Hello,
sorry for not having replied any sooner - I did not receive any notification concerning this thread . There must be something in the forum settings I did not configure well, who knows.
Anyway, thank you everyone for your advice here, and thank you everyone who PMed me
Just a word: I should have mentioned first that I've read >100 times "buy books before swords" on this forum and somewhere else, which is excellent advice I followed to the letter. Now I've got quite a decent library! I've also read somewhere that Jean said "BE ADULT !" and I think I am, I know what I do, please understand this and also that after studying the books, buying a sword is probably the next step to do.
Maybe I should spare $1000 to get a better sword. But the same is true for $2000 swords, and so on. As I said, it doesn't have to be an objet d'art; just a very low-end Nihonto, because I've a very precise design for it, and as I said, it's not really Nihonto studying, whence the very tight budget. Please also don't show me waks when I said I'd just like a katana. The one Brian posted could suit me, but I'm reluctant to buying a blade with gunto mountings -- please don't ask me why.
Anyway, I could find something that roughly fits my budget and I'm happy with it. Thank you again for your help, it was a pleasure reading you