Bugyotsuji

As a resident of Okayama may I say that Ujo (as many have mentioned above) is the only way anyone around here pronounces it. I would not expect people from Tokyo or other regions for example to know this particularly. Just to be on the safe side I phoned my sword teacher who is from good Okayama stock, head of the local branch and on the national committee of the Nittoho and he said it is and always has been Ujo. (To read it Karasu-jo, you would be emphasizing the meaning to someone unfamiliar with the single sound U, so in that sense it is not 'wrong' per se.)

Refreshing to see your reaction Alex. The whole 15 display exhibition is only offered in Japanese. Stupidly, I offered to translate their visitor exhibition guide for them into English and just spent the weekend doing it.

Interestingly on weekends they run all kinds of parallel workshops to take advantage of the exhibition. Today there was a special introduction in the lecture hall for members of the public interested in Kansho/Kantei and how to hold a Nihonto, etc. The speaker asked how many had heard through Twitter about this opportunity and almost everyone raised their hands. There were perhaps thirty newcomers seated there. He showed some Powerpoint slides on the possible roles of Nihonto, how they are made and what to look for in the steel. Once they had the background information, he gave them a break and told them to wash their hands and get ready to remove bags and jewellery! There were five blades laid out representing easily recognisable styles, for example San-bon-sugi from Seki, Choji from Bizen, and Kikusui from Osaka. A lot of women in the group, and everyone quite friendly, respectful and mannerly. Next Sunday they will have several sets of old smelly armour for people to helped on with and have their photos taken. I have helped with these sessions before and you can get hundreds of people in one day. Backbreaking work. Gradually you get to be able to do a young lady in about a minute and a half. Kneel and fit her Sune-ate round her shins and haidate round her waist. On with her Kote and then Doh breast plate, and wind her and bind her tight. Stick a sword through the mawashi, fit a hair bag and slap on the Kabuto... voila! They love it! :D

Not in the same category or the same quality, but would this one qualify for the Y of Yoshiro at least? Crumbs from the Yoshiro table? Or is it some other school or area?

Yes, wonderful quality. Here are two Yoshiro from old books.

Only size! Aw Brian, thanks for the pick-me-up. Just feeling sorry for myself, I was.

Tobias, they are producing a booklet, but is not yet ready apparently. I was chatting with some of the people there and picked up some fascinating insights. The Koshirae for Mr Ando's sword probably cost more than the blade itself to make, with every little detail of the tosogu made from scratch by trained artisans. Even the tsuba has swirls in it, showing that it too contains meteorite. Incidentally the amount used in the long blade was reduced to make the patterns less obvious. One Dotanuki-like blade was made by Mikami Sadanao of Aki （with koshirae） to illustrate Koike Kazuo's Kozure Ookami ('Lone Wold and Cub' in the US). The two-volume set of his books were displayed there, with a backdrop of three large panel illustrations by different artists. There was a beautiful katana blade with stunning hamon by Oono Yoshimitsu, with a tsuba-less long black Kenshin goshirae. Oh, and the curator there, Mr Ueno, assured me when I told him about the differences of opinion on this forum, that this is really a fun exhibition, aimed primarily at the young for the summer vacation.

Interesting, John! A pity as the better quality ones are hidden. From today I will ignore my daughter and go back to taking those good old low res shots again.

Ken, I'll try and get some better shots of the blade for you. In a hurry yesterday. I'll pass on your other questions. *Side note to Brian. Probably browser difference but photos below a certain pixel density, ie from my iPhone show up as photos and say they have been 'opened' 196 times for example, whereas larger 1 mg photos come up only as a clickable line of code and show they have only been clicked on say 7 times in comparison, as the two Devil Tachi shots above. Are some people not being able top open those larger 'hidden' shots, or is there a difference in the click counter, I wonder? PS They are allowing non-flash photography this time.

Tobias, thanks for the feedback. Yes it is their 2013 summer fun follow-up, and yes, there is gold in them thar hills. Maybe they will make collectors out of young women yet! I do not blame anyone who entertains mixed feelings though. They had a guides/volunteers meeting there today which I sort of observed, and there were around 15 fairly elderly sword-knowledgable people cheerfully taking this on. Among the swords on display were some interesting smiths, not least Musashi no Kuniie, the Chairman of the Zen Nohon Tosho Kai, no Kai Cho Sama. Not sure if there will be a booklet. I'll ask. BTW, I hear that the Evangelion one will be travelling, perhaps France, Spain, maybe London?

Loads more, and some very sexy anime ladies, but in the meantime follow the 'character' 刀匠ちゃｎ To-sho Chan! (How many swords?) :D

Here is an illustration of the horned god of the underworld by the famous 開田祐治 Kaida Yuuji, and the Higo Akamatsu Kanemitsu sword, and koshirae they created for it. Kaida Yuuji will appear on Sept 8th (?) holding a signing event for up to 40 people.

No, although it is a Bizen sword, that is not utsuri! For Ken, a shot with the iPhone showing the blended meteorite iron patterns, more clearly seen above in the kozuka.

It opens at Osafune tomorrow and runs until Sept 16th. Anyone crazy enough to brave this terrible heat could well enjoy some time in the air-conditioned halls. An interesting concept, they have divided the three museums into past, present and future. (Presumably some visitors will want to travel around and see all three, bringing much needed tourist money into the area?) Well-known graphic artists have been invited to send in large illustrations of their work featuring Japanese swords. Well-known gendai swordsmiths from around Japan and related artisans then set about creating the swords and koshirae featured. In Osafune alone there are fifteen displays, each featuring a cartoon and a written introduction to the work and the artist on the right side of the display, and a sword or two in front with a board on the left side side explaining the sword and the artisans involved in creating the blades and koshirae. As an example here are a sword and kozuka made by Ando Hiroyasu with meteorite iron in the blades.

Poster, front and back. http://www.city.setouchi.lg.jp/~osa-tok ... %A1%A8.pdf http://www.city.setouchi.lg.jp/~osa-tok ... %A3%8F.pdf This is a triple exhibit, held in parallel at Hayashibara Art Museum, Osafune To-ken Hakubutsukan and Seto-uchi City Art Museum.

Maybe if we attack somewhere and reduce it letter by letter? 1. Do people see 知義　there?

The last kanji has a feeling of 作 to me. Or could it be 包家　ie Kaneie?

Yup, learned something today! So many of these only make sense with the benefit of hindsight. Very good indeed!

Just playing, but if not, then 雲州 ?

Yes, it does have a 'young' feel to the iron and shape. Here are some examples of very modern Sasumata used in schools and banks around Japan for catching undesirable types. http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%B5%E3%82 ... m_sbs_sg_5 http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%A2%E3%83 ... m_sbs_sg_2 http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E6%A0%AA%E5%BC ... _sbs_sg_11 Many more on Amazon.

My pleasure gentlemen. Kunitaro San. The tsuba was on its own, lying flat in a darkish space between the koshirae on the right (which had a different tsuba in it) and the splendid blade and pieces on the left, as I remember. Brian, no I am too much of a coward to take photos when there are clear signs saying "No Photography". I saw a western youngster obviously snapping away with his mobile smart phone, which was a bit galling. Grrrr.......... There was a Kikuchi yari, two or three fukuro yari, several Oomi, and were some lovely Sasa-ho, several Jumonji, one by the famous Yari smith Masatsune. Perhaps fifty blades altogether, with some amazing Yari-saya. Look at the size of the Yari they had standing in the hall. '3 Gen-Han' Yari, just short of 20 feet? http://okazakipark.com/museum/iyeyasu/ka100.htm (Four pics. Two clickable links below.)

PS Afterwards we had the engine re-mapped at a tuning shop in Nagoya so the return trip was exhilarating. At just after midnight I got out of the car and saw a fire-blue shooting star dropping towards the orange half-moon hanging low in the sky. Walking back to the house I saw two fireflies in the garden among the shrubbery, reminding me of younger days feeling guilty as I stumbled home drunk to the wife, but sensing that Nature was somehow giving me forgiveness with a glimpse of things rarely seen by more normal folks.

Having started this thread I suppose I will have to take some responsibility for fleshing it out. 5 am start. 800km round trip in a lightly-tuned Mitsubishi and at least 15 pamphlets later I am safely back home. Saw the Yari exhibition at Okazaki Castle, in the Ieyasu and Mikawa Bushi Museum about 50km east of Nagoya. This alone is worth a visit if you have never been. A real eye-opener for me on the beauty and variety of spears. Included in the ticket is entry to the castle keep. Rebuilt, it is a bit of a familiar disappointment with the concrete and metal-railed stairs, but the grounds and moats are superb. Next stop Nagoya and the Tokugawa Art Museum. Set in beautiful gardens it is a bit of an excuse to stretch the legs. I was expecting a few Bizen swords to be thrown together but how wrong I was. They were pulled from everywhere, but it was gratifying to see how they had managed to find something representative of every age and place and personage linked to Bizen and Tokugawa. Some swords gave you three of four chances in a row to see a Mitsutada, a Nagamitsu or a Masatsune from surprisingly different stages in the life of the same smith. Famous names galore. Not a part of my remit here really, but the sword I liked best was a lowly unpapered Hikozaemon Sukesada from 1505. (Please forgive me, these things have to be subjective, so sssshhhh... don't tell anyone.) And now the bad bit. The lighting there was terrible. You could not see into the blades at all. (The Gakugei-in at the Osafune Sword Museum for example do go to infinite trouble to get the lighting just right.) Whoever was responsible at the Tokugawa Museum for placing those precious swords almost haphazardly on those inflexible stands got everything wrong. The katana were bad enough, but the tachi were impossible to appreciate. Sure there were a couple of better-lit cases, but most were under suffused and dimmed light coming through an overhead grille. What a waste! The Akebono tsuba too. Too far from the glass and in shadow, you could see nothing. Greasy spots from foreheads of people tying to get a closer look. To add insult to injury, what happened when we tried to shine a small weak torch/flashlight onto the blades? My sword teacher's batteries were getting low, so I enquired in a whisper to one of the attendants whether the museum shop sold batteries. Her reaction was, "Oh, no, you cannot shine lights on the swords!" Not only no photography, and bad lighting, but no personal lighting allowed? :headbang: The reason? Very Japanese. Apparently the reflected light off a blade had got in another visitor's eyes and there had been a huge row and an official complaint made. In order to mollify the offended visitor, the museum had had to introduce a policy of discouragement of personal lights. Luckily my Sensei produced a card saying who he was, and he lodged an official request to have the lighting improved. Let us hope that the attendant followed up on her word to pass the advice up the line to the absent Gakugei-in. There were other related displays including cases of fabulous hand-painted books on the life and times. (There was an Australian couple there yesterday, the lady in a red dress, the man with a beard. Members here?) Just to see all these swords in one place, with those famous names, was a real privilege and it made the discounted ticket price of 1,200 JPY worth it. Please add your voices (mentioning no names of course) if you have a connection to the Tokugawa Art Museum, in regard to blade angle, positioning and lighting.

Not sure if everyone is aware of this, but Yahoo's Japan news reports his death from pneumonia in Niigata at age 85 on the 26 June 2013. Amata Akitsugu (real name Seiichi). RIP http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20130 ... 0-jij-soci