Yukihiro

Not a chevron, but the "bracelet" on the sarute seems to be highlighting the cuff of a sleeve.

This is truly a magnificent hamon! A question I would like to ask is what are the characteristics of a wartime polish? I find it hard to distinguish between what is WW2 polish and what could be termed a post-war amateur polish.

I was asking the question because my other gunto blade (signed by Toshimasa) has definitely more sori than this one.

Honestly, that is exactly what I thought, but I am no expert.

I'll post mine here (actually the one that is on my type 98 shin-guntō!), for the record: This is a Daki Omodaka mon 抱面高 (alternate spelling for Omodaka: 沢瀉). Associated families are: Shiina, Someda/Yanada, Mori, Kinoshita, Asano, Sakai, Horikoshi, Mizuno, Tsuchii, Fukushima, etc. 椎名、梁田、毛利、木下、浅野、酒井、堀越、沢井、水野、土井、福島など (Information provided by SteveM)

I haven't tried to measure it yet, but the blade strikes me as having (very) little sori - was it the hallmark of the production at Amahide's guntô factory or just a random choice on the part of those who made that sword?

Bruce, Could you tell me more about the style of my Amahide blade? I know very little but my impression is that it has a ko-gunome hamon and maybe a ko-maru boshi. Other than that, I really don't know, but surely there is not much to see. I had thought for a moment it might have had a masame hada, but they are just scratches apparently. The Seki stamp precludes the possibility of it being a gendaito anyway.

I know ^^

My view on the subject is that hoping to improve the polish of Showato blades is a lost cause - to be sure, there are those who improve them visually by polishing the blades mechanically and/or acid etching them, but by so doing they take away some of their historical value. That is the reason why I wanted a gunto blade with a decent polish: gunto blades should be taken as they are and for what they are.

Because, in the first place, I thought that the polish might have been revamped after WW2, but it turned out that I was wrong.

The expenditure would by far exceed the intrinsic value of the blade anyway...

The blade does have some scratches and stains here and there, but, other than that, the (wartime?) polish looks good to me (as good as an original WW2 polish can possibly be, I mean! ).

These are actually the very first pictures of the blade I was able to take in broad daylight (no sunlight, though): I can't tell whether my Amahide blade is low or medium grade Shôwatô, but it doesn't look too bad in the light of day. The "scratch pattern" on the blade is not visible to the naked eye for the most part, so I suppose the way I took some of the photos must have had something to do with it.

Actually I had, Mal, and I assume the reason why Amahide's production is so well documented is because it was indeed much more complex than meets the eye (literally!). From what I have understood so far, my blade might have been made by Fukumoto Kanemune, Amahide's son-in-law and adopted son, but, as a matter of fact, I find Kanemune's style more flamboyant than the one my sword exhibits, which is, at least from my layman's point of view, of a much more "classical" gunto style.

This is for comparison (I should get my copy of Slough's book tomorrow): Ichimonji Amahide Kitae Kore 一文字天秀鍛之 Here is yet another one: https://www.nipponto...swords6/KY332614.htm