Markus

As Uwe mentioned, the item in the Samurai Art Museum Berlin is not intended to be used. It is a ceremonial axe with sword tip which is referred to as ken'iri-masakari (剣入鉞). This interpretation is a little bit different from a fusô (斧槍) which is a yari with a long tang that has an axe element around it. In other words, the ken'iri-masakari is basically an axe with a normal sword-style nakago ken added on top. Such ritual axes have a quite obvious symbolic meaning, namely "cutting through the sins". As also Buddhist ritual swords have basically that meaning, you have here a good "combo," i.e. cutting off and cutting through the sins." FYI: The axe part is indeed made of steel but it is not sharpened. It has engravings of a dragon in clouds and the sword has a Fudô-Myôô on waterfall horimono. The piece is super heavy BTW

Great read! The full English version of the website should be online in a few days by the way.

Wow, this is a beautiful koshirae and package!

You are right Guido. It is indeed a variant of the 隠 character and can be found in this database: http://jigen.net/kanji/167686 Doing a quick check on Japanese pages for a reading of 小隠 , most seem to quote the name "Shô'in".

Interesting history: The sword was tested by Shôdôken Togasaki (尚道軒戸賀崎), i.e. by Togasaki Kumatarô Yoshitake (戸賀崎熊太郎芳武, 1839-1907), who was a swordsman from the Shindô Munen Ryû. His great-grandfather Togasaki KumatarôTeruyoshi had studied with the school founder Fukui and is briefly mentioned at the very top of the Wikipedia page of the ryû: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shind%C5%8D_Munen-ry%C5%AB

Excellent! Subscribed.

Whilst I still try to figure out the mei, I just wanted to throw in that I saw the sword at Bob's place and it is just amazing! Very high quality workmanship and after checking it out hands on, I can understand why it must be a great cutter!

Thank you very much Klaus for your continous support!

Just wanna post one pic that Bob Elder from the Orlando Show took. Its my friend Bobby Block and me after our lecture and it just looks like as we were about to start a fight with the audience over there. Subtitle: "What, WTF you just said?"

Great show! Thank you Mark for the perfect oranizartion!! Happy to see you guys again (in alphapetical order ): Alfred, Allan, Arnold, Bary, Bill, Bobby, Bob, the other Bob, the other other Bob, Brian T, Chris, Chuck, Cyrus, Daniel, Danny, Derek, Eric, Fred, Joe (hey, saw you and your cute daughter just twice briefly), Jim, John, Jurgis/George, Mike V, Mike Y, Moses (Moseis ), Nick, Pat, Paul, RKG, Rob, Robert, Ron, Taylor, Ted. If I forgot anyone, it is not because I'm rude but because I'm going to bed right now

Does anyone have AITO (愛刀) magazine #391, 12-2010? Would love to check a blade featured therein for research purposes. Thank you for your attention.

Maybe koroai (頃合)?

Very sad news indeed. Thierry had always been highly supportive of my work and backed every single joint project we did here on the NMB. To give you an example of his kindness, Thierry just donated to the Gendaito Project on Thursday the 15th, the day before he presumably died, as Jean meantioned in his initial post. That makes me very sad and the very least I can do to pay tribute to Thierry's enthusiasm is to dedicate the finished Gendaito book to him. Rest in peace.

Thank you Neil and Steve! @Neil: Yes, PayPal shows me the name and the email address that you have linked to your PayPal account.

Thank you Jussi! And thank you very much for your donation!

Thank you Brian! You are on the list for the finished book

Michael, Daniel, and Klaus, thank you very much! Donations received

Thank you very much Martin!

No worries Stephen, I greatly appreciated the $50 you sent me a while ago.

Thank you Brian, every donation is highly welcome!

Thank you Peter, I already dropped you a mail from the indiegogo site, hope that it worked. @Brian: Unfortunately, that's indiegogo's new "restrictions": Please note: As of February 14, 2017, only campaigns raising funds in AUD will be able to enable PayPal on their campaigns. If you are raising funds in CAD or GBP, and haven't yet enabled a verified PayPal account, you'll be able to enable direct credit card payments only. As of February 2017, campaigns raising funds in USD and EUR will be able to raise funds exclusively through credit card. However, I would be happy to accept direct PayPal donations to "markus.sesko@gmail.com", with all the options for perks as offered on indiegogo of course

I have just started the crowdfunding campaign Thank you all for your support! Every donation is very much appreciated! Just couldn't do that project at the side, i.e. funds are necessary as many many hours have to be dedicated to feeding the database. It's my first crowdfunding so I am a bit anxious about its outcome https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/gendaito-project#/

Please take a look at the link below. The Gendaito Project is still going strong and after my second announcement, I really got much data from you guys over the last couple of years. This is very much appreciated and more information will follow in couse of the planned crowdfunding campaign when I'm back from Europe at the end of February. Thank you for your attention! https://markussesko.com/2017/02/07/gendaito-project-2/

Hm, I think that the motif might be a so-called temochi-daiko (手持ち太鼓, lit. "hand-held drum") that comes with handles and which is today basically a kid's toy. And I think, as mentioned by Guido, that the left and right protrusions are for securing the menuki under the tsuka-ito.

Yes, it looks like KANEKIYO indeed. But I go with Morita's suggestion that the duplicate kanji is deliberately written different. There are more kozuka out there by this or these Masakiyo. On some of them, the MASA character is signed more "recognizable". Also the context of that there were indeed some Yamaguchi based Masakiyo smiths, that there are no Kanekiyo that would match, and that the Mondo no Shô title was used a (famous) Masakiyo makes me stay with the MASA reading. http://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/227076454 http://nihontou.jp/choice03/tousougu/kk/kk/027/00.html http://page3.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/c578315480