Sukaira

Wow this helps! I would actually say in general it is easily equal and probably above these in quality. Cannot really tell on that last Hitatsura looking one since it is just an oshigata. That is not to say that past Juyo session indicate current Juyo sessions. I would be curious to see what passed in Juyo 65.

I would be interested to see some references to compare against with the full matching signature 備前国往長船五郎友衛門尉清光作 if you have them!

The Kiyomitsu or the Sukesada?

I agree, Sue Bizen has some outstanding pieces. Yeah the Sukesada above is definitely not getting submitted for Juyo, but the Gorōzaemon Kiyomitsu might, depending on the Tanobe sayagaki being done. It is great to have these numbers, and your insights into these things are always super helpful! Interesting also that Sesko's index does not rank Yosōzaemon as Saijo, but it seems Fujishiro does? In any case Gorōzaemon and Yosōzaemon were contemporaries and both the top smiths of their branches (Kiyomitsu and Sukesada respectively) KIYOMITSU (清光), Eishō (永正, 1504-1521), Bizen – “Bishū Osafune Kiyomitsu” (備州長船清光), “Bizen no Kuni-jū Osafune Gorōzaemon no Jō Kiyomitsu” (備前国住長船五郎左衛門尉清光), “Bizen no Kuni-jū Osafune Nomura Gorōzaemon no Jō Kiyomitsu” (備前国住長船野村五郎左衛門尉清光), real name Nomura Gorōzaemon (野村五郎左衛門), son of Katsuhei Kiyomitsu, wazamono, jōjō-saku SUKESADA (祐定), 1st gen. Yosōzaemon, Eishō (永正, 1504-1521), Bizen – “Bizen no Kuni-jū Osafune Yosōzaemon no Jō Sukesada saku” (備前国住長船与三左衛門尉祐定作), “Bizen no Kuni-jū Osafune Hikobei dōshi Yosōzaemon no Jō Sukesada” (備前国住長船彦兵衛同子与三左衛門尉祐定, joint work of Yosōzaemon no Jō Sukesada and his father Hikobei Sukesada), “Bizen no Kuni-jū Osafune Sukesada saku” (備前国住長船祐定作), “Bizen no Kuni-jū Nakagawa Yosōzaemon Sukesada saku” (備前国住中川与三左衛門祐定作), son of the 1st gen. Hikobei Sukesada (彦兵衛祐定), real name Nakagawa Yosōzaemon (中川与三左衛門), he was the best of all Sukesada smiths, he signed the character for “Yo” (与) in the old variant (與) but in a kind of abbreviated manner which reminds of the character (烏), suguha with ko-ashi, gunome-chōji, hitatsura, notare, koshi-no-hiraita midare, long yō, occasionally a long kaeri, ō-wazamono ◎

I agree, if it is gimei, it is still a really a nice blade and the Mei is pretty damn good!

@Jussi Ekholm needs to weigh in on this one - I know from his past threads he supports signed and dated BIzen blades. I will post the Tanobe sayagakai soon, once finished.

Aoi has a Kotetsu for around $390k right now if you have some cash to burn: https://www.aoijapan.com/katana-nagasone-okisato-nyudo-kotetsu-with-saidan-mei45th-nbthk-juyo-token/

Besides what others have said, I personally think the biggest problem is the lack of deep file marks on the nakago with your blade. Every single Sandai I have seen has had very aggressive filing marks. You can see my blade below, but also the one linked above has the same deep filing.

Here are the high resolution links: https://web.archive.org/web/20251104215232/https://www.aoijapan.com/img/sword/2024/24555-2.jpg https://web.archive.org/web/20251104215411/https://www.aoijapan.com/img/sword/2024/24555-3.jpg https://web.archive.org/web/20251104215411/https://www.aoijapan.com/img/sword/2024/24555-4.jpg https://web.archive.org/web/20250907044511/https://www.aoijapan.com/wakizashihizen-kuni-mutsu-no-kami-tadakatsu-tokubetsu-hozon-token/

@2devnul So the jigane will actually be done slightly differently on blades that do not have suguha hamon. For Tadayoshi blades with suguha, the jigane will be done in a very luxurious way, while the blades with hamon like yours will be done in slightly lessor way, for whatever reason. Maybe to let the hamon take more of the attention. I will post some more images of mine, but you should also inspect the images below, which are a Sandai Tadayoshi, with hamon like yours.

Good call! Will Tanobe sensei give an indication in regard to Juyo? I guess I am asking if it is a normal thing that he is alright with giving an opinion on?

@Lewis B I was able to confirm with Seiyudo the Tanobe sayagaki will be done.

I would have imagined that umegane patch was put on much later than the sword was made, but I could be wrong. I have also read pretty much everywhere that umegane is a pretty bad thing since it hides the real flaw and potentially creates a pocket of rust that is not reachable underneath, slowly eating your sword away.

Blade length(Cutting edge): 71.5cm Curve(SORI): 2.5cm Width at the hamachi(Moto-Haba): 3.22cm Thickness at the Moto-Kasane: 0.77cm Wide at the Kissaki(Saki-Haba): 2.55cm Thickness at the Saki-Kasane: 0.60cm

In general I don't think Aoi Art builds cobbled together koshirae for their blades. They deal in volume and I am pretty sure Tsuruta just gets these as-is for the most part as he runs all over the country picking up blades. That being said I almost always ask them to price the blade without koshirae and they usually knock off a few hundred to a few thousand USD depending on the piece. Sometimes its a more recently made or well kept koshirae though, and that is worth keeping.

I wanted to ask if anyone has sent a sword from Japan to the USA recently? The last one that came in for me was months ago and I have seen Aoi Art recently stopped using everything except for a carrier called OCS. Does anyone know what is really going on? Considering keeping my swords in Japan over there for a while until this clears up. Thanks

I think your suggestion for the Tanobe sayagaki is a must do! I will ask them to facilitate this. As for Juyo I am definitely tempted...any thoughts on if I should or even how long the blade would be held for (and out of my hands )?

I would be interested to see which ones if you could post some, that are koto and not mumei o-suriage. Original koshirae if we are talking koto seems questionable to me, but would love to see!

It really just checks all the boxes for me and I had been looking at it for a while but was just searching for something cheaper. I had originally been pretty close to buying this a while back https://www.aoijapan.com/katanamumeiunsigned-attributed-to-den-nakajima-rai-中島来the-17th-juyo-tokenmenukinbthk-hozon-tosogu/ I stopped however once I found out it has a big patch of umegane on the ji (not in the description but look on the image and you can see it, confirmed by Aoi Art). But I really enjoyed the sugata combined with the double hi, not to mention the Rai workmanship of this one. That lead me to look around for other swords with a similar style and I am a huge fan of Bizen (my favorite tradition) history, workmanship and style in general. I had kind of written this one off a bit because of the price, but it really has it all for me. Warring period, Bizen, uroi, utsuri, ubu, long signature, dated, healthy. I find the warring period Bizen swords especially interesting for a few reasons. You do see the Sue-Bizen description thrown around as undesirable by many, but this is mainly because of the overall average of work during this period and the writings about such. It is true, however multiple things can be true at once, and a key thing to remember, as evidenced by the rare masterpieces crafted during this time, is that the smiths did not "forget" how to produce swords with uroi, utsuri, they just weren't doing it for the most part. I am guessing due to time and material constraints combined with needs of the times and other things that have been mentioned in this forum. These were still essentially unbroken traditions and lineages of smiths before the destruction of Osafune. So when I see a Bizen masterpiece come out of that historically important and bloody time, it has always peaked my interest. I have a sword signed only Bishu Osafune Sukesada, but it is one of my favorite pieces in the collection and is overall one of the most interesting and beautiful Bizen pieces I've held, largely due to the (imo) insanely beautiful sashikomi polish on it. It is like the sun behind clouds.

If I ever introduce this sword to anyone, I am stealing that phrase - Great fat sword!

Thanks to everyone who contributed in here. As a final update, after carefully considering everything said here, I have put in an order for a different blade that I have been eyeing for a while. A Gorozaemon-no-jo Kiyomitsu masterpiece, fully signed, dated (1537) and ubu, with all the workmanship and style I was looking for. @Scogg and @Hoshi special thanks for your posts.

This thread 🍿

Is this fire damage?

That is good advice Hoshi. What would you recommend at this price point as alternatives?

You also understand the dilemma here! This sounds much like my inner dialogue looking over both of these blades.