Ray Singer

Suggest Roger Robertshaw, as he has familiarity beyond the Tadayoshi / Tadahiro mainline. Hizento.net

Thank you Guido, I somehow managed to overlook that.

There is no confusion on my side about the designation of this sword, but have heard more than once that it may not be possible to re-export such pieces. Christie's stated that the export of Juyo Bijutsuhin is not possible when the Manno Museum collection was dispersed several years ago. Not that I consider Christie's to be an authority on this subject, but I would expect that they researched prior to the issuing that statement during the auction. There are to my knowledge several Juyo Bijutsuhin in private collections outside of Japan. Very curious to know of any other cases where such swords were imported for restoration and/or shinsa and had been able to easily re-export afterwards. As Brian mentioned, the one-year time span may indicate that this was not a simple process.

Not challenging Fred's article, but this is the first I have heard of the replacement of a Juyo Bijutsuhin certificate. I would be very interested to see a reissued Ju-bi paper.

In terms of reference examples, there is one here: http://www.ginzaseikodo.com/kanehiraE.html And a kinmoku habaki I own attached.

Fuyuhiro saku

The topic of legally exporting Juyo Bijitsuhin has been discussed in this forum on and off for the past few years. I thought it would be of interest to share a link to an article newly added to Fred's website, where the highly important Ju-bi Soshu Akihiro (and its export from Japan) is written about... http://www.nihonto.com/soshu-akihiro-%E7%9B%B8%E5%B7%9E%E7%A7%8B%E5%BA%83/ "After acquiring this blade in the USA, I returned it to Japan for restoration and replacement of the missing and lost original Juyo Bijitsuhin (重要美実品) designation certificate. I also requested permission to properly and legally export it from Japan. After about a year, permission to export it was granted so now it can legally be owned outside of Japan. It should be noted that without such permission, blades of this designation are not allowed leave Japan." - Fred Weissberg Here is one of the previous threads: http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/13787-prewar-kokuho-and-juyo-bijutsuhin/?hl=%2Bjuyo+%2Bbijutsuhin

Glad to hear it. Brian is the only habaki-shi I use, including habaki for swords I sent to Japan for the remainder of their restoration.

The homepage is now in a newsfeed format, so that any new additions to the site (swords, fitting, articles, etc) will appear at the top of the feed. Each item has the date it was added to the site. This newsfeed replaces the 'site updates' list Fred previously had at nihonto.com/itemsale.html. Best regards, Ray

Musashi Taro Yasukuni, a smith associated with the Shitahara school. Addendum: sorry I missed your comment about being familiar with this smith. The reverse has a Zodiac date to the Shōtoku period, and an additional description (正徳丙申仲春発生之時 真丸煉作之). I will try to help translate. I believe that 真丸煉作之 refers to the forging technique of the Shitahara school (they more often have a longer notation of the 15 fold method) and the date is 1716. Best regards, Ray

I am sorry to hear this and wish you good luck in getting your sword back. Not sure if you are able to file a claim with your own insurance company (as this sounds like a theft from your home) but here is a link for dragon's head tachi koshirae that may help establish value. https://www.aoijapan.net/tachi-koshirae-dragon-head/ Also http://www.ricecracker.com/japanese_swords/past_swords/s2/s2-1_birdshead.htm

There appear to be some filtering issues. The top-level Sales page does not include swords. The Sword Sales landing page begins with a mis-tagged tsuba. http://www.nihonto.com/for-sale/ http://www.nihonto.com/category/for-sale/swords/

As others have said, it is a part of the history of the sword. I have a Ko-Aoe tachi with Tokubetsu Kicho that I purchased from a close friend. The papers have his name on them, and I have no intention of discarding them due to their sentimental value and establishing provenance. The sword was later sent for Tanobe-san's sayagaki only, which gave further validation to the attribution on the kanteisho. I felt no need to submit for Tokubetsu Hozon at that point, however I may do so in the future if/when I decide to submit for Juyo. Regardless, the Tokubetsu Kicho kanteisho will be kept with the sword as long as it is in my collection. A future collector may decide to destroy the kanteisho due to it's "obsolete" status, and that will be their decision, however I would find it sad if that happened and that part of the ownership history of the sword were lost.

Thank you to those individuals who reached out to me here and by private message. Very happy to see the positive feedback on Igor. Best regards, Ray

A friend is purchasing a sword from Igor Hochmajer at Nihonto Galley. As this is a new seller to me I was just curious if anyone here had experiences they would like to share (PM is fine). To be clear, communication has been excellent and I simply want to do a reference check on behalf of my friend. Best regards, Ray

As there were not many women known to have been involved in the arts of the Japanese Sword, I thought this mitokoromono would be worth sharing. My understanding is that both Murakami Josui and Jotetsu were women, being students under Murakami Jochiku (and also the artist's daughters). http://togishi.com/store/p175/Plum_Blossom_Mitokoromono_set__by_Murakami_Jochikus_eldest_daugther_Jotetsu.html

As I mentioned to Juha, my belief is that these tanto are in their fully original sugata and are not repurposed yari. I have examined three in hand and all appeared to be ubu. Now with the additional examples in this thread, I have seen seven and every one has a near identical sugata. I believe this is simply a rare tsukuri-komi.

Another...

Another example here. http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/7089-anyone-know-what-these-blade-forms-are-called/?fromsearch=1

Does not look quite right for TOMO to my eyes. Perhaps 安行 (Yasuyuki)...

http://nihonbi.sakura.ne.jp/?p=131

By contrast, this is an utushi of Koryu Kagemitsu as it would have looked when ubu, done by one of Yoshindo's students Ohno Yoshimitsu: http://www.seiyudo.com/ka-030212.htm

It is difficult to say, and I should say that there is also a possibility that the sword was withdrawn from sale for some reason. Perhaps somebody here remembers if the sword was flagged as sold.

This is a copy of the famous Koryu Kagemitsu. Almost all copies of this sword are done to emulate its current suriage form, in which the dragon horimono peeks over the top of the habaki.

Sold before. https://www.aoijapan.net/wakizashi-hori-mikaduki-taikei-naotane-kaochichiwari-dotan-barai-yoshida-fumihira-bunka-5-early-autumn/