Help w/ a single kanji I can NOT find, please?

[CurtisR]

I'm struggling my way through a couple of mei, and have run into one - and a variation of it - that I can not find with stroke count/radicals under the NMB or other kanji sources that I have...

It is three vertical strokes in a row, and the variation is three vertical strokes w/ each stroke seperated by a "dot" (3 total dots).

 

If someone could point me in the right direction I'd appreciate it very much.

 

Cheers!

 

Curtis R.

[John A Stuart]

川 kawa, river 州 shu, country. Are those the ones? John

[CurtisR]

Those are them (or they" who knows? ) - thanks John!

 

Curtis R.

[Gabriel L]

These are very fundamental kanji for mei, you will see shū especially often on WWII blades (濃州関 Noshū Seki)… not trying to make you feel bad Curtis, it wasn't long ago that I was in the same place, just emphasizing that these should be committed to memory ASAP.

 

I do have to ask though, you are aware of this site, right? Would have taken all of 3 seconds to find the 川 radical in the 3-stroke list, click on it, and see both 川 and 州.

[CurtisR]

No Gabriel, I haven't seen that one but it's in my database now - thanks! And believe me, I didn't want to ask just for that reason - but now I know. I'm much better at speaking than reading. Maybe I should stick to that....

 

Thanks again ~!~

 

Curtis R.

[Gabriel L]

I can't speak, or read a "normal" sentence… all I know is enough about mei to translate standard examples. I want to learn the language proper but I have a whole lot of other things on my plate. :-/

 

I guess the takeaway should be "don't give up" for both of us!

[Jean]

Kanji difficult to find, Curtis?

 

- http://japaneseswordindex.com/kanji/prov.htm

- http://japaneseswordindex.com/kanji/kanji1.htm

- http://www.jssus.org/nkp/kanji_for_provinces.html

- http://www.aoijapan.com/tanto-bishu-osa ... 6-gatsu-hi

- http://www.aoijapan.com/img/sword/2007/07160.jpg

- http://www.aoijapan.com/img/sword/2005/05080-2.jpg

 

 

- your problem, Curtis, is methodology. You must learn first the way smiths engraved their mei, so basically go back to Dr Stein's website (I gave you the link above). The kanji "shu" is found on at least 50% of signed koto blade.

 

In the translation section you will find tenth of example of this kanji.

 

 

This kanji is in all kanji data bases.

[Thierry BERNARD]

or may i suggest using jishop?

as you can see my calligraphy is not the best! :D

[CurtisR]

Thanks Thierry - that looks like a very helpful program!! I'll be finding that one asap . And I think I understand what you're getting at Jean...makes sense. This blade is either edo or showa era, but goof to know that it shows up often on koto very often as well. And also Jean, thanks for the sites and links to examples. In the "Shu" kanji the smith used actual dots (like a punch-mark) vs. a stroke, but I imagine it's just a matter of his style.

 

Regardless, I won't forget the lesson between river & country .

 

Stay well all ~~

 

Curtis R.

[CurtisR]

Just uploaded "Jishop" and it's going to be VERY helpful - thanks again to Thierry BERNARD for pointing me in this direction. I'm going to play w/ it a bit more but will probably also load it onto my phone.

 

Many thanks,

 

Curtis R.

[Brian]

Just bought the plus version for iPhone. Thanks Thierry.

 

Brian

[raven2]

Yes Thierry,

 

Thanks, I just downloaded it also. It seems to work very well.