Hoshi

Indeed Denis. I think in fact someone cleaned that very sayagaki recently. The sword has a few uchiko gung-ball scratches, so there you have it. Grey, that's a very good tip. I'll do exactly that.

Thank you. Rice glue is surprisingly easy to make from what I've gathered and it's probably the safest (wood glue would surely hold up better). I'll make a batch and apply it to the split area. With the moisture it should as well reactivate the existing glue. I don't have a regular saya for the blade so I'll just keep it well oiled in a dry place as it will take time to dry.

Hi, I have a shirasaya with a subtle sideway split along the glue line. It came as is, and I presume it was cleaned up by splitting it then re-glued poorly. The horn pieces keep it in one piece but you can still see feint openings. My question is - how bad is it? Presently I've tightened it with leather straps to keep it sealed, but you can't make a perfect seal this way - should I seek repair? If it's not too involved, could I do it myself (rice glue?). I wouldn't want moisture to get down in there and make a mess. Thank for the advice, Chris

National museum is a hit or miss. They display one or two major artifacts everyday. I was unlucky and got a scroll. There a few national treasure swords that may go on display every now and then. It's on a rotation basis. If you go you need to check what's the treasure on display that day - or adapt your schedule as to get to see one of the major swords. No idea if its listed anywhere, but you can call to make sure. The rest of the swords exposed there weren't even close to the sword museum.

Don't forget the french-speaking Swiss

The thickness of the boshi doesn't really fit with the tip being broken and reshaped, unless it's been somewhat masked by clever polish or creative oshigata...

Blown away, thank you. That was a fascinating read Lloyd, the most detailed information on iron manufacturing in Japan I've seen.

Thank you Jean for your in-depth answer. It's enlightening. But then what is your point of view on this, that the regional iron ore deposits (and their composition) has no discernible effects on the craft? Or do I read you wrong. It seems to me that the regional characteristics of iron ore deposits are often invoked as the reason why it's easier to kantei koto-period smiths compared to say, shinshinto, when iron production was centralized. As for old swords being recycled, that's an interesting point. Reforging the blade would lead to a lot of carbon loss and hence, I suppose you could use it to make core iron. I read tea kettles and old temple nails were used by some shinto smiths to make blades in the old style (I think Kotetsu did this, hence the name meaning "old iron"). Also, do you think that namban tetsu was indian wootz cakes? or something else? I suppose it would make sense given the likely maritime trajectory of the traders in that time. But do we have any hard evidence of this or is it just a conjecture based on the visual account that it looked like "iron cakes".

Indeed, always enjoyable to read your posts. Thank you for posting so often down here and sharing your experience. "By my books" referred to a search on the nihonto signature repository. Coupled with the intuition that inlaid signatures are less likely to be fake - the latter is probably not the case even, in retrospect. Back to books and grinding cash in what I'm good at. -Chris

Thank you for all the replies. Carlo, I'm hoping someone had a look, that's why I ask! It seems to me that running chemical analysis on the raw materials used by geographically-distinct schools is such a basic low-hanging fruit I can't believe it hasn't been done. Jean, the idea that bloomery process yields "pure steel" only varying in carbon content has been challenged to say the least. Bloomery steel is in fact full of impurities, the only notable difference is that the temperatures are insufficient to melt (most) of the trace elements into the iron, as steve points out. These "macro-level" impurities are beaten out but they persist. Japanese swords are full of impurities, in fact. And some smiths used these impurities to create more durable steel in the folding process. e.g. https://www.esomat.org/articles/esomat/pdf/2009/01/esomat2009_02024.pdf Density of "impurities" vary naturally from the raw material and the smith's work. Now the word impurity is perhaps not ideal in this context, because we that these impurities influence the properties of the steel. For instance while high phosphorous steel is ill-suited to make swords, traces of vanadium found in indian wootz have been shown to improve the structural properties of the steel. Modern metallurgic, especially the field of high-grade crucible steels for specialized applications relies these adjunct elements to form extremely tough steels. Now one could argue that we're confusing inclusions versus homogeneous distribution (and carbide formation) but I think it's quite clear that they both have an effect. Jussi, Having a translation of the Naruki article would be great, it looks very promising. I'm not impressed however by the "one problem three solutions Part 2" as it's really doesn't do a good job at presenting wootz. But it's understandable given that the major headway in understanding the stuff has only been done in the past few years. However the first part on on late medieval era swords was interesting - I've read also that Europeans in the late medieval era failed at forging imported wootz cake because they overheated it, leading to all sorts of superstitions about the indo-persian smiths. The vikings managed just fine, however. But I'm drifting so far off-topic...

Do you know for sure its because of westerners and not the auction markets warming up? Is this effect restricted to Agent-based purchases? If its the latter then your agent needs to get smarter and create ghost accounts to get shill bidding out of the equation.

I'm currently trying to wrap my head on the differences in steel composition from Koto period swords. Has there been any metallurgic analysis done to compare steel from different regions? What I'm basically trying to get at is how much can we say that the technics of a particular, geographically-located lineage of smiths was an adaption to the characteristics of the local iron sand deposits compared to technical aspects that are not material dependant. We often hear that "steel quality" is the main reason early work cannot be reproduced by Gendai smiths. However, if we had detailed composition data we could in theory reproduce the steel composition and we could see the magnificent koto-style hada and activities that made these swords famous. This is corroborated by the observations of Yasutsugu who could produce superior hamons through re-tempering of old koto blades compared to his own. At least we could take the steel variable out of the equation. If this is the case then I'm not sure the current centralised "traditional" bloomery steel production in Japan is best way to keep the tradition alive if you're striving for reproducing excellence. If hard data on skin and core steel composition was available we could reproduce the composition of these steels. Besides, it is well possible that the smiths of old time had a secret formulae for their bloomery steel. Now I'm not a metallurgist but say, in crucible steel production (which happens at a much, much higher temperature) you can infuse elements. (say, vanadium). Overall my intuition is that technic has been overestimated in the production of these masterworks if technic is understood as an adaptation to raw materials. If we had a time machine and brought Masamune along and gave him the NBTHK Tamahagane he will produce a Soshu-style gendai blade not a Masamune.

Thank you for sharing Luis. Shopping for rust buckets is very much like buying lottery tickets. Keep scratching (polishing) until you find something. Shopping for bargain polished swords very out there in terms of knowledge you must possess. You need to be willing to travel in order to make a principled appraisal. Interesting to observe the psychological process when an neophyte like me thinks he spotted a potential deal. First you get excited, then you put your tin foil hat, do your research and appraise rationally then let the excitement dwindle down to the cold realization that you better spend this time on something productive and use that foregone income to go boutique shopping, pay your rent and enjoy. The time spent on researching auctions online and other such occasions does not justify the time commitment if there are more pleasurable activities to do.

Well, it looks that pixel-by-pixel analysis of terrible picture are good enough to give credence to the re-tempering. Case close. But beyond this lemon that seemed to have potential, if you have multiple hypothesis and you know the value, but are uncertain about which is one yet you can give ballpark probabilities to each different cases, you can simply make a weighted average for the average case scenario. Of course for a single purchase it's not meaningful, but if you're say, a dealer, you can account for errors over multiple purchasing events. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expected_value My ballpark estimates are based on Aoijapan.net minus 30%. Maybe that's being optimistic, however. I wouldn't know how to do any better at this stage. And the retempering line(s) which hurt the eyes... PS: This was clearly a "stream of consciousness" series of post with very little bullshit filtering on my part. Just outlining my thought process for other more experienced collector to see and comment on and spot the errors.

Ok there was a key piece of data missing from my analysis. A very bad sign is that it was sold to a foreigner by a Japanese dealer at some point, and not taken a WW2 spoil. Which means the Japanese dealer has just decided to dump his trash on a naive buyer. Which is perfectly compatible with the re-tempered blade theory as it would make very little difference for the general arms collector who would certainly think he was getting a "deal". The same "deal" I think I've spotted. And "deal" moving around, we've heard that story a few times... Trash is near 95% now. Expected value dropped to ~7.5k Why do you guys think? Any other piece of data I've missed assuming we proceed blindly and without high resolution pictures to appraise the yakinaoshi? I have no chance at translating the sayagaki but I assume that's another clue. Perhaps there is a mention of the condition. Then there is course yakinaoshi executed by a master and amateurish quench in backyard pool. Given that the owner preserved the signature, he cared for its maker. Maybe there is a slim chance it was re-tempered during the Edo period by a qualified smith, and in this case it the trash hypothesis takes a bump in value. Furthermore the auction description states "boshi and hamon are typical of his work" - that means if it was re-tempered, it was done respectfully. That, or we're back to expert hypothesis number 1.

Hi Jean, Wouldn't you argue that if the seller lacks knowledge, you are more likely to make a deal? It's a case of both Information asymmetry (you can't see the good) and knowledge asymmetry (maybe you know more than the seller, more often its the other way around). I would argue that you want to close the information asymmetry gap as much as possible (e.g. see the sword, request detailed pictures, etc) in order for you to weaponize knowledge asymmetry. Now because its an auction house their incentive is in the buyer's premium and the reputation from achievement good sales which bring in more customers, rinse and repeat. If they were really into the deception business they could faint not knowing about flaws, since sales are final, pretending that their knowledge (e.g. hagire, retempering marks) does not allow them to exploit their information advantage (having the sword potentially in hand for study long before you). It looks like the "expert" is indeed not so much of an expert, or he is pretending not to be in order to make you think you know more than him to lure the greedy sucker. It basically breaks down so: 1. Appraiser is no good. Gave a ballbark that is below market value. 2. Appraiser faints being no good but knows secretly that its a lemon. "Maybe retempered" and tries to make you think you could have a bargain while knowing its worthless while covering his ass with the "Maybe" disclosure. Importantly its not ebay or some other swindler's den. This is clearly the heirs of a collector dumping an old collection on the market. That means we can be reasonably safe in assuming there is a chance it's good and will paper. Of course it's most likely a lemon but its still a signed lemon Motoshige, which is a highly rated smith, with a retempered hamon trashing its value down the drain. You can get away selling it for ~6k and recoup some losses. Now assuming it's a not a lemon the value rockets up to ~35k as a signed Motoshige bizen blade which is very likely to pass Juyo. Let's say you assume that scenario 1. has a 90% probability (the lemon) and 2. has a 10% probability (the treasure). You can get the expected value of the sword as .9*6k+.1*35k =~ 9k. That should be your willingness to pay if you're buying for value not for love. Maybe I'm playing 4D-chess too much...

Its shoshin by my books. https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/important-Japanese-samurai-sword-tachi-3578-c-59243ab8c0 How do you even gamble in these actions? The pictures are terrible, and they won't provide more. No idea about boshi, kasane, etc. It's potential juyo unless it's hiding a big ugly secret. No idea who does the appraisal of 10'000-15'000 if they even know what they're talking about. If they do, then there is a catch because that's low for a Bizen Motoshige with a signature preserved. If they don't then they are dishonest w.r.t to the seller's family by claiming expertise they don't have. Given that this auction house never really sold Japanese swords they probably outsourced the appraisal to some contact who had no skin in the game whatsoever. Also the ominous words "possibly re-tempered" without any sort of appraisal or detailed image of the hamon. What do you think is the catch here? No sure how common fake inlays of signatures are - but you never know the depths of human ingenuity when it comes to greed. In any case that part doesn't raise any red flags but then again I am a beginner. Probably kano era sword due to the smaller size of the signature which places it in the more valuable period of the smith's work (or two smith, or whatever the current dominant theory is). However the shapes would tell us this is more likely to be earlier work with its slender shape and ko-kissaki. What's your opinion? How do you navigate these auctions without further information?

I was marveling over the monkey tsuba. The monkey's expression is absolutely fantastic. It's feels alive, almost as if was about to jump away from the tsuba...

No idea if he owned Nihonto, but I did find one of the swords he owned. http://www.hermann-historica.de/en/general_george_s_patton_jr_1885_-_1945_-_a_de_luxe_model_1913_cavalry_sword_a_sp/l/154520?aid=154&Lstatus=0&ord=result_d&currentpos=2

Enough is enough. I realized just how utterly lost I am when it comes to keeping up with auctions. The most promising auctions are the mortuary ones, where the heirs of a deceased collectors bundles his treasures and sends them off to the wind to get a quick buck. These are the events where its worth it gamble and you get decent odds. You get the chance to make valuable mistakes and pay for it or find the occasional treasure at a discount. It's fun and exciting. Bidding on Ebay or Yahoo Japan is just asking for trouble. Bidding on AOIart and you're paying the boutique premium but you get some modicum of safety. What are the auction houses that deal with the liquidation of high quality collections? (aside from the rare Christie's and co auctions which everyone knows about and happen once in blue moon). I will start. Hermann-historica is a german auction house based in Munich that liquidates large collections of arms and armor with the occasional Nihonto from general arms and armor collectors. If you're a general arms and armor collector this is really the place to be. Nihonto in general are low to mid-grade. http://www.hermann-historica.de Example of relevant past auction : http://www.hermann-historica.de/en/objekte?aid=147&Lstatus=0&Accid=1787 I hope this gets us somewhere towards a general directory of auction houses to watch out for.

Now if we start introducing more variables... Skin to core steel ratio in cross-section is interesting. A lot of soft core steel would offset the brittleness of a wider hamon. I think I read in one of Darcy's post that the RAI school has very little skin steel compared to its Yamashiro predecessor. Possibly giving their blades both an economic edge in terms of production cost and a reduced risk of breaking. I can imagine that core steel showing up after a few chip repair wouldn't cause screech of horrors in the samourai of old as it does to the modern collector as long as the blade remained with a viable hamon thickness. Then there is of course the hardness of the core steel and skin steel itself and the hardness of the hamon quenching process. I read somewhere that Koto Bizen used a relatively soft steel that had the good ductile properties even for the skin, compared to centrally-produced/imported shinto steel which was much harder. From there we can assume that for the same hamon thickness and irregularity, the shinto blade was far more brittle compared to the koto bizen sword. I think when the Soshu tradition emerged they didn't have access to the quality raw materials of bizen and hence had to adapt their style out of necessity due to the new iron deposits they were using. It just didn't work and hence they had to change the formula towards thicker swords to survive the more intense quench resulting in harder hamons that would chip more easily. How their steel differed from the yamashiro and Bizen deposits I'd like to know. I'm also curious if the nie-deki was a necessity to make this steel work or just the byproduct of their experimentation as they tried to adapt to the new deposits.

Please share! This is extremely interesting. Thank you.

it's the swindler premium

Another one for an unscrupulous seller in the west. Forged sayagaki is probably so bad that it would never fool a native.

Fantastic innovation.