Bazza

This sword is currently offered in a private sale on ebay, Item No 320622011717 Regards, BaZZa.

Gentle Folk, Just in on Chris Bowen's discussion list FYI. Very nice to see Ford Hallam and Brian Tschernega in the prizes. Regards, BaZZa. ---------------------------------------- From: Kenji Mishina To: 'Token Kenkyu Kai' Sent: Friday, September 10, 2010 5:44 PM Subject: NBSK Sword Craftsmen Competition Dear members, We just uploaded the photos of all of entry works to the 1st NBSK Sword Craftsmen Competition. Please access to the NBSK official site “English” then click “1st NBSK Sword Craftsmen Competition result” if you are interested. NBSK site : http://www.nbsk-jp.org/english/front_page.html The NBSK is moving to a new office of the 3rd Floor of the 1st Terminal Building of the Haneda Airport. The building was completed recently and the Haneda Airport newly opened as International Airport (it used to be an airport for domestic airlines and to some Asian countries like Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan). There has been a complaint that Narita Airport is too far from central Tokyo and no good hotel around there. The Haneda Airport is expected to be the main hub airport of Japan in the near future. The NBSK obtained a show case in the 4th floor of the New Hadeda International Airport and we are planning to display items related to Japanese sword culture there. Mishina *************************************************** Kenji Mishina 三品謙次 Japanese Sword Polisher E-mail : m-kenji@parkcity.ne.jp http://www007.upp.so-net.ne.jp/m-kenji/ ***************************************************

Dear JPH, This contribution probably comes under the heading of "useless information", but I submit it "just in case"... There is a style of forging called tanzaku kitae, described in one online dictionary as "Forging together various pieces of different kinds of steel and iron to get the required qualities for sword steels." A more comprehensive description is found on David Pepin's website about a RAI NORIMICHI katana: -------------------------------------- "RAI NORIMICHI" WAS ONE OF THE FOREMOST STUDENTS OF "RAI KINMICHI" IN KAN-EI (1624 AD). HE FURTHERED HIS STUDIES WITH THE "HORIKAWA MON" UNDER THE TUDOR SHIP OF "UMETADA MYOJU", AND WORKED IN OSAKA (SETTSU PROVINCE). HE WAS TRULY A MASTER AT "TANZAKU KITAE", THE COMPLEX COMBINING OF "HADA STEELS", I.E.: MASAME, AND ITAME (EXTREMELY DIFFICULT TO PROPERLY ACHIEVE). THIS BLADE IS A SUPERB EXAMPLE OF HIS GREAT SKILL! -------------------------------------- http://www.samuraisword.com/nihontodisp ... /index.htm Regrettably my Rai Norimichi katana is out of polish so I cannot comment on whether any "twisting" is evident in this forging technique. Regards, BaZZa.

tateware, to be precise?? google [ tateware sword ] Regards, BaZZa.

Curran, Is that a way of drawing attention to the apparent mizukage, with an oblique suggestion of retemper??? As it is Tokubetsu Juyo I wouldn't think so and this seems to say that the hamachi is original, as it was made. Regards, BaZZa.

Well, yes. These things can go on forever, but there is just one thing I would like to say, and I say it to people who express the horror so eloquently written above, even to my own Mother, now 89. I am also very well read in the area of World War 2 atrocities. We must not forget that tens of thousands of good Japanese people were abused - and murdered - in their own country by the political police, the Tokkō, Japan's approximate equivalent of the Gestapo. The enemy here is not the Japanese officers handing over their swords, it is the untrammelled abuse of centralist power and the militarist mindset of total control of the population. It has happened in modern times, it is happening even as we speak. I am not in two minds and have no trouble reconciling the abuse of power over centuries with the fabulous art of Nihonto. And of course, there was lots of abuse with the Spanish sword, the English sword, the German sword... Edit after reading later posts: War is the most profitless of all human activities. Regards, Barry Thomas aka BaZZa.

Steve, The hamon running off before the habaki area is called yakiotoshi and is a rarely seen feature. However, it does occur from the Kamakura period into Shinto times. I have seen it only once. Just put 'yakiotoshi' into google and read about it, but go here: http://www.sho-shin.com/sai9.htm to see it on an old sword, a Bungo Hikozan School blade of the early Kamakura period. The relevant text says "YAKIOTOSHI is an expected feature." Regards, BaZZa.

Greg, I would opine that the "paint" is in fact urushi, real lacquer. The fabric wrap (hempen cloth??) is I believe a typical underlay for lacquer even on old koshirae, and indeed I have seen cloth under lacquer on an antique saya with lovely decoration - regrettably, like yours, this knowledge came only because the lacquer had suffered damage. I imagine this gunto saya lacquer was quite expensive at the time, as good lacquer is today, and as it always has been in quality work. What blade is in this koshirae?? Can you post some pics of the nakago?? Regards, BaZZa.

Jason, Lovely!! Thanks for sharing. Over the years I have found THREE excellent sets of menuki in otherwise abysmal swords!! A suggestion if I might - very selfish as I want more detail!! - crank up the scanning resolution to max and crop the image so we get more pixels on the menuki. Bestests, BaZZa.

Does anyone else think this particular nagabonji has been done with a Dremel tool or somesuch????? Charles raises the question in my mind since the first look - the carving does not look "proper" - perhaps the recent work of an amateur??? BaZZa.

Thank you Chris for an excellent "word picture". I couldn't have put it better in a week of thinking and drafting... Sincerely, BaZZa.

Dear Robert, I'm sorry, but it's not possible in my life at present to put up pictures as I've not made any, but Chris Bowen (I think?) hinted at the difference in one of his posts. I'll think about this and re-visit the topic later and see if I can give a word picture. Regards, BaZZa.

This thread has been most enjoyable indeed. Captivating. It's at the heart of what I intuited about Nihonto from my earliest years of collecting. I'll make a statement about Gendaito and polish that might get me a broadside, but that's why we are all here... Based on observation I've come to believe there are THREE polishes - "easy" sashikomi, hadori, and "hard" sashikomi (as in taking longer and more difficult to do). WW2 era Gendaito have a kind of sashikomi that is "easy" to do (read quicker) and shows the hamon clearly, but leaves the hada more difficult to "see". The swords do look good at first blush, but leave one with a "lacking" feeling because the hada is not so easy to discern. For these reasons I disagree with my dear and esteemed friend George Trotter and would polish such a WW2 era Gendaito. I have one such a sword that I'll run past George when we get together in a few months (we are at opposite ends of Australia!) before I send it for polish. Another issue is that Edo period blades of quality that reach us in good condition often have a "worn out" polish such that they look similar to the WW2 era "easy" sashikomi described above. The use of uchiko "wears out" the rendition of hada, but leaves the hamon outstandingly brilliant. A polisher visiting Australia many years ago looked at a Shinshinto katana a friend of mine has that is in excellent condition with everything visible, even the hada. It did not come anywhere near my criteria for "worn out" polish. Yet, the polisher looked at and said "It is beginning to dull. I would start on the second stone". Which underscores Chris Bowen's point of leaving it to the expertise of the togishi. The grandfather of this particular togishi was taught by the Hon'ami of the day - and he thought this sword should be polished again. I'm not sure these comments have been helpful, based as they are on a very "small sample" database, which cannot begin to compare with Chris Bowen's very extensive empirical database. So I suppose they might come under the heading of "BaZZa's Random Rambles"... Regards, BaZZa.

Ahhh, Keith, it's good for us all. I think the small column below SHIMADA reads "nagasa 1 shaku 4 sun 7 bu (about?)". The last character is a little blurry, but I guess it means "approximately", "close to", "about". Regards, BaZZa.

If someone will remind me in my problematic memory state, I have a line of query to pursue here in Victoria, Australia, for a specialist transport service. A colleague once had to leave our workplace due to some exigent circumstance and asked me to oversee some important art pieces (paintings) that he was consigning to an exhibition. This was duly accomplished (some years ago now) and it just popped into my head that this was a company I had never heard of who specialised in shipping art works. When I knock a few things off my one-straw-away-from-breaking-back, I will enquire about this company and make representations re Nihonto. Regards, BaZZa.

Well, this looks like a party I can join, and probably stating the obvious!!! Under the ICHI character it says "WAKIZASHI. MUMEI (SHIMADA)". That's my limit for today!!! Regards, BaZZa.

Brian commented in another thread viewtopic.php?f=9&t=7595&p=61426&hilit=sweden#p61426 that he feared shipping of swords would shut down: ---------------------------------------- From that little snippet, I am genuinely scared that we are about to see a worldwide new policy from EMS themselves, to not take any edged weapons anymore. In the politically correct mess-of-a-world that we have nowdays, it would not surprise me at all. It would be a tragedy here, as all other methods are unreliable and expensive here in SA. Pray I am wrong and paranoid... ---------------------------------------- I have just seen this on an ebay auction by Kanetoyo: http://cgi.ebay.com/K-Japanese-KATANA-S ... 255ac4e260 Part of the auction text reads: ---------------------------------------- For Australia, Europe, Canada buyer *USA,Germany,France,Netherland, UK, Italy is no problem, I will send sword at EMS or SAL. Now, EMS and DHL and UPS not accept sword. Shipping law changed about shipping item. Therefor, I will use surface of Japan post office. It take about 3 month from 2 month at surface If you need soon recieve sword, I will send sword at Fedex. In this case, Shipping fee is over USD250. ---------------------------------------- I have a friend here in Australia who has personally carried 3 swords to Japan for polish. On landing at Narita he declared three katana to Customs, who apologised and said that they would have to call the police. A policewoman came with white gloves and explained about art swords to the Japanese Customs people - good English was apparently spoken to my friend. The necessary forms were filled in, signed and my friend was on his way with the swords in 25 minutes. Everything went very smoothly. My friend especially asked Customs about the 3 swords limit that we had heard about. They said no, you can bring in any number (of course, this might depend on the airline) and all Japanese Customs wanted to know was where the swords were going and what was going to be done with them. Any other take on this??? It looks as if we here in Oz will be personally carrying our swords to Japan and personally picking them up after polish and shinsa... Regards, Barry Thomas aka BaZZa.

Do the inlaid spots suggest a leopard rather than a tiger??? BaZZa.

I'm pleased to come out of the closet and declare myself to be a "pinger". I once had a tsuba (a mate now has it on a Shinshinto koshirae) that was a Saga Kaneie iron tsuba that rang like a bell, a beautiful, sonorous ring with overtones. Of course, the workmanship backed it up. I hypothesise that the reason for the ring is the forging of the iron. The metal being compressed under the hammer must alter its acoustic response to being struck. I agree (and experience backs it) that obviously cast tsuba do go THUD. I think that if Chuck's cast tsuba rings, then it may be because it is modern, cast STEEL (as he speculates), quite different from cast IRON. All-in-all though, whatever the consensus or not of a bunch of forumites the ping is merely an incidental 'test' that is comforting to the 'pinger', much like a pacifier/dummy is for an infant. It is worth noting that the wheels of railway carriages are still subject to the 'ping' test with a hammer to gauge cracks. My final word on this subject comes from the Antiques Roadshow. The 'ping' test is performed on porcelain to detect cracks... Bestests, BaZZa.

Keith, KANABO means metal rod/stick and TETSUBO means iron rod/stick, so the two terms could be interchangeable - like HINAWAJU, TEPPO and TANEGASHIMA. Tetsu meaning iron I have also seen rendered KUROGANE - black metal. Regards, BaZZa.

Nice tsuba indeed. I enlarged the image in my photoapp and there is a lot of "gunge" in the cloud formations, the dragon carving and no doubt in the interstices of the nanako. The gunge is probably an accretion of dust from laying wherever it has been for perhaps a 100 years or more. Looking at the gilt tail of the dragon there is also a slight greenish tinge to the accretion immediately adjacent to the top side of the tail. I'm guessing this is a minute quantity of copper salt that has leached from the metal into the dust accretion. This thread seems an ideal place to discuss cleaning this tsuba. Is this something that could be accomplished, say, with a fine sable brush cut short so the hairs are somewhat stiff, then gently working it over the surface a very small area at a time with a conservator's solution of 50-50 ethanol-amyl acetate?? I particularly ask this question because I have recently worked through a collection of swords in a Government museum. The 21 swords ranged from abysmally worthless to a fine katana by Yamashiro Kunikiyo. They were all in a depressingly neglected state and covered in the wax so beloved of old-age "conservators" (yes, even the lacquer, tosogu and tsukaito...). My white gloves were nearly black after three days... Tsuba were mising, fuchigashira likewise in some instances, and menuki taken out of the binding. Some of these swords have been "around" in various Government departments for well over a hundred years, no one seemingly wanting to "take them on" seriously. My particular concern vis-a-vis this thread is a very nice wakizashi with malachite inlays in a black lacquered saya, the black ground also having finely crushed malachite through it. The tosogu are unsigned shakudo nanako that look very nice, but have that slight lack of elegance that suggests to me either very late Edo or Meiji workmanship. I have attached a couple of pictures that well illustrate the condition. The present curator is serious about bringing some long-needed attention to this collection, but suffers from that "ethnology" condition that appears to want everything left in its original "as found" condition. I understand this from a general ethnology perspective, but we all know Nihonto is different. This museum also has a "science-based" restoration laboratory. I would certainly appreciate opinions on this situation, both for Clive's tsuba and "my" museum's wakizashi. Best regards, Barry Thomas aka BaZZa.

Dear Ron, Thanks very much indeed for your most valuable comments. Having been around guns and swords for 45 years I have seen some savage abominations wrought on both, so when I got my 3 Tanegashima in quite good condition I did not want to do anything I did not know about that might compromise their condition and originality for future generations. I am grateful for your wisdom and advice. Best regards, BaZZa.

Ron and all, I would hesitate to oil the wood under the barrel where it beds. My three Kunitomo guns have clearly never been oiled under the barrel, while the stock outsides have been clear lacquered. The wood under the bbl is white and untouched. Two of mine are signed and I would never oil these for fear of the ink running. Could we have more discussion on this before recommending oiling this "under wood"???? The guns are 200 years old and have scarcely suffered any warping or cracking to the wood, so I even hesitate to oil the outside of the stocks, which are in excellent condition. Regards, BaZZa.

Of those few yari I have seen with suriage nakago all have been cut to mount in sword koshirae, mostly tanto. This was to make a cheap weapon for stabbing, as has been noted. Recently I looked through a collection of 20 swords in a museum. The first sword I picked up for examination was an itomaki tachi koshirae. I could see it was unusual because the saya was straight. A puzzle. However, the moment I picked it up I knew it was "something else" as it was as heavy as lead! On drawing the blade I was surprised to see a HUGE ryoshinogi yari with a suriage nakago. The tachi koshirae was nothing of note, so I'm surmising that the yari was remounted to sell as a Meiji tourist piece. The mekugiana is intact and the suriage is just below the last character of the mei - ?ZEN KUNI JU FUJIWARA SUKEFUSA. BTW, the first character of the mei is so faint I couldn't read it at the time. Does anybody (or Nobody?? hahahahaha - the joke has been made before. Sorry) know the smith at all?? It is interesting to see that the nakago jiri has been nicely rounded instead of being cut straight across as swords usually are. Regards, BaZZa. EDIT: Photography hint. When I'm "out and about" I've found it very useful to place tangs left to right and photograph with a flash. I take numerous shots at slightly different angles to make sure I don't get flare from the flash that washes out the image. Note I also rotate and crop the image. Postings on NMB could do with a lot more cropping...

As one who has a number of gendaito this has been a most interesting thread. I hesitate to ask, but does anyone think the tsuka on Keith's sword has been recently rebound??? It doesn't look "quite right" to me... Regards, BaZZa.