Kronos

I guess if there's any top level kamakura swords about with fatal flaws like hagiri, extremely tired etc so as to make them much less valuable that may be a source that could be used to test mineral content. What i believe to be the most difficult aspect for modern smiths to replicate is that it's partly technique and partly material so that exponentially increases the difficulty of replicating earlier work.

Looks good, what did the polisher say he thought it was? Is there utsuri? It reminds of sue bizen i.e. sukesada/kiyomtisu or similar.

I don't deal in swords but I see a lot of divides so for example between Japan and the rest of the world where the Japanese market is staying resilient at all levels and also there's a big divide between those that trade in nihonto while not specializing such as auction houses.and Nihonto dealers which has always been there as far as I can tell. I can see it continuing for the next 5 years where the western market deteriorates and maybe people will start selling back to Japan more. This is at the mid end anyway, the high end will always stay as it is. The biggest change I've noticed is where people in the west, particularly new buyers aren't willing or aren't able to pay $4000 for an ubu zaimei papered shinto katana so for example in the for sale section here this type of thing is going unsold or the sellers are drastically reducing their prices to get a sale. They seem to want that for less but are resorting to buying the cheaper stuff so maybe this is the economic factor. Overall I think in recent years everyone wants to feel like they got a bargain but it may be ending up that instead they're only bargains in their own head (I know I'm guilty of this) which is boosting the low end of the market at the expense of the middle. Edit: part of why the Japanese market has the appearance of strength may be the power of the yen at the moment. I would be interested to know what dealers think about this they and may they need to replenish their stock from Japan?

That's what I mean by depleted, as in the used all the stuff with the best mineral content for a given outcome so what was left couldn't produce the same results as in previous generations.

Joe raises a good point in that time has almost certainly separated the wheat from the chaff so to speak, Then we're still left with the dilemma that if you take the 300 swordsmiths working today, say between 1980 and 2010, then take all the swordsmiths working in just Bizen province between 1278 and 1311 (to fit era's) and double it to include a possibility of the worst smiths that are not recorded and made consistent garbage you end up with 176ish (so doubled it's 352). Not a massive difference. Included on this list of Kamakura smiths though are the likes of many ichimonji/fukouka/yoshioka smiths that while many are mumei now flood the juyo and tokuju along with Osafune smiths like Norimitsu, Sanenaga and don't forget Junkei Nagamitsu among others was still working. There's also the Hatakeda smiths such as sanemori; Omiya and so on. So I'm yet to see a single shinsakuto that could compete with a large percentage of these Bizen smiths and utterly pale in comparison to the listed ones. So what did these smiths have that cannot be replicated today? If modern smiths knew they'd certainly be making equivalent swords. It's a difficult question and raw materials could be the answer; so then if this is the case surely there'd be just as good iron sand somewhere outside of Japan which hasn't been depleted that could be used to make tamahagane and replicate earlier works?

I would like to agree with you that Gassan smiths knew enough to make gimei that weren't blindingly obvious but the shear amount of dreadful gimei on the market not to mention honami sayagaki that are patently wrong I feel shows the leaps and bounds knowledge has come on thanks to some of the great scholars and organisations of the 20th/21st century. I don't know much about Sadakazu so maybe I'm mistaken but I'm hopeful my second hypothesis that the smiths were simply making work "in the style of" and it was other nefarious characters that got their hands on them after the fact that were trying to pass them off as koto is more preferable. It's a very interesting question none the less and gives pause for thought. I'd be interested to hear what others have to add.

Having read your Hosho Tanto article again to refresh my memory If there's not enough left to say "this is a hosho work" then even if it was made by a hosho smith in the mid-kamakura is it still a hosho work? What I'm trying to say is these things can be a real headscratcher and with time it makes it almost impossible to ever really know who made what and why unless it's signed and typical. We can only get the most informed opinions. It's both one of the gifts and curses about this hobby especially when getting items out of the woodwork that they don't make sense without a time machine which can be fascinating and infuriating at the same time. Getting back to your original question I've been doing a lot of reading on the Mino tradition as of late as well as Shodai Yasutsugu who was prolific at both retempering and making blades "in the style of" famous smiths, the latter the sue mino school did much of as well. I believe this to be the most plausible explanation whereby they weren't making out and out fakes and maybe Sadakazu wasn't either, rather they were copying earlier works but had a habit of putting in some contemporary traits, the boshi being a prime example along with the sugata running the full gambit from very close to original to contemporary but with hada/hamon the only discernable difference. Maybe it's a Sadakazu work but he wasn't the one who attempted to pass it off as gimei?

Is the quality up to the standard of Sadakiyo/Norishige? I ask because at the end of the day if it is, does it matter who made it? I may be being influenced by one of Darcy's superb recent posts but from what I took from that is if the quality of the Norishige is of near top level soshu then it should be attributed to that. If the quality is the same then why isn't a Sadakazu worth the $50k+ of a Norishige as after all this is why Norishige is so famed because of his skill... The alternative is we're saying that Norishige is just a brand no different from any other and many of the other smiths making copies are equally as skilled and you could pick one up for a fraction of the price. If we wanted to test this then as all the differences can be modified you'd erase the signature, shorten it and convert to mitsu-mune then submit to the NBTHK.It would cost less than the $750 pricetag. If it comes back Norishige then it breaks the entire concept of appraisal. Either this or the books need to be rewritten to show Norishige made works with these features. If it were the former then chances are there's already someone out there commissioning Shinsakuto to the specifications of top level smiths and passing them off as originals to make a substantial profit. With the level of knowledge on signatures we have now I'd be surprised if there wasn't craftsmen capable of creating gimei's indistinguishable from the real thing as historically gimei's are mostly bad and/or rushed as they just didn't have access to countless examples available now not to mention the knowledge built up; particularly over the last half century on the genuine works by smiths. I feel it is much more likely in these cases that the likes of Gassan Sadakazu even if attempting to make something to pass off as genuine wasn't aware of things we take for granted today such as all the shape differences throughout different periods. That and hopefully shinsa judges are capable of telling the difference in quality and minute differences in hada/hamon that most on this forum aren't capable of to weed out any forgeries that are "close". BTW, you never mentioned from who did you get the 3rd attribution on the Sadakiyo?

Shirake is it not?

This smith is not really renowned or prolific enough to have much chance of finding oshigata outside of the NBTHK so it may be much more fruitful once the window is done to observe if the workmanship matches what one would expect from this region/time period. Just my humble thoughts.

Wouldn't it be cheaper to buy a showato in reasonable polish for less? Unless this one has sentimental value...

Just to clarify I'm not saying the sword is definitely from that time period, just that it has the signature that purports to be of this smith. Tomoie is a relatively obscure smith that wouldn't be an obvious target for gimei but without a valid reference it's impossible to tell. Nakatsu wasn't really a place until Nakatsu Castle was built in the early 1600's so no swordsmiths would of been living there until this time and no other known smith signed this way. Without a full length photo of the blade and nakago without any fittings its impossible to judge the age based upon shape. As others hsave said the best course of action is to find someone knowledgeable to show it in hand.

It depends why you're buying but either way you don't want to lose money if you ever sell. So I'd say that chujo shinto smiths are limited around the 5-6k mark any way you slice it so it's close to it's maximum value so that option would be out. For the other three it really depends on the condition and individual smiths. There's saijo smiths that have made garbage and have a small premium due to the name but these works are not the reason they attained that ranking,whereas there's jo saku smiths who are ridiculously consistent so as long as it's ubu, zaimei and not tired they're pretty much guaranteed to sell for 1.5-2.5m yen. There's also how popular they currently are so another jo saku smith may top out at 1.2m yen in Japan unless it goes juyo just because of popularity. Saying all that I'd go for 3 or 4 depending on the smiths and quality unless I could convince the seller of 1 to allow me to pay for a window and buy it only if I liked what I see.

The mei says: “Buzen Nakatsu-jū Fuji(wara) 備前中津住藤 ( 原 ) and the only match I can find in my references is: TOMOIE (朝家), Enpō (延宝, 1673-1681), Buzen – “Buzen Nakatsu-jū Fujiwara Tomoie saku” (備前中津住藤原 朝家作). It's suriage (shortened) so the rest of the signature was cut off.

Tbh with the price of some of the items even a small percentage donation like 5% would be a considerable amount if everyone did it. It's a lot less than consigning with a dealer and your item gains a lot of exposure. Personally for everything I sell here (granted only a few tsuba and books so far) I usually give 10% for small items like books and fittings and 5% for swords/high level pieces.

The closest would probably be Chicago http://www.chicagoswordshow.com/

Buy the sword not the papers is absolutely correct in normal circumstances, however make no mistake that dealers can smell a profit a mile off and if there was any chance it would get new papers I'd expect them to buy it outright and submit it themselves.

Was it a consignment item? If not then Aoi would of tried to get Hozon papers if they thought it shoshin.

Nijuba?

What you're missing is the pure, unadulterated beauty of nature that had a hand in creating this. The reason I dislike Gendaito and a large proportion of shinto/shinshinto works is that it's so contrived and manufactured it's lost the magic. The skill is in controlling the outcome without snuffing out the elegance and patterns that only comes from nature like a seashell. Even A good Suguha of the Awataguchi or Rai schools has this. It's like a gentle Yasutsugu notare compared to an acid etched chinese piece of junk.

I'd take it slow as you don't want to jump straight into a polish on a mumei suriage wakizashi. Like Brian said investigate further and maybe get a window put in to see but mumei suriage makes it hard not to be a financial loser.

Funnily enough I was thinking Yamato shizu on first look but maybe not enough activities in the hamon particularly sunagashi. It could be either side of nambokucho but I'm leaning towards Oei and mino senjuin is a good fit. Either way it's a lovely sword. What I've found is that with Oei Swords the saki-sori is hard to distinguish from photo's but quite obvious in hand and the best way to distinguish it from earlier works.

Measurements? I'd say earlier than mid muromachi tbh.

http://www.nihontomessageboard.com/faq.html You should read the bits on sword care and maintenance.

It'll be one of the Chikuzen Kongobyoe Moritaka's from the nakago shape. (the Kongobyoe school of swordsmiths working in Chikuzen province who signed using the art name Moritaka [this is usually one lineage passing the name from father to son]. This narrows it down to the muromachi period (pre-1600)