Namiwakiru

Amazing, I think you might be on to something there! Yes, when I first got a hands on I was instantly sceptical, as the “sword guy” of my circle I’ve had the displeasure of being shown almost every flea market wall hanger, knock off eBay sword, cheap anime katana and holiday tourist blade by friends and family over the years. What caught my attention and got me researching though is the blade seemed far more legitimate than everything else surrounding them, more akin to the blades I use now rather than the ones I recommend to go in the bin. (The Tsuba stood out also) It fits the location of Yasuura too, which seemed to have a naval presence presence during the war, and judging from one of their museums, a steel working infrastructure. Extremely fascinating! Thank you very much for taking the time to throw some knowledge my way, it’s greatly appreciated. PS: Yes it’s quite an old property that’s been in the family for years, what it lacks in legendary lost swords it certainly makes up for in pre and post war automotive engineering haha!

2nd photo of Tsuba. Terrible condition on the underside. Seppa seem odd to me and there appears to be evidence of glue.

1st photo of the Tsuba. Tsuba is slightly more interesting. Can slightly make out a couple of Gunbai like fans in the bottom left and what looks like a wave pattern in the top left.

The Ashi/Obi-tori is the same as the Kabuto-gane.

The Kabuto-gane seems rather cheap and forcibly made to fit the plain handle.

Full shot: This was the picture I was sent originally. As you can see it throws up some red flags with a plain wood Tsuba and painted Saya. It’s missing the Semigane, Ishizuke, Koiguchi (please excuse me if I got those wrong) but judging from the other fittings and a lack of identifying markers I fear they might not have given much.

Thank you, Thomas. Yasuura Katana was the translation I had arrived at too but with little else to go on my research ended there quite quickly. To be honest the mount and fittings are extremely worrying. My first thought upon seeing it was that it’s a knockoff but as it’s not a sale and a request from family I’m doing a bit of due diligence. I will post some images to the thread.

Hi John. I was thinking that might be the case. There is a Wikipedia entry about a town named Yasuura in Hiroshima that was merged into Kure in 2005. I couldn't find much historical reference but it appears to be a township in a small bay nestled within the islands between Honshu and Shikoku. I didn’t consider shrines so thank you for that.

Greetings. Long time lurker and first time poster here. I was hoping somebody might have some insight on a signature. My partners extended family are cleaning the family property and in one of the old sheds is a Katana their father reportedly brought back from the cleanup in Nagasaki. I was asked to have a look because I have an interest in such weapons however my expertise is mainly in modern practical blades. (I wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity though) It’s in terrible condition so I didn’t want to mess with the tang too much but these 3 characters appear to be the only identifying marks visible. I believe the characters are: 安浦刀 I recognise the third character as “sword” which I found odd. After some research I was able to find the name or location of “Yasuura” for the first two characters but my Japanese is extremely rusty. Thank you for your time.