Curran

Darcy, If Peter couldn't direct you to a more detailed materia, I doubt that I can add much. Your best bet may be Harry's Nihon To Koza- Kodogu translation looking up the Sano Ke. It is just a verbal flowrecord of how the various late Edo schools formed. There is also further mention of Naoyoshi on page 398 (or so), when discussing the height/depth factor of quality in some of the better/best late Edo kinko workers. I'll try finding something in the Haynes Catalogs later, as there he wrote many a paragraph on various kinko schools. It would be useful if someone cataloged all the names relative to volume & page, as I am surprised the Haynes Index did not refer back to this his own work. The Haynes having been commercial in nature are not infalable- but Mr. Haynes work is far and away some of the best stuff published in English. Ah, if there were more time- I would gladly cross index the Catalogs. Anyone know of this already having been done? Some Volumes have an index in the back. Some don't.

Could someone help translate the gaki on the tsuba box pictured below. The box itself is interesting. I have never seen a tsuba box constructed this way, and the box seems very old. Perhaps the oldest non lacquer tsuba box I have ever seen. Constructed with many little wooden pegs, so despite its age it is still fairly airtight.

Brian, Pardon my language- but... "Damn-it". I am sad to hear this. It was only Thursday that I thought about Jim and hoped his website was still operating. Beyond the Nihonto knowledge, I thought I might re-read some of his "Veteran's Hospital Rants". Ole White Lung was someone many of us greatly appreciated, and a few hated. I appreciated him, and never had (forgive the irony Jim) the heart to tell him my mother-in-law is a Veterans' Hospital Doctor. I never met him face to face, but enjoyed quite a few emails with him. Quite a character, and I'm sorry that his website is gone. If you find a backed up copy, please let me know. Curran

It seems I missed a lot in a few days away from the board. I recommended Jim G's list because it is very good and most of what I would recommend would not improve on the list- but just be redundant. Also, given that so many of the texts are in Japanese-- I confess I cannot remember the name of many of them unless I am at home looking at my shelves. Even then... there are a few I have to get down and out of their protective boxes to read on the inside flap the name. For instance, I can never remember the correct name of "the blue Owari-den tsuba book" which may or may not be on Jim's list. And even after 8 years of active collecting, I am still finding there are books out there I did not know existed. It was only a few months ago that I became aware of a book dedicated specifically to Norisuke tsuba. Some books took me years to track down. Until this year, my library expense eclipsed the value of my collection. And several people here have much larger libraries. Also, tastes change. There are certain schools I have no more interest in- although I have books on them. For instance: I personally don't care much for Soten tsuba, but know I am in the minority. Do I NOT recommend such a book, even if the book itself is very good? And I have some books that I get a lot from, but I know others consider to be a borderline waste of paper. To recommend or not to recommend? I've never completed a proper bibliography of my books, and I don't know who has other than Jim G. It is considerably easier to tell you what we think of specific books or tell what migh help with a specific interest. Assembling a bibliography can be considerable work. Give respect to those who have done it. I tried once to properly catalog mine using Excel and confess I didn't get very far. Curran Ps. Milt- Your Ono is an odd one- but probably a good call. I said I thought maybe Yagyu. I don't know if I agree with the Ono call 100%. I need better Yagyu references. In your reference that shows a similar piece and says "Kanayama", I'd question the text or the attempt to jump from the 2-D reference text to your tsuba where so much of the evidence is in the mimi and the construction.

I suppose the theme to be the annual sawing off of the deer's horns in Nara (is it Nara?). Nice festival/seasonal reference. The first tsuba looks legit. I am not too sure about the second. Looks too crude.

See Jim Gilbert's website for a very good list.

Milt, Same for NBTHK. Blade doesn't have to be inside the koshirae. A tsunagi or partial tsunagi that holds it all together is fine. Curran

Bonsai knife, that is? It interested me more than the Akasaka tsuba. I have seen many "bonsai" tanto and even considered buying one, but this is one of the most interesting. Curran

For those of you not familiar with the catalog, it is softback but extremely well done and the pictures much nicer than those from the website. The man assembled quite a phenomenal collection of tsuba. I thought it well worth the price, with many unique tsuba not seen in other books. Curran

Ah yes... that fellow. I never had a problem with him, but I seem to have been the lucky one. "Hageyama" is a big boy and can protect his interests, so maybe he gets a Juyo on the cheap side here.

Rich, that is a good example from Jinsoo's site. To date I've never much been wowed by Kaneiye, put I look at the iron of that example and observe Kaneiye's subtle obsessive compulsive perfectionist work... you'd think it would be easy to copy- but is actually fairly difficult. I understand his appeal. It isn't what grabs me, but I get it. You'd think it would be an easy thing to copy, like Van Gogh's "Irises", but once you've seen it in person and almost touched it... well, any hopes I migh have ever had of painting myself a decent copy just died then. How many of the Kaneiye copyartists got to handle one and then try and make one? Nice example. I doubt I will ever own a Kaneiye, but who knows. I've always like the Daruma one.

Ken- It is much about the iron plate. Imagine low grade iron that is produced in sheets or somehow else in quanity. Then hockey puck sized round ones are punched out with cookie cutter or other technique that produces the nearly identical plate. The rough edges from the punching are quickly file finished, but on some sloppy ones the edges still have a bit of nasty hangnail that has worn down with time/age- but is still not exactly perfectionist. The "hockey pucks" are taken in a bucket to a workshop where trained individuals do a wee bit of carving and building up of base designs onto the iron plate. Usually the base design is on the lower right quadrant- in this case the fisherman w/hat. Then using various (and often poisonous) techniques, a minimal amount of precious gold and silver is placed over the copper. It is an assembly line production that might have inspired Henry Ford. "You can have the Model T in any color you like, as long as its black." Kaneiye was one of the most famous prone to copies. Off the top of my head , the Saga Kaneiye guys would continue his designs and make variations on his designs- and sign with their own names. Saga Kaneiye tsuba aren't KANEIYE (the originals), but still more revival style pieces than copies or gimei. Some of them are quite nice. I cannot comment much on "the original" Kaneiye tsuba. I've had little chance to study them in hand, as most of what I've seen is in books...and a calendar sent to me by one of the Japan sword shops (A Kaneiye tsuba for each month of the year!). Curran

mark, Seperate out into 2 boxes: box1: Copy and box2: Gimei. Rich T is bullseye perfect with his opinion. I second it. But copies are common all through Edo and thereafter. They are to be appreciated for what they are. Posters of Van Gogh and Renoir hang on many a person's wall. Only the biggest chucklehead will try and tell you they are (as a Jamaican friend says...) "Au-then-TIC!". They are still legit hand guards and art, not intended as deception. Gimei are another category. Curran

Nobody-san, Your English is excellent and perfectly understood. We are lucky to have you with us as part of this forum. Thank you for the recent -shinsa standard- from the NBTHK. I would point out that I have seen saiba (or saiha ? -which is correct these days?) Muromachi with NBTHK Hozon papers. Usually they are tanto. The last one I saw was Bizen and for sale by Aoi Arts. Many organizations are overly quick to declare blades "retempered". There are debates over such topics as the use of heated copper blocks to make the hardened and edge more pliable when moving the machi up the blade. It creates the appearance of what looks like mizukage on one side. Yet utsuri can remain and the blade will otherwise seem perfectly normal in all the other places that retemper is usually evident. Is this retemper? You decide! I have seen this many times in blades of the Muromachi period and wonder if this wasn't something done often as acceptable during the demands of the warring period state. I have seen very good and very functional Muromachi blades with this hallmark, but I have never seen a great blade with it. I cannot recall having seen a Shinto or Shinshinto with this trait, although I must have at some point. There are other variations of odd things seen on some blades. When there is any doubt, it gets declared 'retemper'. I have known the NTHK and NBTHK both to declare blades 'retemper', and the other organization disagree and paper them. I have an o-tanto that I like very much with the NTHK declared 'saiha' and the NBTHK gave Hozon in one shinsa, then Tokubetsu Hozon papers in another years later (Oei period, early muromachi, o-suriage...so not signed, if it ever was! - so it does not meet the criteria Nobody shared with us). As to which organization is tougher on this, I cannot say- though I think you could fill a rainbarrel with the number of blades that came out of the 2002 NTHK shinsa with 'retemper'. Minister Amos, to answer your question: "yes". But don't get your hopes up. The large majority of retempers *are* retempers. None of the better organizations will pass them. Curran

If possible, please show us close-ups of the rest of the fittings- especially the junction between the scabbard collar and the fuchi. Initial thought is "higo" or "heian-jo", as some iron and gold (yes gold- not brass, sentoku, etc) "heian-jo" items were made very similar to Higo stuff. It could also be Satsuma work, akin to Higo- but some things like the saya loop will be the only pointers there. Most likely it is Higo. From the initial photos it looks that the wrap has been removed from the handle and I also suspect the tsuba & menuki have been removed. I do not think it was originally an aikuchi mount job. More photos would help firm up the opinion. Curran

Bullpuppy, Value always depends on condition and a range of other factors. Sometimes it seems to depend on what phase the moon is in. I tried to find you an example, but only found the listing for one recently sold by Moses: http://www.nihontoantiques.com/fss152.htm Seeing as you recently submitted the sword to the NTHK through him, he should be willing to tell you for how much this other one sold. I don't remember studying the sword too closely from the auction. Price was very fair for what looked like a nice Bizen piece. My feeling is you probably come out a few (2 or 3) thousand ahead on it, though you should figure out to which smith it is attributed. The English translation on the sheet may be wrong, because it is odd that they would give it to specific little known guy unless it is signed that way. On one instance, I took a sheet back to the translator because they'd translated a 'Mori' character as something else. So yours probably says Sukesada or Sukehira, or other fellow listed in Nagayama. Curran Curran

Bullpuppy, Wrong section. See page #294. Also more on pg. #299 Shinshinto. I cannot see what your papers say. I am assuming "Sukesada" or "Sukehira". They worked both in Soshu style and that of Oei Bizen. I enjoy Oei Bizen very much, so I often take a look at Yokoyama swords. Point scores are just a 'helpful indicator'. 75 is very good. Assuming 50% of blades failed shinsa (probably higher in this shinsa), then it is sort of a pyramid scale from 70pts for passing kanteisho to 80pts being a possible Juyo candidate. Some blades are marginally passed with scores in the 60s. The reasons can vary. Just for convenience sake, conceptualize that of the 50 that pass out of a pool of 100: You have 4.5 with scores below 70; then 9 with 70pts, 8 with 71pts, 7 with 72 pts, 6 with 73pts, 5 with 74pts, 4 with 75pts, 3 with 76pts, 2 with 77pts, 1 with 78pts, and 0.5 with 80pts (yes, we skipped 79 because I've never seen a 79 score to date) that is a Yusho (NTHK equiv of Juyo). If you approach it this way, then you could feel that the NTHK felt your sword was in the top 6 to top 10% of the ones they saw at the shinsa. This is very good. Remember the point score is just there as a rough indicator. My own feelings were that the quality of swords submitted was lower than I'd seen before. However, the quality of the fittings submitted was much higher than I'd seen before. Quite a few published items, and some big names- though I do not think anything was felt to be Yushu level. The judges were extremely hard- but some great collections made it to the fittings table. You should be happy with your results, though maybe you were expecting Koto Bizen results. Do not sneeze at Yokoyama. It is not Bungo. We save those for Milt. Curran

Nobody, Thank you for posting those links. I read the first one with help of a translator program and could also translate enough of the rough spots to get the heart of the ideas. I can definitely see the roots of the rumors. The question is "how accurate is the article?", as news sources in the USA are ofen far behind other public sources for insight and accuracy. Speaking from my own empirical observations, I've had concerns about the NBTHK for 3 years now, but nothing like this. I have seen swords go Juyo that I did not think go Juyo, but in the scheme of things Juyo is only a halfway point on a 5 step ladder valuation system. I thought Darcy was entirely right in his arguements about "statistical mining of the pool" and that as the best swords from the 1960s had long since Juyo'ed- the standard for Juyo would creep down a bit to meet the supply. So those that went Juyo in recent years that I would not have thought go Juyo are simply "low-end Juyo". There are $20,000 Juyo and then there are $200,000 Juyo. After seeing a 3rd gen Nobukuni O-tanto with recent Juyo papers on a Japanese dealer's website, I was even considering submitting my practically identical one for a roll of the dice at a Juyo shinsa, hoping mine would squeak across the line to Juyo. The article makes it seem the Agency for Cultural Affairs may be grinding an axe for the NBTHK. It sounds like there is more than some evidence of impropriety at the NBTHK, yet that some out there are trying to fan the smoke into flames. Given the importance of the sword in Japanese history and culture, I doubt the magnitude of scandal is so great that the NBTHK loses its tax-exempt status. How much is the Agency for Cultural Affairs just banging the drum to have their way? Will the politicians pull its teeth or encourage the Agency to bite? I doubt there is enough public support for the politicos to do that, so most likely we will see some sort of NBTHK sacrificial lamb if they cannot pin it all on the recently dead guys. In a macro sense- I doubt the NBTHK Japan will come out with any direct statement for some time, until it is most politically advantageous to do so. I know it has gotten overly trite in my ears, but the phrase "keep it simple" is good. Don't buy the damn papers. Buy the item. NBTHK papers are just an opinion. There is no financial guarantee there. I do believe in them, and I do paper many of my items for 3rd party credibility- though Hozon is usually good enough for my satisfaction. Juyo is a much greater assurance than Hozon, but sooner or later you must develop your own confidence. Nobody- thanks for the links. Curran

Ed, It sounds like you have started off very well, and the advice Rich, Peter, and Milt has given you is rock solid. I cannot add much. Go slow. Books are a good investment. The Torigoye book is cheap from the Northern California Club. Being largely a photocopied paperback, it costs peanuts compared to most books. It may give you some brainache at first, but you will find yourself going back to it for years. The Haynes Catalogs (#1 to #10) are good. I used them to help identify a rare tsuba today. They may be something you want to look at later. In the long run, you will want to pick them up. Perhaps not yet, as at a beginning point they are a bit expensive compared to other books you don't have yet. The irony is that I just realized today that I have 2 copies of Vol. #6. The Haynes Index is something entirely different. Eventually you will want that as invaluable, but there are a lot of other books that will help you build a basic foundation first. As I believe Rich said... do a lot of soul searching to learn what appeals to you. Even then, you will find your tastes change a bit over time. At 45, you are in the young end of the pool, so you have decades to decide what you like. I force myself to keep a small collection so that I need think about every piece. When something comes in, something has to go out. That sort of philosophy works for me. Try and make it to Tampa. Paying the annual fee for the Florida Token Kai gets you into the show free (I hope that is still true!), and is about the same as 3day admission to the show. Don't be afraid to walk up to someone and start asking questions. Some of us are kooks, but many are good people. If you get a kook, politely bow out and simply go to someone else. Eventually you will run into Peter or me or one of the other guys who are happy to jabber about tsuba and fittings for hours on end. Curran

There is an Owari Den tsuba book (aka. Big Blue Book) that has the silhouette drawing of 39 or 40 Yagyu tsuba design. There is also the Japanese Swords in European Collections (written in German and English) that has a section showing a number of good Yagyu tsuba. Curran

Cool. I look forward to it. There is a storm forming now that I am a little concerned may become a Wilma part 2. We'll see in about 36 hours. I believe you are several hours away by car. If you feel like it, boat to our dock. We're on a bay only about 1000ft from the Intercostal Water Way, but we only have about 5 to 6 ft of depth. Not sure that is enough for your boat. Curran

Kyo sukashi basically means "Kyoto" sukashi. Kyo being short for Kyoto in this instance. Sukashi just being the openwork (null space) style. Kyo sukashi usually refers to the open work sukashi tsuba of a certain "aesthetic sense" associated with the refinement of Kyoto. Some of them are truely elegant. I don't know if Bob Benson attribution is 100% correct, but it is relatively close enough. You aren't missing much in Florida currently. Too much rain. Luckily no hurricanes so far- *knock on wood* (is that just an American saying, or internationally recognized?). Curran

Mike, My pleasure to help. I've been too busy recently to keep up with the NMB as much as I'd like, but felt I could help on this one. Hope I'm right on all of it. I do have one minor correction: My post should read "Higo or Edo HIGO production". In shortest version: Higo style having gained in popularity in Edo (Tokyo) and being a bit far from Higo, artisans (some from Higo and some local joes) set up in Edo to mimick the style for sale locally. Their work is known as "Edo Higo". With tsuba it seems often possible to distinguish Edo Higo from Higo with a fair degree of confidence. With kozuka, I doubt I could say what is Higo vs Edo Higo. Curran

Mike, Just off the top of my head quick thoughts: Higo style rain or water/river dragon . The kozuka being iron is nice. Ones in decent condition seem to be more and more difficult to find, given than the majority of soft metal ones and the nature of iron kozuka to deteriorate if not cared for more than the soft metal ones need. Often the iron ones are Higo or related product. So I'd hazard a guess yours is probably a Higo product or Edo I'd guess mid to late Edo. I'm not much into kozuka, so take my thoughts as novice. Hope it helps. Curran

Nigel, See if this one fits the bill: http://www.bushidojapaneseswords.com/hb ... _tsuba.htm Curran