SteveM

Hello Jim, The paper doesn't go with the sword. It's a certificate of achievement for someone named Tomi Nagahama, in the 6th grade of a pre-war combined elementary-and-high school in Okinawa prefecture Furugen Elementary/High School.

I think this is Sadanaga 貞永, a different smith altogether. (I am talking about the hakagaki in the first post) Kunitomo Teiei would be 貞栄. The date is eluding me. I am tempted to say December, 1947 昭和丁亥年師走, but its a bit too illegible for me.

Get well soon Markus. If anybody hasn't checked out Markus's site, and all the amazing articles that he has made available there (for free!), you really ought to do yourself a favor and start reading those. They are a great way to educate yourself on various matters relating to Nihonto.

It's a flag flown outside of a shrine. This flag says 瓢箪山稲荷大明神 Hyōtanyama Inari Daimyōjin, the name of one of the Shintō gods. Presumably it would have flown outside of the shrine of the same name in Ōsaka. https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%93%A2%E7%AE%AA%E5%B1%B1%E7%A8%B2%E8%8D%B7%E7%A5%9E%E7%A4%BE

Ahh - when I put in fox + rice sheaf + menuki into the search engine, I get a link to this same menuki on the Choshuya site. You are right, Ford; fox and scarecrow, both symbols of good harvest, and protectors of the crops. http://www.choshuya.co.jp/sale/new_tousougu/b/b190/index.htm

Add that to the ever-growing list of misreadings I've done!

Looks like a weasel and farm implements.... maybe there is some story to this. Nothing springs to mind. The marks on the bottom menuki look to me like 後藤 (Gotō). I don't know what the one on the top is (I mean, I'm guessing its the name of the particular Gotō artist that did this. There were a gazillion of them).

In the "Type" column it lists what I suspect are abbreviations; 東 and 名 being typical shorthand for Tokyo and Nagoya. Following from this I suspect 大 is Osaka, and 小 may be Kokura(?). 名造 Manufactured in Nagoya 東造 Manufactured in Tokyo 本部 Headquarters 東一造 Manufactured in Tokyo #1 大造 Manufactured in Osaka 小造 Manufactured in Kokura

I would say the first two columns are 単位 (Unit) and 識別 (Type), and then followed by the months as you said. The "Units" refer to the counting units used in Japanese: the counter furi (振) is used for katana, and the counter chō (挺) is used for guns. In other words, this column is a bit redundant, because once you know you are looking at swords, you don't really need to be reminded that the unit for sword counting is "furi". I guess it shows a certain fastidiousness of record-keeping.

Dōkō Norishige mon to tsutau (This smith is said to have been a student of Norishige) 正に所傳の首肯さるる優品也 Masa ni shoden no shukōsaruru yūhin nari A superb work that we can be sure is as claimed (in other words, we can be sure this was done by a student of Norishige) 窺ひ知うる I think are the words on the saya. 　Nowadays I think people would say 窺い知れる I echo Robert's words above. You've done extremely well.

Yes I was wondering about the shark/ray skin comment as well, and I think he must have meant that he can't see any on his hilt(?). It looks like the ray skin has perhaps degraded and crumbled and fallen away. It is not unusual, especially if the thread wrapping has come undone as has happened on one side of your hilt. There is no inscription on the tang, just some marks that have been painted on (again, this is normal for WW2-era blades). It looks like there is 西 (west) and some other mark on the blade. It is not the name of the swordsmith. Its usually some other identification mark that has been lost to time.

Very nice blade from a well-known and respected group of smiths. Congratulations. You've done very well. Echoing Grev above: the two-piece habaki is more expensive than the single habaki. They are supposed to enhance an already nice sword. (To tell the truth, I find them a bit troublesome as well.)

I was thinking it might be a variation on the rising sun mon (日足紋) Something like "Nijū maru ni kyūhon nissoku", but Google wasn't too impressed with that wild guess. http://www.harimaya.com/o_kamon1/yurai/a_yurai/pack2/hiasi.html My other guess was MercedesBenz.

Alternate name was Gotō Kenjō (後藤謙乗). Fifth generation of the Gotō Hachirōbei line. Kenjō/Mitsuhiro adopted the celebrated Gotō Ichijō. Well out of my comfort zone on the appraisal of these guys. I'll leave that to the experts. All of the above courtesy of Wakayama's Kinkō Jiten.

It should be Gotō Mitsuhiro 後藤光廣, but it looks very suspicious to me. Correction: Should be 後藤光弘　(Same reading: Gotō Mitsuhiro) Very early 1800's. Might not be as dodgy as I thought.

Having a closer look at this; the last name of the customer might also not be Kohara, . Ko-something. Maybe can say with more confidence if you can get a bit closer.

I don't think the price of swords from either of these smiths will be going south. I think when my grandkids are grown up, they will be telling stories of how their grandpa could have bought a designated art treasure sword from Inoue Shinkai for only JPY 24,500,000. I really think he is the equivalent of a Monet, Manet, or an El Greco. Edit: Bloody hell, how nice is that Kotetsu blade! If I had JPY 24,500,000, i would have a tough time choosing which one of these two to get!.

Now that is a lovely sword.

Wow. Looks real to me, too. And it looks to be in fine condition, which seems to be a rarity lately for these kinds of lucky finds. Keep your fingers off the blade, and handle it using a soft cloth or handkerchief or some such that will not scratch the blade. Usually blades are very, very lightly oiled and stored in a plain wooden scabbard - it looks like yours has an actual scabbard (not the storage scabbard), but this is OK too, at least for now. Check around on this site for storing and handling tips. It looks like you have the real deal and despite it being a serious weapon, it is paradoxically fragile, as it can easily be marred by carelessly leaving a fingerprint on it, or trying to scrape off small rust bits with a coin, etc... The script on the other side says, 慶應二年囗月吉日 應小原氏之需 I'll put the translation as a spoiler in case somebody wants to take a crack at it themselves Oh, and forum rules require a name - cuts down on the trolling and allows us to call you by something other than your handle.

吉政 Yoshimasa, I think. (Kichi was the right kanji, but pronounced yoshi in this case). Take a look here. http://iidakoendo.com/4018/

七寸壱分五厘　　壱＝一

You beat me to it. Yes I think Shigeyuki Maybe this one 尾州藤原重幸

Hello Juha, The picture is too distant to get a look at the jigane. We would need much closer pictures, macro shots even, to start talking about jigane. The shape looks good, but I don't know if it screams out "Muromachi". Actually, it doesn't even scream out "sakizori" to me, but I guess it is somewhat sakizori. I get the impression from the nakago-jiri that it has been shortened, and so the original shape might have been longer, but I could be wrong about that. In any event, it is a nice shape, but I wouldn't exclude the possibility of it being a shinto. I also tend to think that any respectable forger wouldn't put a modern name on a koto sword. It wouldn't make financial sense, for one thing. The length will determine if it is wakizashi (under two shaku) or katana. The terms are somewhat flexible - but for registration purposes (i.e. when the sword is registered in Japan) there is less flexibility. Uchigatana and katate-uchi are terms that were discussed at some length on the board here a few months ago - I recommend having a look at that discussion. Looks like an OK sword. Should be very nice when it comes back from polish. (Your togishi should be able to tell you more about it as well).

The tsuba (hand guard) looks like it has parts from an Imperial Navy sword (tsuba with rising sun spacer). Similar thing can be found on the site below, which, along with this site, is a great resource for information on military swords. http://ohmura-study.net/105.html The rest of the furnishings do not look like military issue furnishings, so it could be an ensemble that was cobbled together using various parts. The scabbard and hilt are not military, and there are some bits missing from the scabbard - the bits where the bare wood is showing through. The sword itself is mightily scratched up. The fingerprint is a worry. Looks like the sword is missing the "yokote", and the ridge line (shinogi) is worn down. These are problematic when appraising swords, and will detract from the monetary value.

It's an address. From the saya on top: 本籍地宮城県宮城郡浦戸村寒風澤百拾七番地 現住所宮城県塩竈市泉澤 伊豆興四松 The saya on the bottom has basically the same writing. I'm not 100% confident of the given name. I've basically just transliterated the kanji. It points to a location and a name. It doesn't seem to be a significant name or location.