Bruce Pennington

Dean, That's a very interesting group there! I'd really like to the pics of the full blades on both and would you mind getting good pics of the tangs of each sword? The really short one is quite unusual! Also, those canvas covers are fairly rare, but to have one that was fitted for back-carry is really rare!

Malcolm, I'm aware that they differ on gunto, kaigunto, and contingency models, if that's what you mean. Are you saying that there are 3 different styled sakura found on army gunto?

Grev, I just re-checked Dawson and he was definitive that the Type 8 had 2 belt loops, so as yours have 1 loop and are Type 19s, then they are the 1886 model. That doesn't mean your blades were made in 1886 though. That simply is the year the official order came out establishing the type. They were made all the way through the 1930s, as the Type 94 replaced the 19s in 1934. So the manufacture date of these could be anywhere in between.

Here's a flatter diamond, found by John on the Pinned Kabutogane thread: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/29629-pinned-kabutogane-on-type-94/

Well, how do you like that! It's a detail I've never noticed before! Ohmura's has it there, as does my Mantetsu and my chromed gunto.

Grev, Both are Type 19, the second one is not police but Army. The background blossoms are just obscured by the coloration loss. I've highlighted them in this pic I've enhanced. The 8 and 19 can be hard to distinguish, according to Dawson, but if they have 2 belt hangers, then they're likely 8s. Single hanger, likely 19.

Is there a date on the other side?

Luis, I have never seen either of those before. My suspicion is that the brass mekugi is post-war made, though, it does seem to have some age to it. There is really no way to know, only speculation. The cherry blossom isn't a family mon. I was going to say I'd never seen that done before, too, but on the "Mons" thread here: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/29606-help-identity-our-mons/page-3, is one just like yours WITH a mon. Anyone else able to enlighten us on this practice? Neil?

I recently read in one of my reference books (on the road at the moment, I'll edit or add the book when I get home), where the authors had interviewed a smith named Kanefusa who had several thousand swords in his basement that had been cut in 2 after the war. He used them to make products to sell post-war. I believe many of these questionable tantos came to us this way.

That’s fabulous info Thomas, thank you for the link! That one’s not even in Dawson’s chart!

I'm adding a gunto owned by Michaelr, posted here: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/29676-help-with-blade-tassel-and-fittings/. It is a non-Mantetsu blade in standard IJA 98 fittings (except for the all-brown fitting paint), but has the cream/brown tassel. It is only the second tassel I've seen in these colors outside Ohmura's site. Ohmura states gunto fitted this way are from the South China Railway police. SCR was taken over by SMR. Both military and civilians worked the policing of the lines, protetcting them from sabateurs. Ohmura's discussion is here: http://ohmura-study.net/308.html

This is an interesting gunto. The tassel is of the North China Railway Police (taken over and run by South Manchurian Railway), but the fittings don't have the railway emblem. Ohmura discusses it in length here: http://ohmura-study.net/308.html He does state that many of the officers were actual army, which would explain the standard IJA fittings but I doubt an officer would carry a tan/brown tassel. It had to have been someone associated with the railway police though. And this would be a good discussion over on the Military Swords forum.

Thomas - great thread! Thanks for posting! This gunto suffers quite a bit, though, from the many names it goes by - Late War; Navy Landing Forces; Type 3; Type 0; Type 100; and counting. In Nick Komiya's article, which you cite, he argues quite strongy against using the "Type" term at all, stating the "Types" are created by Imperial edict. The Contingency model had no such edict and was an interim fix to the problems caused by the expensive 94s and 98s. The Engish name for the gunto, according to Nick, is "Contingency Standard Sword" or Japanese (in English!) "RINJI SEISHIKI GUNTO". I hate typing all that, so I call it the "Rinji" or "Contingency model." As to the near 2 year order-to-street time line - it's seems to be true in other areas as well. The stamping of non-traditional blades was ordered in 1938, but the stamps really didn't get going until 1940. I suspect it's simply that it takes time from an order to spin up tooling and manufacturing to make it happen.

I agree with John, looks to be “handmade”, but there was something done that makes it non-traditional, like maybe a different steel was used or it was oil quenched. The Showa stamp is 99% indication that it was not made in the fully traditional way. Still a very nice blade in upgraded fittings. About dedications- they are not the norm, but there are plenty to be found on the market. All in all a very nice gunto!

A very useful list, especially for those looking to get started. We often get questions about recommended books. Now we have a link to give them. Thanks Thomas!

One Bryce found, posted on the “pinned kabu” thread:

Yes, I failed to consider aesthetics. No matter how rare an item is, if collectors didn’t find it appealing, they’re not going to be interested in buying, and if they do buy, the price will be lower.

David, I went back to the books and discovered that the 500,000 number was just the American number. One book simply states "400,000 to 500,000" collected, but doesn't specify by whom. Whereas, Fuller specifies that AMERICAN numbers collected were 661,621. He also specifies that "372,609 were dispersed as torphies, to museums, and technical use. The remaining 289,012 were destroyed." He didn't say his source, but the specificity implies these numbers came from actual records. Fuller speculated that the total Allied swords collected could have been as high as 1,000,000. Another discovery after re-looking at sources: The Type 95 total production was more likely to have been 288,000! Nick's chart from Army records shows 168,950 for years '41-'45. Assuming the low end rate given, the years of '36-40 would have produced another 120,000, giving a total of 288,950.

Dave, Wow, you spent some time gathering that data! Thanks for that! I would modify the numbers in that the percentage requires adding all the gunto together for the total of 104. So: 98 - 63% Contingency (type 3) - 14.4% NCO - 10.5% Kai - 11.5% But it is a good example of a spot-check number. 15 out of 104 were Contingency. If representative, it backs up my suposition that many more were made than the govt order of 3,000 per year.

I've also learned to be cautious about labeling a "brass" looking tsuka as fake. I own a Nagoya side-latch whose tsuka has oxidized into a brassy looking finish. You can see the original aluminum coloration on the edges where wear kept the oxydation rubbed off, but from a distance, it looks like a brass tsuka. But witht the fakes, there will be more signs of fakery than simply the tsuka color, as in this one.

After seeing John's, with the heads missing, but pins evident on one side, I'm thinking that Neil's one with just the holes must have originally had pins, but they must have gone missing at some point.

How about "Ashikaga" or a derivative?

Any speculation as to thier reason to exist? Funtion? Asthetics? Are any of our Nihonto followers aware of historically older koshirae with pinned kabutogane? (I realize the "civilian" style of old mostly had a different styled Kashira, or butt-cap, but some came with a kabuto).

David, Maybe some of our Nihonto experts can fill us both in on that question. The practice goes back before WWII, but I don't know how far. I have just begun collecting them, and don't know much about their use. I have noticed some blades, by the same smith, where one will not have a kakihan and another will.

After re-reading Nick Komiya’s discussion of the origins of the “Contingency Standard Sword”, I noticed the order was to produce “3,000 blades annually at a maximum cost of 80 Yen for a sword.” Assuming the gunto hit the streets in mid-1940, it was produced 5 years. That would be only 15,000 Contingency gunto made during the war. My guess is that they must have made much more than that. We see far too many of them on the daily market. They must have become fairly popular. The very high quality versions with nihonto blades is probably an indicator of that. It is said that the Allies collected 500,000 gunto at the end of the war, and half were destroyed. I’m just working out percentages here. I have read that there were 180,000 NCO Type 95s made, so even if ALL 180,000 were part of the 500,000 collected (which we know wasn’t the case), that would leave 320,000 Officer gunto. If only 15,000 Contingency gunto were made, and ALL of them were collected (again, not likely), they made up only 4.6%. Personally, my guess would be more like only half were collected, so that’s down to 2.3%. So, given all other sales and circulation variables are neutralized, we should only see 2 Contingency gunto for sale out of every 100 officer gunto on the market. I haven’t done a survey of sales, but my gut says that while there are less Contingency sold than Type 98, it’s far higher than 2 of 100. Yes? So, there must have been more than 3,000 made per year. Still, there ARE less of them than the 98’s, so that should cause their collection value to be a bit higher, though, that’s counter-balanced by the fact that they tend to be lower quality blades than an average 98; except for the nihonto, custom order version, which then should put THAT version back into the more-rare category, and therefore move valuable. If the custom gunto were, say, 10% of total Contingency blade production, then they would make up only .2% of Japanese officer swords!!! Since they are that rare, and usually have RJT nihonto in them, I’d say they are currently way under-priced! Thoughts?