Mark

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small writing is the blade length

wow! thanks. certainly educational. I appreciate all the input. No wonder I was in the dark. thanks to all

for Pete here is the other side, I read it as Shoshin Kobuse Kitae Masafusa saku, glad it was not something simple. I appreciate the help

I have a katana signed by Masafusa, I am having trouble with the 2 lines on the other side. Any help appreciated since the picture was flipped I removed it from here to sale bent necks. I will add the other side in a few minutes, I don't think it has anything to do with the other side but happy to add it.

Craig I would pass. Looks to me that it is signed Kanenaga so any research on Kanemitsu does not help with this. For $1700 you can get a nice sword so I would take some time and learn a little so you can make a wise choice

Danny Massey has some info on his site http://www.nihontocraft.com/Mito_Sukemitsu_Katana.html

I can see where it may have had Hiromitsu lacquer that has worn away. The shape and construction gives the impression of latter Yamato work

post some pictures, we will take a look and tell you what we can

it appears to be signed katana-mei so unless a school that signed that way in Nambokucho I would think it is Muromachi. from the shape maybe Sue-koto to Keicho period

Stephen not sure if I clearly understand what eBay is charging you for but I know they charge the final value fee on the amount the buyer pays you for shipping cost. I think they did that because some people tried to beat their fees buy selling items for a low amount but charge huge shipping cost to save on fees (EX sell a sword for $100 but charge $500 for shipping so buyer pays $600 but seller only paid fees on $100), so since a few were trying to game the system they changed it for all of us

orphan fuchi, signed Tsunenao seems a good match for the reference $100 if anyone needs it, or happy to buy a matching kashira. It looks better in hand, the flash and super close up were not kind.

it is a wood base covered with same' of the tanned skin of a giant ray, they use the shin from the belly. Japan is an island so they have an abundance of marine life so use ray skin sort of like we use leather as we have cattle

you are right, it is army not navy. these were made from early 1900's till mid 1930's. hard to say when, my guess is later. I think $500-800 range in the condition

I think correct except my translation differs in the name and exact year Tadamitsu and I think 1488

James Stephen listed a number of links, if you google the translation you will find a lot on him. If you stick with this you will buy some books that have a lot of information

Stephen I did not see your post, we were typing at the same time. I figure so many people just ask without trying and James had actually given it a shot so I would help him out. at least he can do some research and learn from that

James glad you gave it a try, good job. Bungo (no) Kami Minamoto Masayasu you might try looking him up and if you do not find information yourself let me know and I will tell you more but I do not want to stop you learning yourself

you should check the previous posts. I think there is a lot of information and comments. Be careful when considering who you use. It is wise to ask here. Ask some on this board if they have used this service.

all the ones I have had are normal counter clockwise to remove --- not to say yours might be different but I have had dozens

Jean I understand that in certain years there were a lot of swords that passed Juyo, others there were few that passed. The standards seem to change. At the beginning it was hard to pass, then in the late 70's -1980's-90's there were a lot that passed each year, then in recent years it has tightened up again and fewer pass. If you know that then it makes sense that a blade that passed when it was standards were "loose" might not pass now. So if I see a sword for sale that passed in a year when things were "tight" I would not give it a second thought, but if it passed in a year when there were a lot of swords passed then I would give the sword a second look and pay more attention to the sword understanding that there were great swords that passed that year but maybe some lower quality ones made it as well. The number that passed each year is in the Juyo Zufu for that year so if you have a set of the zufu, or access to them, you can make a quick list of the number that passed each year. I do not have such a list but would like to have the numbers if anyone has it. I just keep in mine the dates and figure it that way. If you can tell the quality of a sword then it is not so important, but if you are a dealer, or are unsure then some background helps. I figure great swords make it each year, so there are great swords in each group, it just varies how many lesser swords made it as well. The old adage -- "buy the sword not the paper" applies

paper looks fine to me, no signs it is fake.

Danny's website has a nice section that breaks down the papers and what they say, see the image for TH paper below Hozon, he has it all translated http://www.nihontocraft.com/japanese_sw ... se_sword_4 does that help?

if you want the best reference for Yasutsugu Grey's wesite says he ca get you a copy of the Taikan http://www.japaneseswordbooksandtsuba.c ... an-dr-sato

the first generation (seems that is who you are asking about) is very famous. made many great blades that are very valuable. very high ranking (depending on source) many people collect him, so sought after I have seen $10,000 to 50,000 but I am sure there are higher and lower there is a lot of info on him online as he is famous