Horii Toshihide NTHK-NPO Yushu Papers

[pcfarrar]

A friend asked if I could post this Horii Toshihide tanto (dated 1937) for him as he thought gendaito collectors here might find it interesting.

 

He purchased the tanto from Bill Tagg of Liverpool militaria in an old shirasaya with the blade quite stained. It was sent to Japan for polish/shinsa using Paul Martin's restoration service.

 

It recently passed shinsa with the NTHK-NPO at Yushu level. (see photos). I'm not sure how many gendaito or work by Toshihide have received Yushu level from the NTHK-NPO but I think this is a good achievement!

 

He also asked me to mention that Paul Martin's restoration service has been excellent from start to finish.

[seattle1]

Hello"

Yushu papers? Other side of the origami please.

Arnold F.

[cabowen]

I think he is correct as I recall hearing this blade was awarded Yushu. Not the first gendaito to received them- there have been 3 or 4 others I am aware of, and maybe a few more....

[Soshin]

Hi Peter F.,

 

Nice tanto. Can you please post full length photos if you can. Thank you.

[Eric H]

Yushu papered by NTHK is equal to Juyo Token by NBTHK. NTHK has established a system of appraisal by awarding points to the specific blade. Congratulations to your friend for this superior quality tanto....detailed pics would be much appreciated...btw shouldn‘t there be a „yushu saku“ stamp on the origami?

 

Eric

[pcfarrar]

It definitely received Yushu papers it will be in the journal the NTHK-NPO publish.

 

Was able to grab a few photos tonight but was rushed so apologise for the quality.

 

There is quite a lot of nie in the boshi, forming, 'OKINA-NO-HIGE'(old man's

beard).

[Soshin]

Hi Peter F.,

 

Very nice.:D Thanks for posting.

[cabowen]

Beautiful! Thanks for sharing.....

[w.y.chan]

Looks like a finely forged tanto. I think it is the same blade Billy told me about years ago, amazing how a polish can bring it to life.

No doubt Billy will go on about it now.

If it was submitted to NBTHK I wonder what paper it will get? Other than Gassan Sadakatsu and Sadamitsu I cant recall an early Showa or WW2 era blade getting Tokubetsu Hozon.

 

Wah

[pcfarrar]

From the owner:

 

"Hope this photograph of the papers satisfies the disbelievers out there!"

[cabowen]

...amazing how a polish can bring it to life.

 

Indeed! If more WWII era blades were properly polished I think there would be a lot of surprises.

 

I recently bought a small Horii special order tanto quite similar to this one in old polish. Seeing this makes me want to send it out for polish!

[Eric H]

Thanks for the pics on this very fine tanto, there are not many yushu gendaito I believe.

Earlier papers had a red stamp „yushu saku“ and nowadays it‘s written on the origami.

 

Eric

[Soshin]

Hi Everyone,

 

To the best of my knowledge. If the NBTHK thinks the swordsmith or fittings maker is still alive they will not paper any Nihonto or Tosogu made by them. The NTHK will not paper a Nihonto or Tosogu if they think it is gendai. (My own personal experience with the NTHK and NBTHK.) I can't agree more with the Yushu papered issued by NTHK-NPO this is a great tanto! :D

[zentsuji2]

Trust Billy to have this Peter,I miss his shop,and banter.

Lovely blade,it let's a beginner like myself see the importance of good polish, and also how competent the ww2 smiths really were.

Thanks for posting.

 

 

Regards. Ian bellis

[seattle1]

Hello:

Some years ago, when the NTHK was solely under the authority of Yoshikawa Koen sensei, a Yushusaku stamp with a single border, was given to a blade rating 85-89 points, and with a double border the value range was 90-94. Perhaps the NTHK, NPO follows the same convention of a stamp elsewhere on the paper.

David's comment about the NTHK not awarding papers to gendai can be confusing, as I assume he extends the term "gendai" to include current contemporary works. Both current versions of the NTHK give papers to WWII era gendaito as I have received them from both Yoshikawa Koen and Miyano sensei. Usually things made after WWII are referred to as shinsakuto, if a sword.

Arnold F.

[Soshin]

Hi Everyone,

 

Yes I wasn't making the distinction between Meiji Period to WW2 and modern works. I had one shinsaku tsuba papered by the NTHK-NPO and other tsuba not papered by the NTHK because it was shinsaku. I also had one fail NBTHK because it was modern likely post WW2. Overall a very confusioning experiment.

[Darcy]

I support Arnold's comment there, I usually reserve gendai for a vague period centered on WWII. Shinsakuto for modern made stuff.

 

I think the difference is primarily that during the gendai era swords were being made for use again after retirement from the samurai era. After the gendai era ends, they are made primarily for art purposes. End of gendai is the end of the sword as a tool. Shinsakuto focuses on art, recovery of lost techniques, and refinement, placing items into the hands of people who tend to have no intention to ever use the blade but only to appreciate it.

 

About papering, this is a very nice tanto and it's interesting that it achieved such a high paper. The NBTHK will absolutely not give Juyo papers to gendai era blades (yet). So for now this kind of breaks the rough equivalency between papering levels and shows a philosophical disagreement.

 

I would tend to support that "gendai deserve love too" and there is no reason to say that a blade from this period cannot be a masterpiece, especially as we do need to judge works relative to their era. We don't look at paintings and say because they were painted in the 1930s they are of no consequence. As well gendai blades represent an important return after hundreds of years of relative peace, to the blade as a combat weapon and though the results of this were probably closest in time to the results of the blah-end of Muromachi, there were still the significant standouts and equivalents to smiths like Yosozaemon Sukesada who continued to produce artwork at a very high level in spite of the mass production and general low level technique around them.

 

The NBTHK probably 10 years ago might give this tanto Tokubetsu Hozon. Today I think it would receive Hozon only.

 

Again, there is a philosophical disconnect between how these organizations are interpreting these papers and their levels. As well in the west there are ongoing misconceptions about what Hozon and Tokubetsu Hozon and Juyo and Tokubetsu Juyo really mean. It is an ongoing brain-asplode event for westerners that some Tokubetsu Hozon blades with small chances of going Juyo might cost 4x or 8x the cost of a Juyo blade.

 

Bob Hughes had a good comment to me about this, he said it is the "ladder concept" or something to the same effect. I think a ladder describes it very well, there are rungs and there are areas between the rungs.

 

In the average western collector's eyes then there is a distinct step up from Hozon to Tokubetsu Hozon, and so forth. The reality is that there is a lot of overlap, because criteria change over time and the requirements for these levels are all relative to their eras. Furthermore the swords are made to navigate this course under successive submissions and then halfway through as a competition so blades that "deserve higher" are routinely refused until some arbitrary time in the future. This makes for a breaking of the equivalence between two works of the same smith at the same level of paper. And this is confusing to the market when one of these might be triple the price of the other. "But they are both Tokubetsu Hozon, same length, same smith... wtf!" So the relative pricing and importance is something left to the potential owner to contend with, which means education and skill coming into play.

 

This particular Yushu paper indicates that the NTHK-NPO would seem to be more concentrated on the requirements for achieving this being relative to the smith and with a requirement of absolute skill of the smith meeting high conditions. So with this paper in hand, you can look at this work and say the judges state that this is a masterpiece of this smith and in general it is also an excellent sword. (If you just gave a Yushu paper to anyone's masterpiece, then I could go make my first sword tomorrow and it being my only work would qualify as my masterpiece and maybe I could get it... so obviously there is an absolute criteria at play for quality as well as the relative one).

 

Meanwhile there is still some understanding that due to the time period involved, it is very hard for smiths to achieve at this level at all. But there is no blanket ruling out bias that you will get with the NBTHK paper, and that blanket ruling out is what makes people have to swim on their own at some points. That is you just won't see a Juyo Sadakatsu (as far as I know, it is a unicorn for now), and some people might then get the wrong idea that Sadakatsu can't produce a masterpiece or that he is inferior to all smiths of all periods who come before him who can get to Juyo. Why say Gassan Sadakazu is acceptable for consideration but Gassan Sadakatsu is not?

 

So this whole idea of levels becomes very difficult to process in general on an intuitive basis. Because it is architected as levels we expect it to behave as levels, giving some kind of equivalency between items who have gotten papers at the same level, and we expect then that the price and the market follows these levels... as such you get the wrong idea floating around that "Hozon should cost 0-X, Tokubetsu Hozon, X-Y, Juyo Y-Z and Tokubetsu Juyo Z+" ... but it breaks because really it is a blend between absolute and relative scales of importance. Furthermore the price of a sword fluctuates on desirability of a smith, and a particular work due to size, beauty, condition and importance and marketable desirability is not the end goal of the rating of the paper.

 

So overall, very interesting and useful for thinking about the bigger picture. And congratulations on your acquisition and the achievement of this level of paper for your item, it is significant.

[cabowen]

Once we get past the end of the Edo era, which defines the terminus of the Shinshinto period as well, things are a bit too new and fluid yet to have gelled into a commonly accepted definition.

 

While perhaps yet to become mainstream, I have seen swords made from the end of the Edo era up until perhaps the end of WWII called "kindai-to" 近代刀. Those made after the war, "gendai-to" 現代刀, and those made recently, "shinsaku-to"　新作刀. While there is no length of time defined before a "shinsaku-to" becomes a "gendai-to", "shinsaku-to" is usually used in reference to a very recently made sword.

 

While most use "gendai-to" rather generically in reference to anything made after 1867, I agree and think there is sufficient difference in what has been made post war to differentiate what came after the war from what came both during and before. The use of "kindai-to" in reference to those swords made from 1867-1945 seems quite appropriate in that context; I have heard the term used in this way in Japan but most still just call everything "gendai". In time, I think this usage will most likely become widespread.

 

As for papers, no doubt there are philosophical differences between shinsa organizations, and being run by different people at different times, there are even differences within these groups as well through time. One can go crazy trying to analyze it all and make sense of it as there really seems to be no rhyme or reason to much of it- and that won't change as long as there is little to no explanation given by the NBTHK. Wouldn't it would be a great service to the Western sword community if the NBTHK branches were to sit down with their main office from time to time and discuss these kinds of issues, then sharing what is behind the curtain with the community?

 

Being a director of the NTHK-NPO, I have tried to make the shinsa process as they run it more transparent. I have stated here that they have no issue with recognizing quality regardless of period. This tanto is proof that they do not "age discriminate". Why the NBTHK continues to do so, I have no idea. At some point, without doubt, they too will paper top quality blades from this modern era higher and as I have said many times, there will someday be blades made during the Showa era recognized as Juto. It is inevitable. Will I live to see it? Probably not. Not something I will lose any sleep over as at this point I feel pretty secure in my estimation of quality when it comes to buying swords. I suppose there are financial incentives to having a sword papered at a Yushu or Juyo level and perhaps for some that is motivation in and of itself.

 

As has been said over and over again, it behooves all collectors to learn to differentiate the good from the bad, the great from the good. The closer one gets to this level, the further one can distance one's self from reliance on the shifting sands of shinsa to help one determine quality. Those most reliant on shinsa are those who look at their swords as an investment and the dealers trying to sell one. I can understand the importance of papers to both parties, especially when it comes to big ticket items. I never believed in papering modern swords as there was never a compelling reason in my mind. Recent events have shown that fake kin/gendai-to are becoming sufficient in number to perhaps justify submission for at least certain types of them going forward.

 

While it would make life so much easier for all if papers made swords into commodities with distinct prices at different levels, the uniqueness of each individual sword makes this impossible. There are many reasons a Hozon papered blade can sell for more than a Tokubetsu Hozon papered blade, or why a TH blade can sell for more than Juto. It should become clear to all that papers are not an absolute indicator for pricing and that ultimately, that exercise always comes back to the case by case evaluation best facilitated by experience and knowledge. Papers are best looked at solely as a vetting tool when buying- if a sword has papers, it means it is genuine and of a certain quality- a foot in the door so to speak. It is really impossible to generalize much more than that...

[pcfarrar]

Anyone have any thoughts on the reasons why this tanto was made? For a military man, private individual, wedding gift etc?

[cabowen]

Hard to say....The one I bought recently has a women's name on it so it pretty easy to tell why it was made. This one, maybe a collector or maybe a wedding...

[Soshin]

Hi Peter F.,

 

Did it ever have a koshirae? Was it always in a shira-saya?

[pcfarrar]

Did it ever have a koshirae? Was it always in a shira-saya?

 

No it was in an old shirasaya which looked contemporary to the manufacture of the tanto.