Conway

Recently picked up this Type 19. Thought I would post because it has the "W" in a place I have not seen yet (and bordered too). Conway

Garrett, Have you searched the Swordsmith Index on the Nihonto Club site? @uwe mentioned a smith during the Keiō era whose Mei reads 備州長船住横山祐久作. https://nihontoclub.com/view/smiths/meisearch?page=12&type=All&mei_op=starts&mei=備州長 Conway

Here is the link from eBay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/115766136876?hash=item1af433102c%3Ag%3AhWIAAOSwr4FkNJtg&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAA4AHSX1qK3PjxhgGCKF2Cv5cMnXj%2Fqz3ok9o4mjVBhqESEJxCJngrOBEfeDY%2BCPlFO1wd%2FLDqrrFZr9b59G8pedy3YF8JnSHb1IGqEhO8H7zpRsxRSn9f0K7Gi%2BQtD1R92ftiMKZS92ahyOG%2BIqEdzLOYcNN65HCADQyUD0vL7in9Hb%2FtEzpu0fWjS2u1qf5dclr%2FwvHqd1pPDnGTFCjl4fo%2BOD1b3CLR24sar1k%2BN6q4UjZPz6i3wfIUeNpNSIsozDOD9ePIr4OwgVZr6xZf9Cg9YHW32OnjUMzDU%2FtYyfjB|tkp%3ABk9SR8jho8ryYQ&nma=true&si=PyW4jKex2dfJuouxgkaqKW5Tp%2Fk%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557 Conway

The last character is probably just the sword inspector's name. Glad the link was useful. In the link, did you see the pictures of the tang to satisfy your curiosity? If the sword was dated it would be just above the other stamps. Conway

Hello Grady, Your sword looks fine from the photos you posted. The scabbard originally would have been blackened steel. Maybe take a better picture of the stampings on outside of the bowl so someone can tell you if it is dated. There are two variants of this sword. They look similar but are of different lengths. Not advisable to disassemble the handle to view the tang. Nothing of importance to see as it is a machine-made blade. It might not go back together nicely either. See the below link for more information. Conway http://ohmura-study.net/962.html

Found this sword previously for sale on IMA. https://www.ima-usa.com/products/original-wwii-Japanese-army-officer-katana-samurai-sword-late-war?variant=26171058309 And Matt, the poor placement of the tang hole was the first thing I noticed when I had the sword in hand. I learned an important lesson and won't roll the dice again on any possible crude late war/island swords. Conway

I am still not convinced this was not made in a modern day Chinese workshop right next to the Type 95s... Conway

Thomas, Very interesting find. There are quite a few similarities. Too bad there were no pictures of the blade or nakago. I will keep looking for other examples like these. I saw in the referenced post that late war swords were sometimes machine made. I wonder if this would explain the lack of a temper line on the sword I posted... Conway

Thomas, Those two pictures are very interesting. The amount of uncertainty in the collecting world definitely makes the hobby exciting. You start to realize how each item is a small piece in solving a much larger puzzle. I like reading all the differing opinions on these swords too. I am glad the post spawned further discussion on this topic. Conway

Here is a photo of the leather scabbard. It looks fairly identical to the one in the other post regarding @AlphaRaider's sword. Note the orange thread which was used to sew the leather together. That is another oddity that stuck out to me when I first had the sword in hand.

Here is another picture of the handle.

With great difficulty, I was able to remove the habaki. No markings found. Does the picture provide any further indication of what this sword might be (Chinese fake or some other non-Japanese made period sword)? There was a blue/green gunk under the habaki.

It has an unmarked blade.

Thomas, I have read through the above thread in regard to the cross guard on the sword in my other post. As luck would have it, I have another sword with the exact same one. See below. I will post more pictures.

The collar is also intended for a sword that had the blade release mechanism. Not sure if it was common to piece swords together, but I assume that is not a good sign.

The little white insert is actually metal.

Appreciate the replies Bruce and Brian. I was hoping the blade tip would show in the pictures. Here are the fittings that came with it.