Gakusee

Well, in fact, my main interest is Bizen den, particularly Koto and Heian, but life is too engrossing to be contributing to the forum unfortunately… My workload has exponentially increased in the last 15-20 years since I have been on the forum and my presence here is now mostly reduced to reading what others write and the occasional post. Yoshifusa is a great smith and, for a stereotypical/mature/ top Ichimonji, one can also go to Sukezane and Norifusa. In fact, you get more “bang” for the proverbial “buck” with Norifusa, as Yoshifusa and Sukezane seem very premium-priced. Sometimes the top quality Norifusa are surprisingly cheaper than a Yoshifusa which could not be as good in appearance or preservation. My own Norifusa, when I still owned it, had a very fine jigane and jihada (better than on almost all Ichimonji, including my other ones). The hamon was also very active etc.

In fact, Piers, with your profound knowledge of armour, teppo, language, the Japanese culture and elegant, polite manner, I think you will be one of the best moderators ever…. In fact, you will elevate the role and discourse, if I may say so. And after all, keeping control of us all will not be dissimilar to your teaching career and managing unruly hotheaded youngsters.

Hmmmm, you seem to know me better than most . Not sure whether to be flattered, perplexed or perturbed? Well, in fact, I know this sword and its previous 2-3 owners….. In reality, the sword looks much better in life than these pictures give it credit for. I am not sure why it has been changing hands so much in the last 4-5 years…. When I first considered it, it was “only” at Hozon level but of course it made it to Juyo…. Perhaps one thing to note for those who might consider it is that it is in the early Ichimonji style, more akin to a late KoBizen in nature. It’s more heavily nie rendered and the choji are rudimentary, if I could say that, and the hamon is more sugu-/midare with some wild niesuji activities. Anyway, for someone like me who likes KoBizen that will tick the boxes but it is not for everyone or for those who are after a stereotypical Ichimonji… P.S. The koshirae is a recent add-on by the dealer. In fact, it must have been added by the last or penultimate dealer who had it.

Thank you for the reminder, HB. Could you please help me understand something in case you have more information. Who is leading the shinsa, what format is it going to have and what will the outcome be? In other words, is it an informal friendly evaluation or a formal exercise with some certificate issued thereafter? Thanks.

Legitimate, although worn-down work with typical mid/late signature (albeit some of it wobbly) and priced where it is because of the TH and condition. Price already down from the 25m yen at the DTI to what currently I believe is a very good (even bargain) price for a Mitsutada long sword. Note, as CH mentioned above, that these are rarer than Masamune and in my subjective view more desirable.

The real daisho regulations really applied to the koshirae and the length of the blades. The names of the swords were not regulated and did not matter.

Proper sword daisho are extremely rare indeed in pre ShinShinto times but they do exist.

I would say, firstly start with the correct orientation of the inscription, and then try to decipher it

Well, good luck with the sale in any case. For those in NY, please go and see the swords. It is a great visual treat.

Your are right. But it is OK. I am also having a laugh. Joking aside, it is a great blade but I am not sure what their pricing thinking has been lately. There has not been a wider benchmarking of the global market, which they ought to do….

Talk of someone who wants to play in the big boys’ playground Frankly, the prices of top pieces have nothing to do with chin chin or not.

Ok Stephen, grand old royalty like you deserve to be given the info. This is said not in jest but with my best sentiments. This is from the NBTHK magazine.

look up the auction sale poster and you are in for a surprise….

Out of the above three, the tanto is the best. Mind you, the Yoshioka Ichimonji is also gorgeous but the price estimate is extremely ambitious. Dare I say, unrealistic.

Jacques and Patrice, For the sake of clarity to forum users, it will be useful to point out that: - the NBTHK certificate uploaded by Patrice is not a qualification diploma or certificate of graduation of a course or training; - it is not a document certifying capability, knowledge, expertise per se in absolute terms etc the way a university degree or technical college diploma might be. No training course and no exams have been taken for these to be conferred (so Jacques, please be careful not to conflate these in your typical attacking mode); - it is a certificate acknowledging that Patrice submitted to the annual NBTHK competition a sword he polished and achieved the rank “nyusen”, the precise interpretation / translation which I am not capable of, but loosely it means something like “his work has been deemed competent enough to be accepted and recognised in this endeavour / exhibition”. I know several European non-traditionally-Japan-trained restorers (in the U.K., Italy etc), who while not formally having completed a full-length Japan-based polishing training period (and thus not having the government diploma of togishi recognition which comes at the end of that training period after passing an official exam) still achieved that “nyusen” recognition. In fact, my Italian friend Massimo has several of these diplomas, which I have seen at his home. These certificates clearly indicate a level of capability and skill recognised to some extent by the NBTHK, and deserve the credit / merit they imply. The “fully traditionally trained”(often Japan-based, but not exclusively) polishers often display skill higher than nyusen, and achieve even higher-rating diplomas and awards. All of that is very public and disclosed in Japanese by both the NBTHK and NBSK (which also organises similar) every year after the awards are granted. But people need to be very clear about what these certificates and achievements are and what these are not. So, I am not defending anyone in the above discussion of what should have been done/said in relation to Catawiki, or taking sides in this debate, but just hoping the above clarifies the matter a bit with regard to such certificates.

Or it could be they doubt how the shu mei exists today. For instance: It could be that “Nobufusa” (very well preserved part of the shumei) was added subsequently above the Koson mei (much less well preserved). In principle, Koson tended to write the attribution on one side of the nakago and put his name and kao on the opposite. That is how I have seen it, including swords I owned. Here everything is on one side and also the different parts look slightly differently. Regardless of all this speculation, it looks like a gorgeous sword and Tanobe sensei seems to have verified it, so all seems good.

Thanks. I am very clear on the “to mei ga aru” implications. Well, if Tanobe sensei has verified it, that’s great. Its sugata is truly wonderful.

Well, excellent, Chandler and thanks for sharing. Is there also an NBTHK paper and what does it say? Nobufusa is a rather rare attribution.

Ray, I think it was recently disproved that the Yoshimitsu was a saiha blade. It was believed to be so, but the latest interpretation is different. I have held the Yoshimitsu in my hand and it is a truly sublime blade….

Jacques, we went through this already. Refer to my post above with the excerpt from the Sano museum book, by the highly renowned but sadly now late Watanabe sensei, which splits hamon types into suguha and midareba. Written in both Japanese and English for you. End of argument. We are wasting time and effort and precious life energy.

Are we discussing this image? I would describe it as predominantly sugu-gunome in monouchi with some notare areas and with nezumi ashi. [But depending on in-hand examination, one could interpret some of the horizontal hataraki as kinsuji]. The lower part is gunome midare interspersed with choji midare, togari, yo and ashi. [And again, depending on in-hand examination, some of the areas of nie in the hamon could be areas of shimi]

BA or also pronounced Ha in other conjunctions and as in the word Hamon. Hardened sharp edge Midare: irregular

“Sussed” or not, Alex, it is still amusing to engage dialectically with Jacques just to disprove some of his grandiloquent statements. He is often right in his views but sometimes they could be very extreme.

one has to love you for the comical effect, Jacques, like a pantomime villain…. As I said, translation is ChatGPT for those who cannot read and understand Japanese. I appended the original Japanese text and as you know it says exactly that…. Of course, you are not commenting about the key point, namely that Watanabe sensei differentiated between suguha and midare as the principal types of hamon and instead you choose to digress….

yes, we agree on that indeed. These two above are not mainline Tadayoshi.