Rayhan

Man your response to Brano is condescending on the "language barrier" ? Totally unnecessary. And "ASSumed" is also unnecessary What's up @Hokke have i done something to you in person?

To be honest I have not intended or taken any offence to anyone here. Gents, we've all come through some tough times these past few years, and whether we like it or not or like each other or not we came through them as a community of Nihonto collectors. I know I do bring up stuff that is a bit of a tough subject now and then but I mean well and my general demeanor is not everyone's cup of tea or coffee but a discussion with Nihonto guys is still better than the office for me, even if they don't agree. Let's keep it chill as we can.

Any opportunity to meet a fellow collector is welcome, all up to Piers

Its more of a ship really

Only in a communist court Piers...read the whole thread

@Hokke it must be really hot in Florida man, grab a cocktail or something

Maybe i will just avoid your question, 1 because the answer is obvious (so makes you look very intelligent, yes sarcasm) and 2 you're in a combative mood as usual and im just chillin'

Oh on the contrary!!! Let me reiterate my current collection is 50% Mumei, but I keep to the rule of Heian, Kamakura and Nanbokucho only Mumei. I do like it when there is a direct attribution because it forces us to look at why that name was given and hunt for clues in the steel, but it makes it hard unless you've seen many zaimei from the same smith and can piece it all together. You might even say, wait that's not right, it just keeps the puzzle going. I appreciate more when a sword is placed at its artisans group, eg, ichimonji or Aoe or Hosho etc. This allows for very quick identification of key traits, which leads to years of enjoyment trying to figure out who it was within ichimonji for example that made the sword. But, you can never be sure, which is also charming and frustrating. Mumei are cheaper in Muromachi on to shinshinto for that reason and the older mumei are so few anyway that sometimes we just have no choice. Hosho for example, you get to see or own Hosho you don't um and ah or hmmm, you buy it straight away. They are that rare and katana or tachi are all mumei on the market. No choice. Unless Tanobe sensei gives his attributions then I am very eager to own that. But Muromachi onwards you have so many zaimei examples available it makes no sense to try and learn from mumei. You will still see the basics but getting to the who is not possible because the Muromachi was when mass produced blades were around and Bizen smiths only put their names on the best blades or signed with a very arbitrary general mei and sent the blade out the door. Edo is a time of artistic expression and that means smiths were doing the variety thing so you might have one smith doing a multitude of traditions. Not a good idea to learn from impressionism, that's more for the beauty. Koto was for the warrior. Edo was for peace time.

Ok so I am going to ask you to please explain how you came to choose this as your first? It spoke to me is not an answer I would expect at Naoe Shizu because good Naoe Shizu speaks to most people in some way. But having your story would be a great addition to this sort of outcome. I do not know how healthy the measurments are but I like the sword, it has wonderful Sugata and even in this polish it has a lot to say! So congratulations on a first buy, Sugoi!.

This is a noble path and no doubt a Mumei Kiyomaro is a very nice puzzle, but you can never really solve the puzzle of any Mumei, because it is Mumei. This is me saying that and I have 50% Mumei swords in my collection at the moment.

Was it papered? Good condition? Naoe Shizu is a very nice first! Mind sharing any pictures, I love Shizu in general and used to have Naoe Shizu, wonderful swords.

Books are essential, don't be fooled into thinking otherwise. So what did you get as your first?

And a catchy title too

Hey @Matsunoki , look at this point I need to just concede that you feel my advice and my experience has no standing in your orbit so let us just agree to disagree, handshake and move on. but thank you for the opposing opinion because that is so important to make a measured discussion. @Rivkin it is really unfair for you to bait me like that because you know my feeling on the subject of Mumei in certain eras. I have been put to sword by so many people on the NMB for that view and it's just my personal view. But since you asked... "And if someone says - ok, without saving at 5-10k you actually can buy a first tier shinshinto blade, but mumei, I guess you'll take a significant issue with that. What price range to strive for, when, how, is directly linked to how we perceive the financial value versus art versus collectible." In order for one to have a perception of financial value of anything they will need to have some knowledge and apply variables to that item in order to form an educated opinion, analysis is happening as soon as we start looking at an item of "value". You cannot do that if you have no educational background on the subject and it is at that moment that emotion takes over. The mind is so confused that the heart takes control and before we know it the item we knew nothing about is now in our collections. Love is like that, it is human nature. Whilst the heart is taking over there is a dealers description of the item that adds to the emotional context and then it is really game over. About your comment on Shinshinto Mumei blades, I have issue with this because you are making a blanket statement. In order to validate such a statement you must have seen all of the Mumei Shinshinto blades and compared them to all of the Zaimei Shinshinto blades and after about 5 decades of that comparison of 10's of thousands of swords in the shinshinto category to have concluded that, THIS Mumei sword is better than all the others...Have you really done this? *disclaimer, the following statement is just my opinion and mine alone, I am not imposing this personal rule on anyone else, put your swords away. When is Mumei ok: When it is a Heian, Kamakura, Nambokucho period sword. When is Mumei not ok: When it is Muromachi, Shinto, Shinshinto, Gendaito, Modern. (exception is if it is a faithful Utsushi of an already mumei blade done by a later artisan). Just because the Mumei Shinshinto is less expensive (and it is basically obvious why it is so cheap, it is mumei and the person selling it even respects that it cannot command a high price) does not make it a good item to add to a collection and you will 100% lose money reselling it after you have studied it. But what will you study on the Mumei Shinshinto? You will study Sugata, Hataraki, Jigane and, etc. Will you really know that this is 100% Hosokawa Masayoshi work and as he intended the work to be? No you will not, you will basically see elements that you could study in any well made Zaimei Gendaito or Modern sword that can also be bought for the price of a Mumei "top tier" Shinshinto sword. If I want to study Shinshinto Suketaka then I should hold out for signed examples to really see that this was Suketakas intention on Torandba hamon. As opposed to the Mumei one that might or might not be Suketaka but it is easier to convince myself that it is Suketaka because it is Mumei and no one can argue otherwise. Mumei can also never be Gimei. "For me, second generation Sukesada is more talented and interesting smith than Kagemitsu. Buying it instead of saving up for signed Kagemitsu daito - super. Mumei Kiyomaro at 15k usd or mumei Naotane at 6 can be vastly more interesting, educational and enjoyable blades than 80% of Juyo at 30-60. Its a Rembrandt at 15k... with significant collectible-vise detriments." You have chosen the field well here because when we look at Zaimei Kiyomaro or Zaimei Naotane they are in the astronomical region of pricing. Juyo Kiyomaro or even THozon Kiyomaro can be in the 60K - 250K USD range. So yes then if you get NBTHK Mumei Kiyomaro and you want to see his schools production then you may be better off at the 15K range, will you sell it for 15K, no, but will you sell the Juyo Kiyomaro at the price you paid or more, yep, 100% you will, it takes time but you will. You will never really know your mumei was Kiyomaro, or his intention but it will no doubt be a nice study item. It will not be a Rembrandt.

@Brian I am sorry to hear you are not well, keep strong and wishing you swift recovery ahead. Remember you said you need to get better so we can finally meet in Japan in the next few years so get better soon. How else will you put a face to the PIA on your NMB? Get well soon!

Well, if you know what you are buying i'm not sure that can be possible? I mean really talking to people, getting opinions from trusted fellow collectors and education, I have seen and heard so many success stories, personal wins. Isn't that what you see in Juyo sessions, few dozen successful wins, THozon many hundred of successful wins, every year. It happens constantly just navigating that curve is a learning process.

It is a lot of money for anyone. But there are time factors involved as Hoshi said, how fast we get there in learning and budget are not parallel roads. @Hoshi thank you for your post, it was a nostalgic reminder. I am advising to save and learn but if you look at the current market and what you can get at 8K to 10K it is a very nice starting pool. And it depends on what you go for, but i am speaking of the whole package and at this range it is achievable and you can have something to spend years discovering without andy road blocks. This is also a huge consideration. I would want them to be items sold with fondness and memory, not a burden to sell in my twilight years or inherited burdens. Fact is for your successors the swords came to them at zero, they are not thinking how much is the recovery, they sell your 10K sword for close to 10K in their minds they were left a fortune, they have no idea the road it went through to get to you, unless they too have the nihonto bug and were along for the journey. Yes, Brano also finds most of my blades boring lol as he told me twice now

Investing? Where, the only mention of Investing was Investing time. And the fact you call it old iron, why are you here again?

Im not defining anything by me, at all, it how you see my comments and deeply something is saying he is telling me what to do. Nope im telling you how it is as someone who has been through this before. I have no idea how long you've been collecting but how you interpret a collectors lessons is up to you entirely. Others may interpret it differently.

The post is on saving to and learning about nihonto before making educational purchases. What impresses you or me that's a tea and sandwiches conversation we all love to have but isn't what im getting at.

There are no Rembrants for 8k or 10k. Look if you need to pass criticism because someone is urging people, especially new comers to look deeply before making purchases, use a better angle please.

Any item that is sold with the right elements in place is a better buy than any low tier item. Unless you find a unicorn masquerading as a grain of sand, well then good one!

Its how many of us started, we need to start to try to change how this goes as it's a very toxic way of starting in a world where we have amples amount of information. This isn't 20 or 30 years ago. And a few decades ago the learned and experienced were still making good choices so we praise Compton and Davidson and the like, why? Not just because they had good swords but they learned.

Ok please tell me what would anyone say to them. Just because you cannot buy now doesn't mean you will never be able to one day. And if they are less fortunate financially does that mean they cannot go to the same local meetings as me or anyone else, to the same museum and hang in the same community and still see good swords and see what can be defined as quality conditions? Come on. That is a question we all answer for ourselves. You know why, when that educated individual spots a gem and says nothing to anyone and quietly buys the gem for themselves they will be the winners. I'm saying learn and save and learn more and save and then maybe you have 8k and you walk past a gem and buy it for 4k and it goes Tokubetsu hozon after a polish and now you have definitely made up, depending on what you found. If you have 8k and you buy something for 900 because it spoke to you and you then never see that 900 back...you now have 7100 left and that's it. You're literally learning to go backwards. Congratulations.

See i like this direction @Matsunoki. There is absolutely a huge markup. For instance if we buy a house off plan in a swanky neighbourhood and finally pay off the house and it's value drops the developer still made a killing. It can happen with a house in the best district depending on many factors but what is more likely is that having an item with all the factors built in helps. Is the house in good selling condition or does it need work, is the property in a desirable neighbourhood or indeed an up and coming neighbourhood (top end Gendaito), is it fully certified and all relevant paperwork cleared, you can add cherries on top later, as in John Lennon was living in it previously or Ronaldo is just down the road or whatever you want in provenance, and there will be a higher likelihood of the sale being sound after a given period of time as long as the economy is not collapsing around us into hell.