PietroParis

I don't understand this comment, all members can see who voted what.

I know nothing about blades, but one thing I would ask myself is why a quality blade currently located in Tokyo does not have papers.

mantis poop?

Except for a typo (?) in which the NTHK certificate becomes NBTHK

I'm not sure who you think called you a liar here, but it certainly wasn't me. I was just pointing out what appeared to be some confusion in your interpretation of the punched date. I know nothing about blades, but yours does look gorgeous to me.

Yes he is. You can check any number of NBTHK certificates, the first two punched numbers always coincide with the year of the relevant Japanese era. Indeed, in the linked example 2000 was the 12th year of the Heisei era. Also note that, even in that certificate, the date written in the calligraphy (December 27) is a bit later than the punched month would imply. If you don't buy it, just try to find a counterexample!

Ahem, in the perforated date 02-2020-09 the 02 stands for second year of the Reiwa era. If I'm not mistaken, the date written on your certificate is: 令和 (Reiwa) 二 年 (2nd year) 十一月 (11th month) 九日 (9th day) i.e. November 9, 2020. It's not entirely clear to me why the month in the perforated date (September, in this case) is often earlier than the month in the calligraphy. Maybe that is the month in which the blank certificate was made. Cheers, Pietro

This tsuba signed Namitoshi is currently being offered by three (!) different sellers on eBay, it must be a re-sale from Yahoo Japan. Relatively cheap but, alas, in terrible condition:

According to the thread linked above, recurrent complaints on this seller concern cleaned-up nakago and acid polishing. How does this blade fare under that point of view?

I can’t judge the blade, but I know that the seller has a troubled reputation in this forum:

Priced an arm and a leg on eBay, an unusual tsuba with rice bale design signed Tatsutoshi:

I forgot a quite important difference: 4) the buyer pays a 9% fee!

In fact Catawiki does not "publish the sales of various auction houses". It is an online auction platform not unlike eBay. The main differences are that 1) the items on sale are supposedly vetted by "experts" who provide (usually too high) estimates; 2) most items on sale have reserve prices; 3) the deadline is moved when there are bids in the last minute (i.e., no sniping). What happened in this case might be that somebody bought the item on Catawiki and then put it on sale again. Or maybe the sale failed for some reason and the original seller is trying again on a different platform. Cheers, Pietro

I googled this, but I suppose you know it already: https://www.Japanese-wiki-corpus.org/literature/Nozarashi Kiko.html

A mumei tsuba from eBay, very similar to one signed Tatsunao shown in the previous page (see link). If I'm not mistaken, the NBTHK paper classifies it as 武州 Bushu:

Obvious trash has some value as well as it provides entertainment. IMHO it's up to the people who animate the thread to set the balance between fun crap and insidious fakes. Members who find the thread too lowbrow can either skip it or provide worthier items for discussion.

One more with Noshi design, signed Namitoshi (from eBay):

The issue was recently discussed in this thread. It would seem that newer papers don't have the ownership info on the back.

Could it be 芳光 Yoshimitsu? There seem to be several Meiji-period bronze artists signing with that name, although the first kanji looks a bit different in each of the signatures:

It might be easier if you post a picture focused on the animal...

I'd say either 正艮 Masanaga or 正良 Masayoshi + kao (artist's seal)

A naive question: is the rugged texture of the steel in the Varshavsky tsuba an intended effect, rather than the result of corrosion?

Hi All, today I noticed that a tsuba that had attracted my attention for the thread "Tatsutoshi & students" is being offered three times on eBay: seller: tsushu0; price: $950.39 https://www.ebay.fr/itm/Flange-Efu-Sumi-Hoju/203291624238 seller: tsushu0; price: 730.25 GBP https://www.ebay.fr/itm/Flange-Efu-Sumi-Hoju/203293794553 seller: cool-Japan.ec; price: $612.23 https://www.ebay.fr/itm/Tsuba-Sword-Guard-Blade-Katana-Samurai-Japanese-Antique-T-05/124605337567 Note that the first offer listed above came a couple of days earlier than the other two. What do you think the deal is? Why would a seller list the same item twice at different prices depending on the currency? (i.e. 730 GPB is about $1016 at today's rates). And more importantly, what about the second seller who offers the same tsuba at a significantly lower price? Is it just a scammer who stole the pictures from the first seller? Or maybe neither seller owns the tsuba, and they are planning to purchase it at a lower price from a Japanese-only source in case they find a buyer? Cheers, Pietro

Back then I had answered that Tatsutoshi belonged to the Akao school, and indeed in the useful genealogy posted by Mauro (from Markus Sesko's book) he is six generations down from the Akao founder. However, he does appear to be also listed as "founder of the Ito school" .

Do I understand correctly that Tatsutoshi & students should be referred to as “Ito/Ido School”?