Gabriel L

It will? (EDIT: ah, somehow I glossed over "…but it is no good I think.") Dan, don't sweat it too much. Yumoto's book is a nice starter with a great chapter on hand-drawn kanji variations. It was practically the first of its kind, an English-language primer following WWII, so it is worth having. However, it is also a little bit dated, slim, and rough around the edges by now, mostly with respect to some of the preferred romanizations or terminologies. Something like Connoisseur's would be a great addition to your library, but unfortunately Kodansha has let that one go out of print, driving prices up too high on Amazon etc. You can sometimes find some of our members offering more reasonably-priced copies for sale in the classifieds section, and/or Grey Doffin (http://www.japaneseswordbooksandtsuba.com) may have a copy.

Bienvenue Zhang. I think that is a katana with some decent aspects to study and learn from, from a well-known gendai smith, at a fair value. Tokugawa Art / Sanmei Trading has been around for a long time, to my limited knowledge they are a perfectly legitimate seller. The koshirae is fairly standard modern example, well-made in an absolute sense but nothing special in a snobby artsy collector sense. The sword was polished once when it was made (indeed, polishing is part of the art of the Japanese sword) and I don't see any reason it would have been re-polished so soon. I do not think you should waste money re-polishing this sword as it is in fine state for enjoying and viewing, and every polish takes a little away from a sword's lifespan. In short, for a first nihontō I think there are many worse choices you could have made. If you hadn't already purchased it, I would have suggested perhaps that you take the time to study more actual examples in-person—at clubs, shows, exhibits, etc.—to gain a deeper knowledge of smiths and workmanship. Then you'd have a better idea of what you are looking at and would be more confident in your selection. However, you did not make any "mistakes" here, so since the deed is done I suppose congratulations are in order on your acquisition. Regards, —Gabriel

Thanks Barrie! Glad that you enjoyed it. I forgot to add an observation. Compare the tsume (claw) at the base of the suken with the prongs of the ordinary sankoken. Consider also that Japanese dragons are usually depicted with three claws, specifically. Though I have not seen a source specifically confirming this, it seems pretty evident to me that these elements (the three sanko prongs and the claws of Kurikara) have become semi-equated in the Japanese artistic motifs.

That's a very touching story Darcy. Thank you for putting at least part of this man's life and character into context. I've never read manga and hadn't heard of him before tonight, but you and the other contributors to this thread make me feel like I got to know him in a small way. I am very sorry to hear of his passing and any difficulties he may have had in life. Requiescat in pace, Mr. Smith.

Hello everyone. For a few weeks I've been collecting detailed vocab (kanji) as a way to improve my reading skills, sort out a few longstanding points of confusion/ambiguity, explore topics I may have previously glossed over, etc. I've found some very nice sites in the process—this Japanese page has been great, for example—and found a few gaps in my academic knowledge that I am working on filling. On the one hand it's "just vocab," but on the other hand, really making sure I know what each kanji means and how it relates to others has been surprisingly illuminating. One such gap has been the deeper religious significance of many horimono. I could previously identify the motifs in a simple way ("that's Fudō Myōō, that's a suken, that's sō-no-ryū with a flaming pearl" etc.) but it is only recently that I learned of a few deeper connections bridging the many ken motifs. The following will undoubtedly be painfully old news to many of you, and perhaps woefully incomplete besides; but for the newbies and intermediates among us, I hope it may be useful information as it was for me. I rush to add that this is just an edited summary and amalgamation of many other peoples' work, especially this page. I will append as many of the sources I used that I can recall (with the most relevant at the top). ----------- 剣 Ken We all know (I presume) that ken are, in general, buddhist ritual objects in the form of a double-edged straight sword, often represented in various stylistic ways in blade horimono. Of particular interest is the distinctive "vajra" hilt. But what is a vajra exactly? 金剛 Kongō (vajra) Vajra (kongō in Japanese) is a sanskrit homophone for both lightning and diamond, symbolizing unstoppable force and immovable spirit. The physical vajra is ostensibly a weapon, but like the ken is really a ritual object, meant to overcome evil via the indestructible truth. It is symmetric with a varying number of prongs at a given end. One (dokko), three (sanko), and five (goko) are typical; three is most common. It often has demons' eyes running down the center, and lotus blossom patterns to either side. 独鈷 Dokko (Tokko) (single-blade vajra) This motif also represents a spoke in the Buddhist wheel of law. This is not directly related to the following items, but as it is a motif sometimes seen in horimono/menuki, it is worth mentioning. 三鈷 Sanko (trident vajra) The sanko represents the three jewels (sanbō 三宝) of Buddha, Dharma (law), and Sangha (community). This is the common form used as the hilt for certain kinds of ken. 宝剣 Hō-ken (treasure sword), 三鈷剣 Sanko-ken, or 金剛剣 Kongō-ken (vajra sword) So now we have come full circle and have a little bit better understanding of what the hilt of a ken is, and why this form of ken is called hōken or sankoken. But what is the significance of turning the vajra into a sword? 不道明王 Fudō Myōō (literally "immovable wisdom king") Acala-vidyaraja in the original Sanskrit. A worthy accounting of Fudō's meaning and importance to Shingon Buddhism would be impossible here, but we can address some basic points. The highest of the Wisdom Kings, a category of deity following Buddhas and the Bodhisattvas, he is a manifestation of the Buddha Mahāvairocana. He is wrathful in the pursuit and eradication of evil from men's hearts. Wreathed in flames, he burns away earthly ties. He has blue skin, and sometimes even crooked fangs. In his left hand he holds a kenjaku 羂索 (five-colored lariat) used to bring wanderers back into the true path, or to bind harmful emotions. In his right hand, he holds the kongō-ken 金剛剣. If the kenjaku should fail to restrain men's violent passions, Fudō can cut their earthly ties using this sword. Thus the hōken is a means by which Fudō cuts through delusions and overcomes evil. For this reason, this sword is also called the chiken 知剣 — sword of wisdom. 素剣 Suken A stylized representation of a ken blade. As far as I know it has no further significance other than that inherited from the above points. However, as in the second image, sometimes it has a base with a tsume 爪 (claw)—specifically that of a dragon. Which brings me to… 剣巻龍 Kenmaki-ryū (dragon wrapped around ken) or 倶梨伽羅剣 Kurikara-ken (dragon king sword) Another common horimono theme is the dragon wrapped around a ken. Sometimes it is wreathed in flames (sound familiar?). This is not simply an arbitrary mashup of images: There is a legend that Fudō was challenged by another deity. They both manifested as flaming swords (ken) and found they were evenly matched. However, Fudō then transformed into a dragon, wound around the other sword, and ate it from the top. Thus, the dragon-king Kurikara 倶利迦羅 is actually another representation of Fudō Myōō. On a related note, Kurikara is golden in color; thus, depicting him in actual gold is not just for materialism's sake. ------- I invite everyone's corrections and comments as I was only peripherally aware of these themes before doing this research, and am still quite a novice when it comes to the deeper religious dimensions of horimono. There are many other interesting connected themes in other horimono, but I wanted to focus on this variety tonight. I hope it has been of interest! Regards, —Gabriel -------- Sources include, but were certainly not limited to: http://world.choshuya.co.jp/engrave/index.htm (most images) http://new.uniquejapan.com/glossary/ (the image of the ken) http://nihonto.ca (the image of the suken) bujishugyo.wordpress.com (connection between Fudō and Kurikara; Fudō image) http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/o ... senju.html http://www.aisf.or.jp/~jaanus/deta/k/kongousho.htm http://www7b.biglobe.ne.jp/%7Eosaru/index.htm Connoisseur's (Nakayama) Harry "Afu" Watson's glossary (Nihon Tōkō Jiten etc.) http://www.thejapanesesword.com/terminology Wikipedia (yes, I know…)

http://www.nihon-token.com/ is actually in the NMB's link list, and I am sure that the francophones among us must surely know this already, but I was bowled over by his remarkably thorough and well-organized glossary. I have been assembling a personal database of glossary terms for a few weeks, currently at 567 entries and counting (with an emphasis on multiple kanji forms, etymologies, attention to macrons, various descriptors/modifiers, etc.). Well, this site just filled in a whole heap of blank spots. Everything has commentary, variations are covered, things are grouped logically. It's a real gem provided your français is not too rusty. Just look at how extensive his hamon page is! The vocab is limited to blade stuff — he doesn't go into materials, methods, tools, furniture, kizu, togi, etc. — but the subjects covered are covered very thoroughly. Just wanted to give a shoutout to this excellent site.

肥前国忠昭作 Hizen no kuni Tadaaki saku (made by Tadaaki, Hizen province) I don't know anything about the smith offhand… would do a search but I'm busy at the moment. Good luck. —G.

Came across this interesting page while collecting kanji related to habaki. Figured others might be interested.

Ah, I understand.

The nori 度 Stephen posted seems pretty close to me.

Stephen, Not sure why they would leave off the "Y," but I would be very surprised if they were not referring to the Yuki 幸 you already posted. Actually I would like to say "I am sure that is what they meant" but what do I know… Regards, —G.

Barrie, I only see one partial pic of the ura… did you have a full ura pic you meant to post?

That's a really nice tsunagi… niju habaki in wood? Someone cared about this piece. I wonder why it got separated.

For the benefit of Karl, the comments by Joe & John (and double checked by me, not that that matters) yield the following: 備前國住長船盛光 Bizen no kuni jū Osafune Morimitsu Morimitsu (an Osafune smith), resident of Bizen province. This is slightly odd in that the Osafune Morimitsu I am finding in the popular reference lists are all listed with the Bishū 備州 form of Bizen in their signature. I'd want to look more carefully at this line before concluding anything but just remember that gimei (false signatures) are common in antiques. All three swords are genuine antique nihontō. It is not possible to assess their ultimate quality from these photos, and in their current condition (out of polish) it is doubtful that more photos would help. Still, if you want to try, I suggest you take a look at this guide I wrote. I would recommend you take them to a sword club or show (San Francisco in August, Philadelphia in October, Tampa in February, etc.) to have people look at them in person and give their opinions as to restorability, latent quality, etc. Regards, —G. P.S. I can't make out the other signature either.

I'm going to try and make at least one day. I also put up an ad on the /r/SWORDS subreddit, which receives about 500 unique visitors a day.

My pleasure Curtis and congrats on getting what you did. For future reference, any time you see a guntō you should straight up assume it will start with Nōshū 濃州 and/or Seki 関 until proven otherwise. They are very fundamental kanji to remember! The Kuri 栗 was slightly more off the beaten trail and not a high priority kanji to learn. As a side note, it is the same kuri as in kurijiri 栗尻 (chestnut-termination, i.e. round nakago end). But I just looked up ___yama 山 Kaneaki 兼明 smiths in Sesko's index and saw that Kuriyama fit the bill. Often I'll "cheat" like this when I have enough characters and don't want to bother with the remaining unknowns. Cheers, —G.

Hello Jason, First, to save our necks: Now, for the mei. I'm putting it in spoiler tags because I think you should try part of it before seeing the answer. I'll give some hints on that below. Hints: go to the Nihontō Kanji Pages by Rich T. and take a look at the "common kanji" section. In particular, the last two kanji (which you can see are slightly smaller and separate) are on that page, and so is the fourth kanji. Now, the first three kanji are very familiar to nihontō students, but you may not recognize what they mean just by using that site; however, if you look carefully at this page, you should be able to find them. The sixth character is hiding out here. So is the fifth character, but it has a different reading here than is listed there; I'll give you a freebie on that one and let you know it's read as "Ama." That's enough handholding, give it a go! But if you have trouble, don't be discouraged, it takes practice. Cheers, —G.

Thanks Peter… so that would make it something like: 贈 prize 浦江銃後奉公會 (Urae?) Homefront Civil Service Ceremony 馬渊太？一氏 Horse… [someone's name?] Also, learning proper shodō is on my long list of things to do "eventually" as it would undoubtedly be an excellent way to improve reading comprehension (and of course the art itself appeals to me). Of course, higher up on the list is learning Japanese in general. :lol: As to typed kanji, I use a variety of methods which boil down to: 1. Kotoeri input in OS X. This is the main one. 2. Copy-paste from various eBooks & websites, including http://jisho.org & wiktionary.com – useful for the many old-style kanji that kotoeri doesn't like. 3. The kanji by radical tool – useful for pinning down unfamiliar kanji with recognizable radicals. 4. If I'm desperate, I might try kanji by handwriting. Sometimes it works.

I'm finding some of the kanji but it isn't really pulling together to me as I don't know "normal" Japanese. Unsure kanji in red: Top: 贈 Line 1: 浦江？？奉公會 Line 2: 馬渊太？一氏 I'll let someone else fill in the gaps, this is not quite in my grasp.

Hi Mark! I might give it a try in a bit (no guarantees). In the meantime, for the sake of everyone's neck:

I feel so special! :lol: Thanks for the pics Piers, as I won't be able to make this exhibit it is nice to see a couple of the pieces in photo form. Love the Muramasa, classic hamon for him. And the yari has quite an even more complex blade shape than normal jūmonji, very impressive. I don't know much about katchū, but it is certainly a striking design. Cheers, —G.

Piers, I would certainly enjoy seeing a few pics. But don't let me keep you from any work you may need to do otherwise. Regards, —G.

Good luck Curtis!

I was literally just explaining to someone how authentic nihontō are never signed with anime-style phrases like "bleeding shadow" (which he wanted to sign on a sword he made)… and here we have a sword signed "blue frost." Never say never I guess. Of course, to be fair, 青霜 is much more poetic and Japanese than 血流影 .