Bruce Pennington

Thanks Chris. That pretty well pins it to Fukuoak then. Slight correction on the date though, Showa 20 is 1945 (have to subtract 1).

Stephen, Assuming the name is not the smith that made it, I haven't found anyone or any source that goes into the meanings of mune stamping. Most speculate that it was the polisher. A couple have guessed that it was the buyer who contracted the blade. Maybe someone who knows more about smiths, polishers, and WWII can chime it, but I know nothing about these other than the ones that are clearly arsenal inspection stamps. Interesting google find: Hiroshi Yamauchi, 3rd president of Nintendo, and wealthiest Japanese, "was put to work in a military factory" during WWII! Could it be???

Yes, I see the 5 clearly now! The second kanji could even be another 5.

Thanks Chris, does the mei state “Fukuoa”?

Chris could you give us the smith name from this blade? The top kanji is “Fuku” which is either the first kanji of Fukuoka, Fukushima, or “good luck”. But since the Ko is there, I suspect it is one of the city names. The smith name may help us pin it down.

Aoi Japan graciously sent me the original picture and I can see the number more clearly. It is 336!

Aoi Japan graciously send me the original picture and with the added clarity I can see the top kanji is a 5! It could even be 556, or 526!

Hm, I may have to amend my comment on this on my Stamps document. Are those smith names or factories?

I don't think this one has been posted yet. It's a single kanji used for "Good Luck".

John, The way I read that discussion is that there were certain years each of the 4 mei appeared, or began being used, but that didn't mean the previous mei stopped completely.

Thanks guys! It came from AoiJapan sales site. Here's the full-sized picture. It's not high-res enough. Sometimes someone is able to recognize the kanji hidden in the mess, so it was worth a try. Thanks Stephen! Your guess is along the lines I was leaning, so I'll go with 326.

Thanks Stephen. I'll go with that unless someone else has a better idea. Neil - No kidding! But it's clear someone spent a couple thousand on the polish, so they've likely added that to the 3,000 Mantetsu price. The Japanese sites seem to sell at higher prices than we see elswhere.

Katakana "I", but the numbers aren't very clear. Anyone make out the numbers on this Mantetsu nakago mune?

Thanks Eric! I generally ignore this site because they usually don't post pics of the serial number, but this one had it! I appreciate it. Though I can't make out the number. Katakana "I" the "3" or "2", then the rest is too blurry. anyone want to take a stab at this number? Quite a beautiful blade, BTW!

Oh never mind! I forgot the general tassel had red and brown laced with gold. Just pretend this never happened {tiptoeing away now}

OK, learned something new today! Ha! However Dave’s point was the main point - only 95’s use top-latches (mune edge).

Sorry, I was referring to this one:

Sooooo, I seriously doubt Tojo carried a Field grade tassel!

Chris, the kaigunto don't use latches, and therefore wouldn't have the holes for it. Shamsy or Stegel have seen it all and could tell you for sure.

Do you know who the second sword is attributed to? It has a Field grad tassel.

Chris, good eye! You're right, it's seems to be leather! How unique.

Barry, if you look closely at his first pic, you can see that his saya is bare wood. It was originally covered in either leather or canvas (which is what he’s looking for). The wood isn’t painted so it was meant to be covered.

Interesting that the one from Bill’s site has no same’ at all, but is black painted wood under the ito!

Many officer blades come with a date on the other side from the smith's name. If yours doesn't have one, it's not really possible to say. If you know the smith, some of them died during the war. So if you have a date of his death, you'd be able to say it was made "no later than ...".

I’m surprised they gave us such a clear picture of the fuchi stamps! Quite an artsy-fartsy Kokura stamp! At least they attempted a Nagoya inspection stamp. And gee, I didn’t know the Tokyo inspector was a contractor!