Geraint

Well that's a question I had never thought to ask, Rich. Thinking about it now I suppose I have always associated it with quite late koshirae, certainly the few I have seen have been relatively late Edo period. Interested to know what others think about that. All the best.

Dear Bjorn. For what it's worth I would not clean the habaki. I find that the limited oxidation near the base comes from age and is a pleasant indicator that the sword has had the habaki for some time. If you were to go down the route of shirasaya for this one then of course a new habaki would make sense. Here is one which illustrates the point. All the best.

Hi Jack. Welcome to NMB. You have clearly done some research and learning and as this is your first sword then you have done a great deal better than most. (I see John has just replied.) I assume that you know enough to look after this one sensibly in the short term. As it is not in pristine polish I suspect that it is going to be really hard to get much better photographs at the moment. Depending on whereabouts in the country you are there are some members who would be happy to look at it in hand, when we can do such things again, and give you an opinion but in the meantime I would keep this one under advisement as regards polishing and so forth. I assume you know about the Token Society? All the best.

Dear Jesse. Dating fittings is really hard in most circumstances unless you are looking for an Edo period catchall. At first glance the fuchi and kashira appear to be associated rather than a set, this is not uncommon and not always a problem especially as the ito maki seems to be of good quality. Nightingales and a crescent moon, chrysanthemums and insects, perhaps an autumn evening theme. It's a pleasant set. You are not going to get much more information from these. All the best.

I would respectfully suggest that in the current market that is too high a figure. I would aim at somewhat less than that. All the best.

And one with a story. Some years ago we wanted to get something for one of my sons who was passing out in the forces. He showed me an article about a knife maker who was working ion the Japanese tradition and so we commissioned a knife for him from this man. The build time and the passing out parade were running a little close and as a present the knife maker, Andrew Jordan, slipped in a kozuka because he knew of my interest. It's a little too large for any koshirae but it's a nice piece. If anyone is interested his website is worth a look, he does good work. http://www.jordanknives.com/home/ All the best.

I had forgotten these two. Both are original to the koshirae they came with, both are from diminutive tanto. The one with the waves has a famous mei but I think spurious. All the best.

Dear Fred. Welcome to NMB. The tsuba is signed, "Echizen no ju Kinai saku". If you do a search you will soon discover that this is a prolific school and that this is one of their stock designs. It has a shakudo pillow inserted for the kodzuka and the zogan, gold details, appear to be complete. If this is your first buy then a trawl through online sites will quickly tell you the range of prices. It looks like quite a good example of it's type and it is not a bad place to start. All the best.

Dear Tony. If you have a look here, http://www.sho-shin.com/osaka-ishido.html , also here, https://nihontoantiques.com/project/ishido-den-fss-812/ You will see why Kirill made that suggestion, I think. However, a note of caution, do your own research and be open to other ideas. Just as Ishido smiths copied/developed Bizen style hamon so did others. Enjoy. All the best.

Dear Tony. Have a look around katchushi for the first, possibly a later version. The second I can't help you with but I do like it. If you've not found it this will give you a few hours of pleasure, http://www.shibuiswords.com/tsuba.htm All the best.

Dear Julien. Just to add to the list, here's one currently offered on Ebay.https://www.ebay.co.uk/str/World-Armor-Antique-DAIMYOU?_trksid=p2047675.l2563 If it were not for this post I have to say that this design would have fooled me, not that that says very much. All the best.

Dear Gary. Those are beauties! Perhaps a slightly better photograph of the stock? All the best.

Thanks David, when I saw it I thought the same. It didn't take a lot of thinking about and at the time it wasn't a lot of money. All the best.

Yeah, I got that bit, but where on the tanto are they? I can't see anything on the tanto image that relates to the image with the kanji. These appear to be stamped on soft metal and I can't imagine where on the tanto they are. All the best.

Hi Grev. Where are the kanji on the piece? All the best.

Hi Piers, Yes, I have always assumed that it is a mamorigatana because of the koshirae. All the best.

Such a relief! I bet you were keen to open that package, Grev. Look forward to the geography lesson. All the best.

Dear All. Not sure how small we need to be but here is a little tanto. Nagasa is 150mms All the best.

Dear Teisa. Have a look at your other post for a reply. All the best.

Dear Teisa. More in hopes of provoking someone else to reply, as you know this is signed Soten but I cannot tell you if the signature is genuine or not. The style became so popular that many workers were making them. However I think yours is well above average, the quality of the work is good. As such it is very collectable. For some more information about the school see here; http://www.shibuiswords.com/tsuba.htm#soten In your other post you ask about insurance valuation, in this country such a valuation is based on what you might have to spend to replace the tsuba and is therefore much higher than what you might get if you chose to sell it. With that in mind I would shot around the $1200 mark for insurance. I am sure others will jump in with more information and better guesses. Hope this helps a little. All the best.

Dear Dave. I think they have every right to be confident, its a blade made by their own smith, Kokaji. At least they can be sure that it isn't a Chinese copy. All the best.

Gives you a whole new level of respect for the Japanese armourer's ability to make tameshime dou! Thanks for posting. All the best.

As a kid I started collecting WWII stuff; family medals, bayonets and so forth. A low point was a collection of lumps of concrete I managed to get off the pill boxes that lined the coast here in Cornwall. (Even lower was the live cannon round I found on the beach art Arromanche but that is another story). A local antique dealer, Peter Watts, used to let me look around his shop and every once in a while I would have enough pocket money to buy a bayonet or something. Fascinated by antique guns, one day in Peter's shop I saw a wheel lock rifle, sans lock and went home raving about it, way out of my price range. My Mum went down and bought it for me for Christmas but not wanting me to find it asked Peter to hang onto it. A day later the police turned up and told him that a local collector had been robbed and the gun was part of the haul, of course he returned it and when my Mum went in to collect it told her the tale and said, "Why don't you have this instead, you can have it fir the deposit you payed on the gun." It turned out to be a katana, damaged in combat and remounted as a Burmese dha. I was fourteen at the time and there was nothing available in terms of books, the best computer was literally hand cranked and so one or two general books on sword collecting until at college I came across Stone's Glossary and the reprint of Sword and Same, did a written study on The Japanese Sword, including building a small tatara in the garden and forging some metal.. It got me my degree and I started work as a teacher in another town. Cycling past an antique shop I saw a katana in the window and had to stop for a look. Stunning! Big katana in good mounts. Pulled the blade out a little and the sticker on the blade said £30. Automatic reaction I asked what they could do on it and it came down to £28. It is still the only time I have ever gone overdrawn but I bought it and cycled home with it. I still have both swords. All the best.

Dear Jesse. Please don't take this amiss, it is meant as an encouragement. In the acquisition of skill there are often said to be four stages; unconscious incompetence, where you know nothing and don't even realise it, conscious incompetence, where you begin to realise how much there really is to this and that you know nothing, conscious competence where you start to understand if you really think about it and unconscious competence where you don't have to think, you just know. I suppose we could call that last one connoisseurship. According to your own declaration that means you are already at stage two, only two more to go! (Of course, not all stages take the same amount of time but, hey ho, progress is progress.) You are asking questions and really looking at what you have and that is the start. The feeling when you really 'get something' for the first time is worth it all! All the best.