Bazza

Rather than "something YUKI HISA", perhaps "NORI (or something) YUKI KORE"??? BaZZa.

A friend of mine has a Shingunto with a tanto size hamidashi tsuba. If he sees this he will know what I mean and may comment further. BaZZa.

Shooting from the lip here - I can imagine a tanto being worn to the theatre by patrons, but not a katana???? Also, I meant to comment on the "sliding ashi" - I once had a tachi with handachi tosogu and one of the ashi moved freely along a contained length similar to the one Dale has shown. Regards, BaZZa.

40 man en??? BaZZa.

Rather than a stylised fan I think it is a plectrum for a samisen or similar stringed instrument. This would certainly complement the theatre theme we seem to be seeing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamisen Regards, BaZZa.

Does Ford's example suggest the use of a matrix punch???? BaZZa.

The posted arrowhead is a side-notched type and looks to be more North American Indian or Neolithic European than Japanese. For some Japanese Jomon period arrowheads see for example Figure 4, items 1 – 5 in: http://www.academia.edu/1807628/The_Neo ... _Prospects The figure shows middle Jomon arrowheads from the Southern Kurile Islands. This link http://mcrocks.websitetoolbox.com/post/ ... ts-3567693 shows a large number of Japanese Jomon period arrowheads with only ONE being side-notched. The owner of the points commented: -------------------------------------------------- All of the pictured artifacts came from the same farmer's field area over a 20 year period. The arrow point styles were concurrent, and were remarkably similar over several thousand years. I found it interesting that basically no Japanese points were side-notched. I found the only one I've ever seen in Japan - and I've looked at collections at a few dozen different places in Japan. By happenstance, a university field crew excavated an area in an adjacent field. They determined the 6,000 year old date. I learned a lot from them and got ID's on some of the artifacts I'd collected. Frequently I would join the crew from a local historical museum on digs in the region. It was like getting a free graduate course in Japanese archaeology. Archaeology/anthropology was my college major. -------------------------------------------------- However, ancient Japanese spear points may have been side-notched – see http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/1975.268.200 which shows a Late Jomon period (ca. 1500–1000 BC) stone Spearhead. This link http://www.tnm.jp/modules/r_free_page/i ... 15&lang=en shows a small photo of Jomon period stone arrowheads that are quite unlike the posted example. Best regards, BaZZa.

Peter, Without checking, I have a memory that Roger Robertshaw discusses this in his book??? Either that or he mentioned it to me in one of his visits to Oz about the finding of a Hizen kera somewhere. With regard to artillery, wikipedia addresses Armstrong cannon used in the Boshin War http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saga_Domain. Anbd in the thread viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8325&start=15 our Own Dear Roger wrote: --------------------------------------------------------------- The Hizen Kaji did use foreign steel - they had a teppo factory just 25 yds down the highway from the Tadayoshi forge, and there was the cannon reverbatory factory 0.5Km back from the Nagasaki highway still in the Nagase-Machi 'area' under Hashimoto control. Interesting also how some Hizen tsuba appear very 'Namban' in nature. --------------------------------------------------------------- So a "cannon factory" would indicate cannon use and Roger's words perhaps suggest it was early Edo, but this link: ------------------------------------ http://books.google.com.au/books?id=4N0 ... CFMQ6AEwBQ ------------------------------------ says "The first reverberatory furnace (used in the making of cannon) was set up by the Saga clan (Hizen) in 1850 and was ready for use in 1852." This interesting link http://www.masuko.com/English/company/Cannon.html suggests that cannon making and use was confined to the Late Edo period, supported by a Christies sale description here http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/arms ... tails.aspx. In discussing the Shimabara Rebellion, this link http://www.uwosh.edu/home_pages/faculty ... orrea.html suggests that cannon were used in the siege with this passage "Captured prisoners revealed that no food remained in the fortress; and neither did any powder or cannon balls remain," though no mention of cannon firing during the Rebellion. Finally, antique cannon are mentioned here http://www.japaneseweapons.net/hinawajy ... nglish.htm in Seki - in any event it is a good read for the teppo people. Best regards, Barry Thomas.

Please tell us about the blade. Any photos of the nakago and mei, please??? Does it have a star stamp?? Regards, BaZZa.

HAHAHA - Mariusz, absolutely no offence at all. In fact, your brain was more in gear than mine!!! SHEESH - UBU tanto in shinogi zukuri was what you meant, and I took it too liberally when I should have taken a nap... It was a long time ago that I saw this shinogi zukuri "thing" and apart from its outstanding awkwardness of sugata I cannot now remember anything about the tang. So, Mariusz' original question stands - show us an UBU shinogi tsukuri tanto, Bestests, BaZZa.

Mariusz, not so. I have held in my hand a shinogi zukuri tanto complete with koshirae. However, it was indeed a strange looking thing, mumei, and I guess the front end of what was left of a skinny katana. I think it was probably an alteration to give someone a cheap defensive tool, much like the yari we see mounted as tanto. It underscores the point that the only rule in collecting Nihonto is that there is an exception to every rule... Best regards, BaZZa.

Yes, but the 'accent' (hatsuon) in pronunciation is different. Pronunciation of tsuba in two syllables is rising on the second syllable or falling. One means a sword guard, the other spit. I know the pronunciation can sound the same, but native speakers have no trouble with it at all (of course!!). Our tutor in a language class once demonstrated this conclusively to we Western students of the language. hashi is another common one - chopsticks or a bridge depending on the accent. Bestests, BaZZa.

Having seen a few of these FWIW I agree with Paul Bestests, BaZZa.

All, The emphasis in the last sentence is mine. The botanical name notwithstanding, this sounds more like a cumquat, which is certainly highly acidic and inedible, but does make a delicious marmalade (and brandy!). I wonder about this because mandarins are a delicious citrus fruit, very flavoursome and far from the description given. Regards, BaZZa.

Dear All, I have received an email purporting to be a genuine email from ebay Australia. The text of the email is between the ****** start/end ******** lines. The email asks for a check of my account details for a sale already made. I HAVE MADE NO SUCH SALE. I have reported this to ebay support and changed my password. I have yet to hear back from ebay but there is no doubt in my mind that there needs to be an alert on this. Regards, BaZZa aka Barry Thomas. ******************** begin pasted text ********************* ----- Original Message ----- From: eBay Payments To: warlord@iinet.net.au Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2012 8:33 AM Subject: You have received a payment of AU $213.99 eBay sent this message to Barry W. Thomas. This message originated from eBay. Learn more. You have received a payment of AU $213.99 G'day Barry W. Thomas, You have received a payment of AU $213.99 for your recently sold item on eBay. Since this payment exceeds AU $100, you must confirm your eBay account, otherwise your selling rights on eBay would be revoked and you will no longer sell on the eBay platform. To avoid this use this above link to confirm your eBay account, to avoid revocation of the selling rights. Visit http://cgi4.ebay.com.au/ws2/eBayISAPI.dll?Confirm. After you have confirmed your eBay account, the amount received for your recently sold item on eBay, would be credited to your account, and the buyer will be informed. Thank you, eBay Australia -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Learn More to protect yourself from spoof (fake) emails. eBay sends these emails based on the preferences you set for your account. To unsubscribe from this email, change your notification preferences. Please note that it may take up to 5 days to process your request. See our Privacy Policy and User Agreement if you have any questions. Copyright © 2012 eBay Inc. All Rights Reserved. Designated trademarks and brands are the property of their respective owners. eBay and the eBay logo are trademarks of eBay Inc. eBay Inc. is located at 2145 Hamilton Avenue, San Jose, CA 95125. ************************** end pasted text *************************

David, Should the year more correctly be expressed as yonnen??? Regards, BaZZa

Off the top of my head without checking "the books" - SU MI SU (Smith)???? BaZZa. Edit - and the strange number at the bottom rhs is possibly the personal stamp of a previous Western owner. A similar thing happens with ukiyoe where a Japanese owner/collector would put his own seal on a print.

If the hand-drawn image is accurate I'm leaning to Chinese repro... BaZZa.

When was the last time anyone saw rust on the nakago all the way to the machi??? Looks suspect to me. I haven't checked "the books", but from memory the nakago jiri doesn't look "right". Regards, BazZa.

To avoid this problem I mostly compose in Word or a text editor, but if composing in the message field every once-in-a-while I copy the text to the clipboard "just in case"... BaZZa.

It's malachite, a copper ore and very toxic stuff to work with. In my years of collecting I have seen only one sword with a malachite saya and "somewhere" on my archive hard drives I have some photos of it with very nice fittings. A very nice and seemingly very rare lacquer technique, similar to the chips of pearl shell sometimes seen. BaZZa.

The sword is the book... BaZZa. OK, to expand. One example will suffice. When I was a very much younger and very inexperienced collector I had 3 swords where if one read the signatures and went to Hawley they turned out to be either old or famous smiths or both. I looked and looked at these blades and felt something wasn't right. I decided they were WW2 Showa period "productions".

Steve, The mei reads ISHIGURO MASATSUNE 石黒政常 plus a kao. There were at least 3 generations and I would opine this is a gimei. Regards, BaZZa.

The Herbert Museum asked : -------------------------------------- This very rusty Wakizashi is in the reserve collection of The Herbert Coventry England it has not been touched for 40yrs and is in very poor condition as conservation is to be finished... -------------------------------------- Most of us know that museums are places where swords go to die by slow neglect - I have seen this personally. In this instance it would appear remedial work has been done to arrest a case of neglect. Can I ask what "conservation is to be finished" means in this case and what constitutes "conservation"??? Regards, Barry Thomas (Melbourne, Australia)

"snippy", mate "snippy"... Regards, BaZZa.