Bruce Pennington

Yes, sorry, never had that terminology down. The first pic made me think it was hira-mune.

Hopefully some of the guys who specialize in tsubas will comment. My gut feel is simply a lower-grade tsuba, but legit. It's got the double hole - one for a button latch and the large whole for a leather retainer strap. That's not something you normally see on a fake, but there are a few of these in the hands of collectors. A bit of an oddity in their own right.

Sorry Trev, that turned out to be a trick of the original picture. I can see in the last picture that the mune is beveled normally. Pictures and lighting sometimes play tricks on us on the forums.

Have you had this translated? This is quite a unique sword! It has a flat mune.

I don’t know if I should laugh or cry!

That's a "that depends" kind of question! You will find collectors on both sides of that question. Some prefer to preserve gunto in their current condition, especially if it appears it's condition came from the war and not from a post-war Bubba. Some try to restore gunto to as much of their original glory as possible. I did that with my dad's Mantetsu, but I've left most of my others "as is." Ok, I've added a missing seppa here and there, but nothing more (ok, yes I've added missing sarute and tassels on them all, but nothing more!!!).(Dang, ok, I stripped 2 95s that had horrible post-war paint, and repainted one of them). So it depends upon what you plan to do with yours - sell or keep and preserve. If selling, don't change anything! If keeping, it's your call. A handle re-wrap can run around $200 and a blade polish from $700 to $2,400 depending upon who does it.

Both appear legit. First one made by the Seki Token Co., inspected by Nagoya Inspector, under Kokura Arsenal administration. Second one very late war. Both Type 95s. Prices are all over the place in U.S.A. You can find them for $600, many in the $1,200 range, and crazy ones over $2,000. I haven't been pricing the late war ones, so disregard what I said for that one, I don't know. On the 95's I wouldn't remove the handles. There's nothing there (except an occacional "W" stamp) and the handles often loosen up after re-assembling. I take all mine apart, but I'm the owner. I wouldn't do it as a seller.

Damascus steel and serial numbers on the habaki are classic signs of Chinese fakes. The tsuba, from what I can see, might be legit. I honestly don’t know when Damascus steel first cake into use. The rig as a whole looks to have age, so maybe it was made by the Chinese even during the war? But that would depend on knowing the history of Damascus steel use.

Ohmura's website is a vast free resource: http://ohmura-study.net/900.html As to the girlfriend's inability to translate the kanji - the kanji used during the war were much simpler than the ones used today. When I first started out, with my dad's Mantetsu, I asked an older Japanese lady to translate the Koa Isshin slogan. She got most of the individual sounds right, but not being familiar with the wartime slogan, she had no idea what it said or it's meaning.

Fittings are of the Type 98 style with leather-covered combat saya (scabbard). Rank tassel is Company Grade, meaning for Lt's and Capt's.

Bob, That's a legit Type 94 Officer gunto! They sometimes had fullered blades too. Hope someone can translate the kanji, they look quite unique!

Ditto on all the above. Stamps are upside-down on the fuchi, wrong place on the blade. Brass is almost always a giveaway (though there are some oxidized Nagoya tsukas that have a brassy tint). They are getting better on that Gifu stamp, but not there yet.

A Good Day, February, 1938.

Luis, To continue this discussion, we are hijacking Chis's thread about his great kyugunto. Simply type Komonjo (or Showa22 or Samuraimonkey42) in the search window at the top and you will get several examples of very questionable, to outright fakery from these sellers. Yes, each of them have been known to sell the real thing too. That's what makes it more difficult for the buyer. But this discussion is going off topic and could be held on it's own thread.

John, Just came across this picture on one of Ohmura's pages (http://ohmura-study.net/133.html). The officer was on a gunto repair team, and had quite a long gunto!

Chris, that’s a good price. I’d love to have one of these, but they’re hard to find under $1,000.

Sad news from Nick Komiya at Warrelics. I guess since Mantetsu-to are where the money is today in WWII gunto, that is attracting the criminal element: "Late last year, the association of Nihontoh smiths petitioned the government for subsidies to support and preserve the tradition of Japanese sword -smithing, which otherwise they claimed to be a quickly dying skill in Japan. They warned further that soon there will only be "made in China" Nihontoh. I did not take their last warning seriously, but if they are making fake Mantetsutoh, China is a likely source and the warning starts to make serious sense. On the other hand, I did a Google search in Japanese on fake Mantetsu, and discovered that Japanese collectors are also onto the possibility of Mantetsu blades being faked since 2015 or so. A post claimed that the author started to entertain doubts when he noticed two Mantetsus were approved for a permit on the same day in consecutive numbers, striking him as too much of a coincidence and that a sudden surge in Mantetsu supply in the market is observed . His theory is that perhaps already registered Mumei Bizentoh (having similar characteristics to a Mantetsu) blades are getting fake Mantetsu mei added, in this case, in Japan. Anyway collectors do seem to have good reason to be on alert over Mantetsu blades."

LOL!!! Thanks for the laugh! Yes, of course someone would take a 500 yr old blade and put a WWII date on it!!! Makes complete sense to me ........ [will SOMEBODY silence those voices in my head!!!!]

Dan, This is one of the most egregiously falsely advertised gunto I've ever seen! The date is March 1944 and the smith is; 兼定 (Kanesada) (I might have the "sada" part wrong). The fittings are called several names - Type 3, '44 fittings, Contingency (Rinji) model - and are not rare at all. There are many of these on the market. Writing on both sides of the nakago (tang) is quite normal. I'll let the nihonto experts chime in on that, but I doubt it. Purely a WWII era, factory blade and fittings. [Ha! I just saw that 3 other guys posted as I was typing!]

Very sad to hear. Scumbags are an eternal part of our humanity. Just painful to have to deal with them in our day & age and in our fields of study. I'm going to keep this one in the study, but note the controversy.

Ha! I think you're going to have to join me and take on that study, my friend! I've saved many pictures, but not one of them includes the mounts. In general, I can say I've seen them in 98, Type 3 (Rinji), and combat saya fittings. But it would take someone more versed in koshirae to tackle that question.

Neil, The short answer is "yes, too early." We know that SMR brought in a smith (or 2?) to design the blade and teach the workers how to make them. But we have no documentation to tell us who those workers were. I might sit down and start comparing mei on a line, like the '42 "Ra" line, since it's pretty big, and see if the mei match, then compare those mei to another line to see if there is a noticable distinction. BUT, we already know that some factories (no idea about Mantetsu's practice) used mei cutters that were completely seperate from the actual smiths, so this might be a wild goose chase. As to where? Still no proof. The latest discoveries are hinting that most blades were made at SMR Mantetsu, with several thousand "finished" at Tokyo 1st Arsenal and maybe Mukden. It's seems possible, too, that some (Ren with 工) were fully made at Mukden, but that is pure speculation at this point.

Thank you Stephen! Are you able to read the certificate and tell us what it says? This is being sold in Japan right? (I can't read Japanese). If so, it's seems unlikely that someone in Japan would buy a Komonjo gunto off fleabay to resell in Japan. The price they're asking is less than they would have paid Komonjo for it. I have seen 2 or 3 other Mantetsu-to with wavy hamon. This is the first I've seen that looks fully nihonto though. It would not surprise me. We have already seen several specially made blades from Mantetsu, for various purposes.

Interesting find by Nick Komiya at Warrelics: Don’t know if it explains or adds to rigs like this, but it might! “Here are two secret ordinances released in succession in May and June of 1945 that allowed Army NCOs to carry their personal family swords as Gunto instead of the Type 95. At first, this option was limited to senior NCOs only (those entitled to swords), but in June, this limitation was dropped to allow all NCOs (except those required to carry firearms). This option was conditional to the family sword suitably resembling the regulation gunto specs and further subject to the approval of the unit commander. Note that these regulations presume the market availability of conversion kits that switch traditional Samurai swords to match Gunto specs, which explain the derivative components often explained away as Gunzoku specs.” http://www.warrelics.eu/forum/Japanese-militaria/short-development-history-type-95-gunto-676112-7/

Thank you BaZZa! A new one for the study! Did you pick any of them up, or just look and enjoy the collection? Interesting trivia this brought to my attention: Of the 31 '41s only 5 are numbered over 400, whereas of the 36 '42s only 6 are under 400. The other years seem to have an even spread of numbers across the spectrum.