Bruce Pennington

Neil, All the '38s I can see that part of the nakago (there are 2 or 3 I cannot see) have the logo. Of the '39s, all the ones with Alpha/numberic numbers, all are non-Koa and have the SMR logo - N 423, N 574, and V 18. The rest of the '39s are katakana/number serials and are Koa Isshin, no logo.

John, Just realized my kyugunto has one of these! A Suya made, one-handed kyu with a Naohiro blade.

Not a nihonto, but a "great find on ebay" still. Wife bought me a gorgeous one-handed kyugunto, with tassel by Naohiro. One of only 3 known smiths with stamped mei:

He's referring to the the Rinji seishiki, George. There was no "type" designation for that Type 98 variant.

Found a Type 95 for sale in a local pawn shop. Rough condition, one nick in blade edge; almost no paint left on saya; dark staining on most of blade. Owner asking $900 USD but you know those guys are always ready to negotiate. If anyone is interested, let me know and I'll get more pics and/or do some dickering for you with the shop. Local city tax is 6% and shipping will add cost, so figure another $100 to whatever price we get him down to. Only 2 photos I have at the moment. Suya Shoten company for the Tokyo 1st Arsenal. Stegel said the serial number puts it in the last year of the style, before the wooden handled versions came in.

The style is of the Type 98 Japanese Officer sword in "informal" or "combat" fittings. The saya (scabbard) would have been covered in leather, but those are often lost over time. It would have looked like this: You can read more about them on Ohmura's webpages.

Seems there were many Japanese swords brought back by troops from the Korean war. Must have been left from the end of WWII. Interesting ant engraved on the tsuba! Can't see what it is on the other side. How about some clear close-up shots?

Ok, head's clear now. Quite an interesting observation. I appreciate that. Too systematic to be random fitter shop stamps. Adds weight to my feeling they are Army numbers, for some reason.

I'm drinking coffee as fast as I can, but I can't see what you're working out here, sorry!

Here ya go Thomas. I'm sorry, but I've had a couple, and I'm going to have to re-read your train of thought in the morning. I really hope you're working on a book, because we'd all REALLY benefit from any book you'd put out!

I've got the next revision in the works. It's only been 5 months since the last update, so I'm trying to make myself hold out till March for the next. Thanks for the kudos @vajo Chris. It has become more of my love of the hobby than the swords (WAIT, no I didn't say that! Delete if I've broken something!!! Ha!)

Thanks Mal! I'm going to change that one in my Stamps Doc. I had it listed at the kao for Tadahiro, but I think it would be better listed in the Buddhist markings page, now that we have 2 unrelated smiths with the symbol. George, thanks for checking on that. Considering the date, Feb '42, I'm now not surprised there is no kana. That early, the only kana/number blades are the Matsu on the Yamagami brothers. I have a Masakazu marked "フ 37" with Star, in RS fittings, but no date. It was likely made in '43 or '44. I'm slowly gathering files on fittings that used kana + number, but it's pretty random, and doesn't seem to be limited to RJT blades or particular areas. Still too little data. Thanks for the help guys!

Pulling this one up from the past as a good friend has just sent me a very similar one, but it's on a Kumazuma Kanetoshi blade! Slightly different as this one is surrounded by a "gourd" shape. @mecox @george trotter or anyone else know if these two smiths worked for the same forge at some point? @PNSSHOGUN, John, earlier, commented that the image might have Buddhist significance. Anyone know? It might explain why the same image is on blades by different smiths. Maybe it's not a kao, but simply a religious symbol/meaning?

Thanks George! Not to detract from this line of searching, but just came across this one with possibly a chrysanthemum? 19 visable petals, so @ChrisW thought it could be either that or sun rays. I'm going with the chrysanthemum angle. Posted HERE.

Inome, or "boar's eye" pattern from @AntiquarianCat HERE. I think it's only the second habaki I've found with the design. Please add yours if you have one! Here's the only other one I have (which is likely to have been posted already, but adding for comparison)

I have another habaki on file with a similar design concept (don't recall the source): Yours is only the 2nd I've recorded.

Thanks Steve. I was just puzzled because both Sukeharu in Marcus' book used 助春 rather than 助 治, but both of them were well before WWII. Thanks for the help!

Not sure if the Care and Etiquette pages touched on the active rust issue. And I'm not a nihonto guy, so if I'm wrong about this, guys, chime in! The active rust can be stopped with coating with an oiled rag. It can actually be reduced with some work with a deer antler and oil. I recently used this technique on a small blade and it actually removed quite a bit with apparently no marks to the actual blade. You can find cut deer antlers at pet stores (dogs love to chew them).

Just like to confirm. A guy over at THIS GUNS.RU THREAD, who seems to know his stuff, translated it as Sukeharu. Can't find a WWII smith by that name in either Sesko's list or Slough, so wondering if the google translation of his translation is correct. Thanks!

This is all there is on him in Sesko's book: "KANETSUNA (兼綱), Shōwa (昭和, 1926-1989), Gifu – “Kanetsuna” (兼綱), real name Ikeda Tsutomu (池田勉), born August 13th 1907, he worked as guntō smith"

Hi Keith! You've likely been hearing that from guys that don't study WWII blades. So, it depends upon what a collector considers "good". There were over 2 million swords made for the war and many of them were made by top-ranking smiths. Mantetsu, Yasukunito, and Minatogawato were swords made for the war that were better than many, if not most, swords made in centuries past. The RJT system put out thousands of traditionally-made blades from top smiths. Now, having said that, your blade with the large "Seki" stamp was likely not made "traditionally", but like the Dave's chart shows, that simply may be that it was oil quenched, not water quenched, but could have been made with the same skill and techniques of the traditional smiths. From my observations, most blades with the large Seki are quite good, to high, quality. A system of inspections was put into place early in the war to weed out poor-quality showato. Those passing inspection were stamped with the Seki or Showa stamp.

Thanks Steve! That's a new one for the files. Many of my Kanemasa on file are

These are really puzzling to me. The blade and kissaki look really good: But the nakago are horrid. I might lean toward Dan's @DTM72 idea, as this blade doesn't look Japanese, but rather off-mainland made. With Nick Komiya's post in mind about mainland sword production being almost totally wiped out in the last year of the war and production being forced over to occupied territories. If the blade were crap, I'd even lean toward total fakery, but it looks appropriately aged for WWII, so I'm 51% at a combination of George's and Corry's thoughts - civil tsuba/saya, late war tsuka, island-made blade. In other words, a late-war, work with what you've got, sword.

Corry, I have a few different Kanemasa on file with both Seki and Showa stamps, but I don't see one signed this way. Have you had the mei fully translated? @SteveM - mind helping me with this one?

Astonishing! This story shows why we, today, struggle to make sense of some of these mei. Really love seeing the human story of these guys.