Bruce Pennington

That explains a lot! I had just assumed to stumbled across this at a swordshow or something. It's quite gorgeous!

Thanks Steve! And thanks again to Thomas. I've enjoyed this whole learning experience.

I love it! Nicely done.

Mei question - the mei on Stamp 1 seems to use a different kanji for the "hide". Am I missing something?

Ok, sounds like he might have had a set made (or made a set himself?) and the differences aren't intentional. I, at first, assumed the progression of the 5 had to do with the 3 generations. I've seen that in father/son kao where the son's kao came from the father's kao but was slightly modified. But that's not the case here it seems. . So, if I have this right, there were 3 generations of Masahide. The hotstamps were used by the first one. Amahide is simply another art name used by Masahide, which explains the same hotstamp on his blades. And finally, the Showa Amahide apprenticed from an apprentice from a Masahide. Which explains the almost identical hotstamp he used, with slight modification.

They might surprise you!

Thank you Thomas, those are excellent! Are each of the 5 from different Masahide? I eye-balled the various dates and they seem to be from different years, but without crawling through the Japaneseswordindex.com page to decipher, I don't know what they are telling me. Are they in sequential order by date?

Kaz, You're hitting the weekend, so response get slower until Monday traffic kicks in, but I'd still post this on the Translation Assistance thread. Those guys can sometimes work miracles.

Yes, I've since come to realize the blade of my original post wasn't fake after all, but one of these occupied-China-made blades, like Fuller proposed. I'm still quite skeptical of the fittings, though. The blade went to Stephen, so at least it's in good hands!

It predominantly is, but I've included a smattering of older stamps, when I find them, as it establishes the fact that stamping was not a Showa era phenomena but began much earlier. Smiths put marks/images/bonji/etc on blades for centuries but they had to be carved in, so it wasn't very common. The industrial age changed all that and so stamping exploded in use and numbers. I'd love to have the other versions of the Masahide stamps if you have them. And that goes for other unique stamps you might have.

Thanks Geoff. Yes, you're right on this one. Too bad. The buyer paid $1,100 for a sword that normally goes for $450. I've emailed the auction house on the one you mentioned being sold as "Navy" with another gunto.

Thanks Thomas, that's a good one. I'm thinking Darcy was onto something with his polisher idea. Let's see if we can chase it down. I have 3 smith mei that are stamped - Nobumitsu, Naohiro, and Masayuki - but all of them put the stamp up high, around the mekugi-ana, not down at the end of the nakago. Nobumitsu Naohiro Masayuki Adding the one in Thomas' reference for ease of viewing:

Darcy, can you explain this some more for me? Do you have photos of examples? I feel as you do that this might be a polisher mark rather than a smith mei.

Wow, Thomas, where have you been all my life! Ha! Sounds like I could use your input on the Stamps of the Japanese Sword document! Do you have examples of the other stamps Masahide used?

I see now, that paper uses 正秀 which would be MASA hide not 天秀 known as AMA hide The kanji on the blade doesn't seem to precisely fit either one, to me. When I first saw it, I was thinking "Masa" because of the bottom of it. Yet the hotstamp is the one seen on Amahide blades. I wonder if @mecox can add some enlightenment? Could the stamp be a forge logo like the one used by the Showa Amahide and seen on all the smiths that worked there? It hinges on whether Masahide worked with the Amahide of the 1800s. The Nihontoclub page shows Masahide working Active Period1781-1820.

Found this on an auction site. First time I've seen both a hotstamp (kokuin) and kao (kakihan) on a blade, but I'd like to confirm that the last character is, in fact, a kao rather than something else, please! If I have the date right, it's 1806.

Adding this Type 95 posted by Hamish on Type 95 NCO got an Upgrade thread

Thanks for the added pics Paul! The "10" on the fittings seem to me to be fitters taking part of the "510" of the nakago, which, to me, seems to indicate the 510 was put there by the smith or forge, not the fitters. The 2 letters seem to be "S 九" or "S 9" which is WAY out of my experience with the whole stamped-numbers gamut.

Good visual glossary: http://japaneseswordindex.com/glossary.htm and http://japaneseswordindex.com/military.htm and many more pages at the homepage.

Steve, To your question of "too much trouble" - I used to wonder that myself. It seems a lot of work to produce something that sells for $150 USD when advertised honestly. But have since seen posts with photos from factories in China making dozens of these at a time. If they can make them for a profit at $150, imagine their profit at $1,500! And China is only one of several countries doing this. The fakes began actually DURING the war! So many of these came home with returning soldiers. Lots were made in the occupation years with G.I.s swarming all previously held Japanese lands. But there are known fakers (one of them IN Japan!) producing them today. Fake aging is becoming a science. Now to the angle that it's produced by an occupied land, you're best bet is to find someone with language skills in from the Southeast Asian nations. If you can find someone that recognizes the characters, then you're in business. But for now, they look like someone trying to imitate Japanese characters, badly.

Steve, I would have assumed just the opposite. An NCO with "Emperor property" (i.e. the Type 95 fittings) putting a personal/private blade in them. Probably would have kept the issue blade on the side. To the undercoat - the brown looks like rust. The bluish-green is really odd.

Thanks to both Thomas and Paul! Paul, to the fittings have the "510" on them?

Steve, I'd post the pics for the thread, but when I click the link now, the pics are gone. I saw it the first time I went, but not now. Hope someone will copy and post them here. After reading the list of officer swords turned in by NCOs in @BANGBANGSAN's thread, nothing would surprise me.

This one is at a Affiliated Auction. Tells: Bad Tokyo stamps on blade and fuchi and missing contractor stamp on fuchi Grinder marks inside tsuba cut-out Bad bohi, which even has perpendicular grinder marks in it! Oddly, it appears to have cosmoline on the blade! That might just be rust, though. If cosmoline, it means the fakers really went overboard to try to give it some age. Finally, look at the dimples in the tsuka diamonds (which are painted silver!). They are punched, i.e. concave. Real ones are convex little dots.

Here's one in bad shape. On a Kanemichi at a Bagwell Auction: https://www.proxibid.com/Firearms-Military-Artifacts/Military-Artifacts/U-S-Vet-Estate-Hand-Forged-Japanese-Samurai-katana-Sword-Kanemichi-Saku-W-Capture-Photo/lotInformation/62012792#topoflot