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Again - thanks for all your feedback If I may I have one last favour to ask I looked on LuLu and filtered the results just to show tsuba books I was surprised that none of the tsuba books had any reviews and therefore no 'star' rating Would it be possible for those that have purchased the book to add on the LuLu website say a one line review and a star rating I'm sure this would help with sales as when I'm buying anything on-line I look first for the star rating then read the reviews so this I'm sure would help with sales Grev

I forgot to say that in my examples the hitsuana of this type appears to be later than ko Akasaka but as a collector for only a few years I have a s*&! load to learn I hope this makes sense as I been out for a few beers and a game of pool so not firing on all cylinders

Hi Japan 2121 On this message board we like to use actual first names Two nice tsuba - Shoami can easily be overlooked but they did some nice tsuba Was there any mention of a possible date for the Akasaka? I still think it is a good result to be proved to be an Akasaka tsuba I have about 30 examples of Akasaka in my book and looking at these dating can be difficult It is annoying when the papers only tell you what you can already see so I wonder about the benefits of submitting tsuba for papers I submitted a Yamakichibei that I was 50/50 but it came back as gimei so you have had better news than me

I liked them

Hi As well knew a load of posts have been lost - it happens There were a couple of nice reviews that have gone The last one was a nice reply from BaZZa so if you wouldn't mind would you re-post today reply There was also a current LuLu code that may still work, obviously this would help if anyone has the code

Thanks Malcolm Looks a good match to me I should have this mon in one of my books but must have overlooked it I'll check again

Hi I have a couple of similar mon where I am unsure of the design I checked for both on the internet and in a few of my books I'm pretty sure this is Wood sorrel This image is very similar but I can't find a match the closest being a water lily I'm sure it is a petal/flower rather than a trio of items

Hi A box of no real quality but I like the lacquer work on the mirror

Hi A bit of a head scratcher I would assume a comon theme and obviously all deliberatly designed The upper ribbon shape may be a Buddhist symbol so if correct may be a starting point

Nice tsuba - I missed that one

Now a couple have been sold I would like to post reply and add a couple of details Currently 3 hard copies and 4 PDF books have gone to France, the UK and the USA Please don't take this a plea to buy but I'd like to say that I get £0.96 ($1.24) for the hard copies and a bit more for the PDF version so I'd say it was good value A principal aim was to be able to approach the Museum and say because of the interest shown in the book 'what about arranging an exhibition The last time they were on display was 1930 which to me is a tragedy! Mikolaj You are quite correct with the dating of the early Akasaka tsuba as these should be around C1650 - 1680 oops You also ask about attribution and this in its self is a bit of a story Four years ago I was allowed to photograph all the Museum tsuba and I was also given the attributions. I also have a copy of the catalogue for the 1930 exhibition Nice easy job, an image plus attribution. It became very clear early on that some attributions were way out After talking to some NMB members I found out that possibly 85% of the attributions were incorrect So four years later with help from collectors and members of the NMB the project was completed Rather than mentioning all those that did help and with the main helpers approval I decided to accept full liability for the attributions In the majority of attributions if three people agreed then I accepted their conclusions With almost 600 tsuba there will be errors and for that I can only apologise but evidently it is quite easy to make amendments to the book Ford also made the point that no Edo tsuba were made of sentoku. It's all brass. sentoku only 'happens' in the early Meiji period. (1868 - 1880) The comments above and in other posts can only help with this publication I did ask a few members of the NMB whether to just do a selection of the best tsuba or do the lot Most said, do them all and I think this is one of this books attractions, having the likes of good, gimei and shirimonjo in one book I did have to take into consideration the cost of the book hence both sides of every tsuba is not shown. Namban tsuba are usually pretty similar on both sides There are some schools that are well represented and it is therefore nice to the similarities as well as their differences At the same time within these bigger groups the similarities around the 'anas' and seppa can be good kantai points Namban selection is quite big so although not a favoured school it shows a bit of diversity I'm very happy to receive any good or bad comments and of course I look forward to your reviews With thanks Grev

I’ve asked Brian to delete my older post about this tsuba book as I now have a copy and can make a couple of accurate comments. The book has exceeded my expectations. The colours and text are great on quite heavy paper. The only comment is that the text on the title page has a grey tinge on a white background. The cover has some very common character, the first being in a computer script followed by the written version and finally the sosho version The book has 221 A4 pages in full colour There are 581 tsuba with many mei that to my knowledge have never been published ​There is a cross reference to the tsuba with a mei and vice versa These tsuba come under the general term of the ‘Good, the bad and the Ugly’. So many books are high end tsuba that most can not afford but most of these can be seen a general sales and fairs This publication is available on LuLu publishers https://www.lulu.com/shop/search.ep?keyWords=greville+cooke&type= Rather than post tsuba images I feel it is better to click on the LuLu ‘review’ tab to see the first few pages Paperback = £39.06 ($49.99) eBook = £19.99 ($25.59) The major aim for publishing this tsuba book was to persuade the Museum to get the tsuba out of storage for an exhibition To help this I’d like as many NMB members to promote this book through their web sites, Facebook, Nihonto clubs etc The more books sold gives me a decent lever to ask the Museum to display these tsuba This has taken me around four years to get to this stage with the help of many NMB members but I would like to mention Markus Sesko for his invaluable help with the actual publication. I would appreciate members to add to this post any reviews or corrections

Hi Just playing with my macro lens and focus not dead on yet One usually requested question is how to tell apart a good/bad tsuba As a novice I'm happy to spot a bad one If you have to choose between a Ferrari and a Ford you wouldn't go on a car message board to ask which was the best car Quality should be relativity easy to see but I do accept for some schools I have to ask the experts An old saying is a bad tsuba offends your eyes (it actually refers to sword rather than a tsuba) If you can see a tsuba in hand always use a loupe So these are a couple of examples Nice texture See how much detail the maker has worked into this wave Not a very good tsuba but again look at the details. You can almost see the maker taking out little nibbles with his chisel

Thanks Franco - I'll check it out

Many thanks - Ispent an hour looking for this mei and it takes less than eight minutes for the answer Is this a record? Any thoughts on the school?

I'm struggling with this mei I have: 淀 = I can't find this in any of my mei books 沢 = taka or masu ​Of course both may be wrong

I just bought 5 tsuba from the Birmingham Arms & Armour sale so my pocket money also spent

Yes it was, I did it ASAP for the seller Having quite a few tsuba I have to stop jumping in!

Ooops sorry Peter I will not be buying No 4

I'd like to buy No4 Would have prefered No 2 but only just seen the post! Nice pick Roberts - are you at the Birmingham A&A fair tomorrow

A diificult situation for both parties I had similar where I thought I was first but it went to anothert buyer and the seller explained why and his reason was sound So although disappointed I just waited for another one It becomes more problematic and maybe heated if someone sold an item for a very low (below it's market) value If I see something that needs some thought/research I'll ask the seller if I can have a little time to make up my decision They may say no or contact me if someone else makes an offer Due to the time differential I will inform the seller if I'm going to bed or work so I will be unable to reply for a few hours If it is something you really desire MP as many safeguards as you can I would not lose any sleep after not buying this tsuba but the post is useful to show what could go wrong and how it may be averted I suppose the next question is how many sellers have had buyers pull out of a deal at the last moment? No names required just a bit of feedback

Thanks Richard & Pete I'm amazed how you find these and then to trace the real sale page The tsuba is stunning but at just over $3,600 and then the import duty James L intimated the price sort a reasonable Tanaka tsuba would be While you have got your search eyes on any Inaba tsuba about? I like my largish collection as I've a lot to learn from these but I can see me selling a load to specialise but not yet Grev UK

Hi Florian I've have a big think about that one as I do like it

Thanks for the relies It looks that there could be too many pitfalls unless from a known dealer I will have a look for Toryusai as well It looks like the prices will be to high for me especially if they are 'flavour of the month' There are four in the Birmingham museum Three are the normal brown patina and then there is the one attached The other favourite in the Inaba school and they have three of these Grev