

New to the forum and looking for a second/third/etc opinion on what appears to be Kai-Gunto blade. 

 

It has an anchor stamp in a circle with two different sets of numbers on the nakago. 

 

The written numbers appear to match the seppa and tsuka end fitting.  My real worry is the apparent lack of a hamon anywhere on the blade as I was fairly certain even the factory ones had an aesthetic hamon somehow applied.  Though I have heard hamons can be polished out if the blade was not taken care of correctly?  Other evidence in the fittings leads me to believe the tsuka and saya may have been poorly restored in the past, and therefore the blade maybe have been polished.

 

I guess my real question is if the stamps/dual numbering is characteristic of any forgery attempts for Kai-Gunto blades? Pictures attached.

 

All information appreciated!

 

-Don

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  • 5 years later...
On 5/20/2018 at 1:09 PM, DonC said:

I guess my real question is if the stamps/dual numbering is characteristic of any forgery attempts for Kai-Gunto blades? Pictures attached.

Don,

Back to your question - the answer is no.  Dual numbering is not a characteristic of fakery.  In fact, it is fairly common on army, navy, and souvenir blades.  There are blades with stamped numbers & different painted numbers.  There are blades with two different painted numbers, sometimes in the same color; sometimes in different colors.  

 

As to John's concerns.  I agree photos of the whole nakago and blade would be nice, but from what I can see, this is completely inline with several other stainless blades I have on file.  And I've got dual stamped/painted blades in both kaigunto fittings as well as souvenir.

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Since it is in line with the topic. Does anyone know what the length of a Takayama -to nakago on a Kai gunto built for Toyama naval cadets I have not seen one measured yet that was full length I estimate them to be in the area of10.5 inches but have yet to see one physically measured.only virtually estimated  using photos with known specifications to estimate. Anyone?

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Signed Takayama-To Sword & Scabbard (Saya). Signed on Nakago (Tang) Scabbard (Sava). This is a WW2 Japanese naval sword. It was made by the Takayama sword forge facility, which made Japanese naval officer swords. This obviously is not a true naval officer's sword, it is a Toyama Ryu iai katana; these katanas were used solely for training. Takayama-To swords were developed by the Japanese Navy under the direction of Col. Takayama Masayoshi. He was the creator of Jissen Budo Takayama Ryu Batto Jutsu (AKA Toyama Ryu iai),I

This is where I found the misleading information.Like I said cannot believe everything you read.....

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 9/16/2023 at 7:47 AM, Jcstroud said:

Does anyone on the forum know what is the Nakago length of an uncut Takayama -to ?

I believe I found the answer :There is posted on the Tomoyuki Ohmura website a photo of an Ishihara Masanao Takayama-To using the specifications from the 1940 Bujin-to specification width of 33.6 mmwas able to compute the Nakago length to be 1 shaku or 11.9 inches or303 mm now that is a long nakago !!!😁

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36 minutes ago, Conway S said:

Did you see the one posted in this thread by Swords? Scroll down past the eBay sword

Just saw it what a lucky guy thats a steal at that price now that too looks like 1 shaku nakago hopefully we will get a real life measurement to verify my estimates,thanks for the link very cool.

John S.

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On 9/3/2023 at 10:08 AM, Bruce Pennington said:

Wonder where he got his information.  I've never heard of a sword made just for training.

Recently read in page3 through page 5 of @mecox Japanese Sword Pdf #2 there is a statement saying the Takayama to was used for cadet training .FYI 

John S.😁

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This thread is quite old. Please consider starting a new thread rather than reviving this one, unless your post is really relevant and adds to the topic..

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