Your thoughts about this Tanto ?

[kunitaro]

This post is not really for Kantei,

I am trying my new camera with an old blade.

Could you tell me your opinion about this blade or opinion about photos.

 

Hamon is based on O-gunome-midare hamon and Mune-yaki,

Jitetsu with Jinie, strong Nie-utsuri, it looks almost Hitatsura on Ji.

I could not take photo of this Utsuri/Hitatsura on Ji, however, please let me know what you see,

 

Tanto : Hirazukuri, Mitsu-mune,

Nagasa : 26.5cm, Sori : 0.1cm,

Motohaba : 2.8cm,

Motokasane : 0.58cm,

[kunitaro]

other side

[kunitaro]

Mune and Nakago

[Marius]

A good old Masahiro(?)

 

Your pictures, or most of them emphasise the hadori, which looks like a real eye-sore. Tanto seems Nambokucho/Oei, as the sugata, including mitsu-mune seem to indicate.

 

The polish is irritating. Honestly, what is the purpose of such a strong hadori for what seems (almost?) a hitatsura? I am not saying that this must be done in sashikomi, but the polisher should have been more considerate with his finish.

 

Having said that, this might be only your photos...

[cabowen]

The hardness of the hadori struck me as well...

 

Nakago shape looks like Sengo.

 

Nice Soshu den....

[Jean]

Good pictures but the hadori is very strong so it is almost impossible to photography the hataraki. The light to take the whole blade is facing it so you can see it in the blade, instead, it should be oriented sideways. The close up is very good.

[Tcat]

Soshu and looks a bit 'Muramasa'. Hamon looks very white...

[Gabriel L]

As to photos, I think you are on the right track Kunitaro-san, but the biggest issue is that the light is very "hard." This means a direct lamp close to the blade, creating extreme contrast and one bright spot with very dark falloff. It reveals much, but only in a narrow region; everything else becomes under- or over-exposed.

 

I think you could improve the results using lights left and right, angled lower, at a distance. Then you will have even lighting across the blade—no "hot spots" or dark shadows—and still reveal a lot of activity.

 

Overall though these are certainly useful photos which do show some features for kantei etc.

[bubba-san]

Taking everything into consideration , I my opinion its still a beautiful blade . Thank you for letting us see it.

 

. James

[Brian]

I know it is not a kantei, but does seem Muramasa Den.

Can only repeat what others have said. The one closeup does show the ji nie well, and can see it has traces of hitatsura and muneyaki.

The lighting is a bit harsh and makes the hada appear a bit hard too. But still good shots and a nice looking tanto.

 

Brian

[k morita]

Hi,

 

Good camera!

 

But, black(ji,地) and whiet(hadori,刃取り) is too much contrast (#1 and #2 pics).

Is it cause of lighting?

[kunitaro]

Thank you for many reply.

the camera is Sony Cyber-shot RX-100. small digital compact.

I have no knowledge of photo, so, I used flash light with Auto mode.

took a few shot by hand (not tripod)

and cut and resized, adjust (changed) contrast and darkness for showing activities of Jitetsu and showing activities in Ha.

 

The polish is also strong Hadori, it made dark Ji and very white Ha.

It is better to make Ha white to show fine activities IN Ha. and good to make dark to show activities of Ji.

 

So, both combination of photo and polish makes hard picture….I think.

 

I should try with photo light and tripod… also, try to shoot from angle through light like how we look at.

 

To make Ji dark is "Nugui" process,

putting "Jitekko/Kanahada and oils" on Ji to make it dark to show good Hada actives,

and use Hazuya stone to make Ha part white to show fine activities in Ha,

That is the concept of Hadori polish that developed by Honnami Heijuro Nariyoshi at beginning of Meiji.

The sashikomi polish before Meiji period was not using "Nugui", using only Tsushima-to powder (almost Uchiko) on ji and ha, after Jizuya and hazuya stone. so, The Ji was not very dark, and Ha was not very bright.

Modern Sashikomi is different, they use "Nugui" to make Ji dark and use acid to make Ha bright without using Hazuya,,, (If you use finger with stone to make hamon whiter after Nugui, you can not trace complete exact Hamon)

I am not going too deep about process about modern sashikomi polish, because, I don't want to disturb some other polisher's business, or some one has secret…

by photo above, you can see some Muneyaki parts on june. That is Hamon without Hadori(Hazuya stone), so, the Hamon of Sashikomi polish looks like that, It is good to see in hand by bare eyes, but, it doesn't look good on digital photos…

Most of people are studying, buying and selling by photos, so, the photo must be good…also, it is important to know how to see(examine) the sword properly as well.

 

BTW, This Tanto is not very difficult to do Kantei. It is Koto, Soshu-den,

from Nanbokucho soshu to maybe Muramasa (late Mino den ?) for most of us.

 

It is very healthy flawless blade, so it is remained most of original.

Hada is very clean/smooth, ( see the last photo, it is under room light), but,when you see well,it is Mokume-Itame Hada with Jinie, and see strong chikei, near Nume also same.

Near Ha become Masame. (as you see photos)

Hamon is based on O-gunome midare as Hadori, but, above it, there is strong Nie-utsuri all over, some parts become more Hamon than utsuri,

and irregular Muneyaki, a lot of Hataraki (strong Kinsuji) in it).

when you see it good angle of light, it looks like 3D Hitatsura,

 

I will try if I can shoot this.

 

BTW, In the picture of closed up Hamon, Could you see Hataraki of Ashi, Yo, Sunagashi, Kinsuji and Inazuma ?

[Marius]

 

BTW, In the picture of closed up Hamon, Could you see Hataraki of Ashi, Yo, Sunagashi, Kinsuji and Inazuma ?

 

Yes. Very clearly :-)

[CSM101]

Dear Kunitaro,

 

I think, sonner or later you will choose only a DSLR for photos. A pocket camera is not very useful, because you cannot control light. And even when you change contrast and darkness, JPEG is not good enough for that. Only RAW will give a you chance to work with it and bring out hataraki, chikei, kinsuji, etc.

 

Grettings

 

Uwe G.

[kunitaro]

Thank you for many comments and advices.

 

I tired two lights without flash, with tripod.

Maybe you can see some parts of Nie-utsuri on Ji and mune-yaki ?

[Tcat]

A much more natural look! Very nice.

[kunitaro]

and close up.

without adjusting contrast or brightness.

 

What do you think ?

[Marius]

Cool, but out of focus. Even so, much better if one wants to see hataraki :-)

[nihonto1001]

Sa School? Muramasa. The pics are very nice, btw.

[Darcy]

For Muramasa there are inconsistencies. Normally he is not making such thick nie and vivid sungagashi. There are not so many hataraki in the yakiba in Muramasa. It is Muromachi work in Muramasa not Nanbokucho Soshu den or derived. This tanto is more like late Nanbokucho Soshu den then like Muromachi Soshu influenced work from what I see if the jiba.

 

Second problem is that Muramasa's hamon is normally mirror image. If we accept the hadori then there is an offset and mismatch going all the way down the blade including the turnback. This does not rule Muramasa out, it is just inconsistent with 4 out of 5 of his works. Sometimes he made them without mirror hamon.

 

Third is that the nakago jiri is kengyo or seems to be in the bottom right photo, not so clear elsewhere. This is not consistent with Muramasa. But these are almost always added after by someone trying to make a point (pun intended).

 

The Sengo like look of the nakago I think is because the blade is a bit machi okuri so it causes it to taper below the waist suddenly but this is an illusion (I think). Soshu tanto of the late Nanbokucho have often been made with very stubby nakago. Why this is, I don't know, but we see them become machi okuri frequently later as people seem to want to correct for this in later periods with works of Akihiro, Hiromitsu, Hasebe. This makes the nakago fairly straight above the mekugiana where there used to be ha and then seem to suddenly taper in the middle where the natural curve of the nakago was. The result is similar at first glance to Sengo but it is not the same. The type of nakago that makes him famous though is much more clearly formed with a clear concave curvature below the waist. This one appears on the left to have a concave curve below the waist which would be right but on the right side doesn't appear to be the same. One of the two is a trick of the light but it is important to clarify one way or another. So I can't tell for sure in this case, I am hedging my bet but mentioning the illusion caused by these blades.

 

Another side effect is that it makes the already low signed hamon of Hasebe to look extremely low to the point where one may think the tanto is suriage when it is only machi okuri. Hasebe just signed at the very bottom often times.

 

Last issue for me is that there seems to be a lot of nie in the ji forming yubashiri. Muramasa did do some hitatsura but they are infrequent and when I have seen the Muromachi hitatsura it is not the same as Nanbokucho, it is more forced and seems to be a different process.

 

The problem with judgment by nakagojiri is that it is fairly straight forward to put kengyo onto anything or to reshape these without a lot of skill required to do either. Give me a file and I can do it. A friend of mine has a Samonji daito with a clear kengyo on it and in the upper it looks like Go. The blade is o-suriage. When kengyo shows up on an o-suriage blade you need to understand that it is part of someone's kantei. It is very straight forward to add to tanto and sometimes we see a Soshu like blade standing out with one of these in a group of the smith's work that otherwise does not feature them and as a result this is probably something someone added to make it main line Soshu.

 

The blocked out signature leads one to thinking that it might be a Muramasa on there and the nakago shape then makes one fall in line but the rest of the work doesn't really fall in line for Muramasa for me.

 

I think the work in style and quality looks more like the middle to end of the Sa school.

 

If you were wanting to make a mumei Sue Sa blade into a Muramasa it is not so hard to massage the nakago a bit. Even so this nakago in the current state is not a dead ringer for Sengo. The width at the jiri is about 50% of the max width of the nakago. It's closer to 1/3 in the prototype blades. Again there is variation in Muramasa but this one would be an outlier on every front.

 

So I am not convinced.

 

(( 30 minutes later ))

 

I grabbed the first Muramasa and first Sa Yasuyoshi I could find and slapped them on top of this nakago. I had to flip them because the right image is more clear in the blade in question.

 

Scaling is an open question, I tried to match the size of the mekugiana as a reference point then align by machi. The Muramasa tapers more noticably as it is wider at the top and narrower at the bottom than the blade in question (though this may vary per blade, but it gets into what I am talking about in terms of the width of the jiri vs. the mihaba of the blade). The Yasuyoshi I think is much closer in terms of the actual shape and dimensions of the nakago.

 

This is not to say that this is Yasuyoshi and not Muramasa, it does illustrate one of the departures I spoke about though. I just grabbed one from the era and I think the rest of it reminds me of Sa school more than Muramasa. So that is my feeling on this one.

 

 

As a side note, look at the low position of the Yasuyoshi mei. This tanto is not suriage but I think is also a bit machi okuri and is featuring the same original structure and so later period correction as other Soshu style tanto. Stubby nakago and long body. I'm curious why they did this as it seems like it would not be a very good feature. In later periods they seem to agree because we see it altered so often.

 

Do keep in mind that I had to make mirror images of the signature sides of these oshigata to layer on top of the right side image of the nakago of the blade in question.

[cabowen]

 

Second problem is that Muramasa's hamon is normally mirror image.

 

Most commonly seen in the nidai but not as often in the other generations. And even the nidai shows plenty of exceptions...

[Darcy]

 

Second problem is that Muramasa's hamon is normally mirror image.

 

Most commonly seen in the nidai but not as often in the other generations. And even the nidai shows plenty of exceptions...

 

I wrote: "This does not rule Muramasa out, it is just inconsistent with 4 out of 5 of his works. Sometimes he made them without mirror hamon." I owned one of these.

 

The point is that when a blade is falling in the outlying areas on almost each point it starts becoming harder to accept the conclusion. It doesn't rule it out but it makes it harder to accept.

[cabowen]

My point is there is more than one Muramasa and they did not all make 4 out of 5 blades with identical hamon on omote-ura. You say "he" when in fact it is a "them".

 

We should also note that the Sengo ha is more than the three generations of the Muramasa line. There are several other smiths in this group that made work in this style, Masazane and Masashige, to name a few....

[Peter Bleed]

Boy is this a great thread! Thank you all!

Peter

[Darcy]

My point is there is more than one Muramasa and they did not all make 4 out of 5 blades with identical hamon on omote-ura. You say "he" when in fact it is a "them".

 

I will explain the semantics which are upsetting you. It is not to the point and doesn't matter much but you want to derail and go into attack mode on one sentence (again, again, again, it's like an echo).

 

There is a lack of clarity around a lot of koto smiths. The reflex should indeed be to take the word Muramasa and then go to the so-called second generation. The problem is not so much with him, there is some clarity around him as he seems to tower over the rest, but there are some problems in the grey area that surrounds him. The first generation isn't mentioned by Fujishiro. The third generation he mentions and says that his work is extremely few. Various people classify something like 8 different signature types in different ways trying to draw the line around the second generation. Is it one, two, three or eight guys? It is not super clear, we know from the dates that there is enough time for several generations but there is some glossing together that goes on.

 

So I am just following that. You want there to be a huge distinction between second generation work, you're attacking me here saying that the second generation's mirror pattern is not adopted by other generations. However the Nihonto Koza refutes you saying:

 

Traditions were passed on from father to son and teacher to pupil, and since they are largely the same with very little differences, I will present them all together.

 

This indicates not only that the style is shared, but it indicates that there is some lack of clarity in examining the work to determine who it might be amongst these teachers pupils fathers and sons. And where the first generation comes in as the so-called second generation is not his son is not entirely clear. Masashige follows this too, they are about the same but a little more boring. More on him later though.

 

About this lack of clarity, this situation is met several times with other smiths: Yamato Shizu, Yukimitsu, Naotsuna is a good one. The NBTHK glosses them a bit and mixes them together under one grouping and doesn't break them out to follow in generations. You don't see Shodai Tadayoshi blades mixed in with the second and third generations. They come after each other in chronological order. The clarity level on Tadayoshi is much higher than Muramasa which is a bit higher than Naotsuna and older smiths.

 

Individual blades they may say this is second or third gen but sometimes no, sometimes they make it clear they are talking about the shodai. But overall they have kind of grouped them into one virtual guy about whom they are not prepared to make huge distinctions. Shizu is another and I made a point on a recent one I had up of saying that you need to go and read the commentary to be sure you know what they are talking about when they make one of these attributions.

 

They made one temporary departure on Norishige as well, there is one tanto among the Juyo token that is attributed to "Nidai Norishige." We do not now go out of our way to refer to Norishige as a group of smiths or as a shodai or nidai. But this departure from past and current practice, is classified within the block of "shodai" Norishige works. If there was clarity that yes there is a second generation, we know who he was, we know his history and we have his signatures documented, then they would place this one tanto in a section that follows the block of Norishige ("shodai") work. What they did do was place it last among the tanto though it should come before the shumei tanto. So it is in this kind of strange zone, embedded in the middle before the "shodai" mumei daito and mumei tanto but after the "shodai" signed tanto and shumei tanto.

 

The takeway from this is that sometimes there is not a lot of useful discussion that can be had about these things, and the practice of attribution sometimes is more about what is acceptable to the listener. Sato Kanzan writes about it at some point when he says that "Norishige, Yukimitsu, Masamune, these all mean the same thing." His listener is a bit confused, and he goes into depth saying that it means that the work is top grade Soshu but sometimes it is not so clear as to who has made this. They are aware that that level of certainty is not satisfactory to anyone so that they will find something from there to go on and lean one way or the other, but in practice the meanings are a lot closer than people would otherwise take home.

 

In this there is not a huge amount of useful discussion that can be had about other generations. Fujishiro could not have useful discussion, he limited his comments to one sentence on the third generation and didn't even discuss the first, unless he believed the second to be the first and hasn't addressed the second then.

 

Now all of that depth is just to set up that the NBTHK has glossed over the generational differences in Muramasa and placed the work together. This treatment is similar to Naotsuna and different from Tadayoshi. The lines are blurry and attempts to distinguish one from another with clarity are not easy. So it is falling into the department of there being a distinction but not a clear distinction. This is why I'm going to say "he" when talking about Muramasa. It is not related to my point about the work not looking correct for what was being done in Ise.

 

Now to get into arguing about whether or not 4/5 of the non-nidai works are mirror hamon, I will make a pass through the zufu, check the comments, see which they are hedging on and which are going to non-nidai and then count the mirror images for you.

 

Masashige though is clearly broken out and I can tell you that the majority of his works are mirror image. Masasane doesn't have a good representative sampling and it's suguba based. So neither here nor there.

 

He is the fourth generation of Muramasa and so you are expecting then that his work is somehow going to look like the second but not the first and third. So it is maybe passing over odd generations like red hair ...

 

 

More on the clarity of Muramasa... the Nihonto Koza cannot shed much light, glossing them together as mentioned and giving this gem: "Thus, I wonder what was the actual period of the founder of MURAMASA Kei?" ...

 

 

We should also note that the Sengo ha is more than the three generations of the Muramasa line. There are several other smiths in this group that made work in this style, Masazane and Masashige, to name a few....

 

Four generations. If i was following your pattern I would just copy and paste this and say four generations and let the train wreck ensue. Masashige is the fourth generation Muramasa and changed his name. So, basic facts missing there.

 

Also, Masazane is not falling in the lineage though he shares some small similarities. You say above that he's working in "this style" but Fujishiro says: "Masazane's style is not too close to the style of Muramasa, and perhaps he was considered to be from a different kuni just because of that." So you are wrong there.

 

Anyway... that deals with the derailment.

 

My point remains that my *opinion* is that the nakago is leading some people off. Maybe it has a Muramasa signature. It would be nice to see it so we can check the signature style and maybe it will aid the discussion in one way or another.

 

I can only go on what I see here and I'm prepared to be wrong. But the myopic focus on "he" or "them" and drag yet another thread into the graveyard is a habit that you have to let go at some point.

[Darcy]

Here's what I counted in the Juyo zufu. 52 items, 14 katana, 14 wakizashi, 18 tanto and surprisingly 7 yari. Yari are never mirror images for anyone and I am going to discount them as this is not a yari. My yari also did not have mirror hamon but I thought it was just an outlier at the time, so I learned something about Muramasa yari here.

 

From the comments and signature what I could figure for sure went to the Shodai had 4 mirror hamon, and 1 without mirror hamon. 1 other blade looked like it was meant to be a mirror but tempering was not perfectly balanced. Close enough to small notare that I couldn't judge it either way.

 

There seemed only to be one that was directly stated to the third generation. It was mirror image.

 

Masashige had three that mirrored for half, it looks like it's intended but not coming together, three clear no (one of which is hitatsura), five clear yes, one undetermined because they added the koshirae and didn't show the alternate hamon due to space concerns. Just over 50%.

 

Masazane has one mirror but suguba over half of it, then the same bit of quasi-notare on the lower (goes up and stays up for a while, goes down and stays down). One more suguba but starts with a dip on both sides in the upper so counts. One hitatsura is a mirror. One slowly undulating suguba ashi fails the test. So 3 out of 4 again.

 

In all this I think defends what I said. On the Muramasa signed blades there is no departure from nidai to shodai to sandai in frequency of mirror image showing up. Sandai can't really be assessed with only one grouped in there. Masashige, majority mirror and Masazane 3 out of 4.

 

So it evidence agrees with the Nihonto koza that there is faithful reproduction of style over the Muramasa name, and is pretty much what I said. I think if someone wants to make flat denials of the Nihonto Koza and of the Juyo zufu examples then the onus is on them to provide evidence for the opinion or just hold it as a contrary opinion with no basis.

 

But I think the point stands that the statistics make it an outlier piece if it is associated with this school and not in mirror hamon. That does not rule it out but it puts it on the unusual side. There are only so many unusual that can be tolerated in one piece before doubt is raised. So that is the backing of my opinion. Won't be commenting on it further as the original poster asked for our thoughts, these are mine, and are backed up, any arguments to the contrary can be made to the oshigata and Nihonto Koza.

[cabowen]

It is not a matter of semantics that upsets me, it is your mistaken mischaracterization of the Muramasa group as essentially one smith that I have taken issue with. Neither is it "attack mode", no need to play the victim. I'm simply setting the record straight. And while I am doing that, no where did I say that the nidai was the only one to duplicate the hamon on both sides- I said:

 

Most commonly seen in the nidai but not as often in the other generations.

 

It is commonly accepted in the Japanese literature that there were three generations of Muramasa. I have seen NBTHK kantei-sho which specifically differentiate the shodai from the nidai from the sandai. I have seen Tanobe sayagaki that specifically say "shodai".

 

Their work styles are sufficiently distinct that mumei blades have been attributed by the NBTHK to a specific generation- here is an example of a shodai attribution:

 

 

Here is a little article posted right here on this forum that highlights these differences:

 

http://www.nihontomessageboard.com/articles/Muramasa2.pdf

 

Not all Muramasa blades are in the Juyo Nado Zufu. Doubtful even most of them. Only 6 shodai, 1 sandai? Your sample size is questionable at best....

 

Yes, there are a lot of unknowns when it comes to Koto smiths. Most people are aware of that. In this case, it is generally accepted that there were three generations in the Muramasa mainline and that their work is frequently attributed to a specific generation because of identifiable differences.

 

Let's just leave it at that....

[Darcy]

It is not a matter of semantics that upsets me, it is your mistaken mischaracterization of the Muramasa group as essentially one smith that I have taken issue with. Neither is it "attack mode", no need to play the victim. I'm simply setting the record straight. And while I am doing that, no where did I say that the nidai was the only one to duplicate the hamon on both sides

 

The mischaracterization is in your mind only because I did not come out and say what you are putting in my mouth. I put it in context but usually you are just argumentative and want to prolong the contrary position.

 

Here's what I wrote 10 years ago:

 

It is not clear how many generations of Muramasa there were, I have read different theories with between one to four smiths. While it is the general consensus that there were at least three Muramasa, with the Nidai being the most skilled and famous, Fujishiro writes in favor of the first of the line and the second of the line to be one generation working over the course of 50 years.

 

http://nihonto.ca/muramasa/

 

Because you will go literal on this as you always do I will define phrases for you:

 

"between one to four smiths" means that of the opinions I researched, there was support for every number between one and four including two and three.

"general consensus" = most people though not all

"at least three muramasa" = there is most support out there for three or four generations of Muramasa, but obviously four generations will believe there were three

 

The fourth generation is Masashige.

 

By saying that there are only three you are making a clear cut and dried statement. You want to say that I am saying there is only one generation. I am not saying that. You are saying there are exactly three. Not all sources agree with this. One, two, three, four all cited in the literature.

 

You are taking something that has a lot of grey areas, theory and disagreement and you are trying to make it a clear cut situation. *That* is misrepresentation the same way you are misrepresenting my comment. Not to mention derailing another thread and getting involved in semantics over content and that this guy was just asking for our opinions on the blade.

 

But when things like the Nihonto Koza and Fujishiro disagree I don't like to draw a conclusion but I usually just talk in generalities or try to report the conflicting opinions as I did 10 years ago. Because to do so otherwise is to say that I'm fit to decide, and I'm not (nor are you).

 

It is commonly accepted in the Japanese literature that there were three generations of Muramasa.

 

MASASHIGE

He was the son of the sandai MURAMASA, initially he was the

fourth generation MURAMASA, but he later changed his name to

MASASHIGE, and this name seems to have flourished from around

TENSHO (1573-1592) to around KAN'EI (1624-1644) in the

Shinto Jidai.

 

Nihonto Koza. No consensus on three generations and again you are making an absolute statement where none is possible.

 

I have seen NBTHK kantei-sho which specifically differentiate the shodai from the nidai from the sandai. I have seen Tanobe sayagaki that specifically say "shodai".

 

Of course, I just wrote about 50 of them and it would not be possible if generations were not mentioned somewhere in the paper. *Sometimes*. Because it is not 100% clear or agreed on and I also showed examples of areas where they have ventured and stepped back without venturing again.

 

What may be cut and dried on one individual piece for that particular day may not be the same situation with the same blade at a later date (ever resubmit a blade and get a different opinion?) As well as mentioned the treatment of the group of blades as a whole represents a different level of structure of the knowledge and they are not willing to make this statement in the index that this is a known, clear and cut and dried situation.

 

As you are trying to make it out to be.

 

If it was as you claimed then the index would be organized as Muramasa I, Muramasa II, and Muramasa III. The same way as it is with Tadayoshi.

 

But it is not. And this again contradicts what you are saying. I don't know if you understand the subtle difference between an individual piece and trying to make a generalization over the whole, but there is a difference and that's the difference between the index and between the paper on a blade. The blade does not have to speak to the whole, where the index speaks to it. They cannot pull back that paper on the "nidai" Norishige but it is there and published so they have to stand by it. It is a difficult paper and a difficult conclusion and they are not going to confirm it by breaking out a one sword section for Norishige II so it is embedded with the work of the shodai. This is saying there are limits to what they understand and are maintaining ambiguity as a result. Regardless of what that paper said on that day. Even if it is correct, they are not going to confirm it in the index as they do with Shinto works that they understand better. I think in particular this example is very difficult for them to digest and if they could undo it they would, but that is just a feeling.

 

Your approach is to just say no. I am not telling you just no because I feel like saying no. I am showing you what they have said and how they have approached the issue. And it has a lot of greyness to it, greyness that a lot of westerners, yourself included, don't seem to be willing to accept. You can't even accept how I treated it in an offhand comment without going to war over it and mischaracterizing what I said.

 

That's the context of what I said. Mischaracterize it you will.

 

Not all Muramasa blades are in the Juyo Nado Zufu.

 

 

Not all Muramasa blades are in the Juyo Nado Zufu. Doubtful even most of them. Only 6 shodai, 1 sandai? Your sample size is questionable at best....

 

It's not *my* sample size. I made the comment that 3 out of 4 were mirror hamon. You freaked and said shodai and sandai work are completely different from nidai.

 

I checked the *available* examples and cracked open the Nihonto Koza and they agreed with my statement.

 

Your response is, "No."

 

You are the one making the claim here that is contrary to the literature and available examples.

 

The logical inference is that the evidence and literature are consistent with my statement and are inconsistent with yours. It's up to you to counter that with evidence if you feel like it but "nuh uh" is not a counter argument.

 

Yes, there are a lot of unknowns when it comes to Koto smiths. Most people are aware of that. In this case, it is generally accepted that there were three generations in the Muramasa mainline

 

You don't seem to be aware of it because you want to argue this one out.

 

As mentioned above the Nihonto Koza does not agree with your theory and places Masashige as the fourth Muramasa who changed his name. This is not my opinion necessarily. I have no opinion. Because these are various theories attempting to explain some changes in signature and a range of dates. That's all. Muramasa was insignificant until the Tokugawa incidents made him important. And then they had the era wrong on him forever. What we have knowledge wise is super sketchy.

 

Let's just leave it at that....

 

Generally I go back and forth with you a few times and get fed up and leave you to the last word because it is hugely exhausting, you desire so strongly to be contrary and interpret whatever is said however pleases you in order to continue your contrariness. So I'm curious if you indeed will "just leave it at that" or if that was supposed to be an order for me to do so ... either way I expect that you can't ever "just leave it at that" because in the history of this board you never have. The only thing that stops you is when someone gets tired of dealing with you or else they lock the thread because they can't stand it anymore.

[Darcy]

Maybe this will help.

 

Muramasa, who lived in Kuwana of Ise Province, is a well-known smith and one theory says that he was a student of Masamune, but today it is accepted that this is a groundless theory. His earliest production date is the Bunki Era, followed by the Eisho. It is speculated that there were three generation of Muramasa, inferring from the different workmanships. Masashige, Masazane and Fujimasa, who is believed to have been the students of Muramasa, were active in the same period. Muramasa and his school (Sengo) temper o-notare mixed with gunome which resembles that of Heianjo Nagayoshi. It reminds us of the close connection between Muramasa and Nagayoshi. Also Muramasa demonstrates a workmanship that has a close resemblance to No Sada (Izumi no Kami Kanesada) of the Sue-Seki school. There is an extant work of No Sada with the mei of ‘Oite Ise Yamada Kore Saku’ and a tanto that Muramasa make in Seki with Seki Kanenori. Muramasa makes a unique nakago called tanago-bara and the Shitahara school of Musashi province also show this. A theory says that Muramasa passed it on to Shitahara smiths. Shitahara smiths presented their swords to the Kuwana Shrine so it is speculated that the both schools had a close relationship.

 

Note the generations are "speculated". This is not to be taken as a statement that there is only one smith. Nor are they stating that there are absolutely three. There is no statement. And they continue to refer to Muramasa in the singular throughout. This is because they can't prove the other generations other than to imply they may exist based on work/signature styles.

 

This is Dr. Honma writing. It is not meant to be characterizing it as one smith though it can be read as that. What it does mean is that he's refused to confirm three because he had that opportunity and called it speculation. This kind of thing happens a lot in what he writes about when he cannot make an absolute conclusion.

 

He has *not* ruled out three. He's clearly ruled out an earlier period of work. It does seem contradictory if you take the simple case of individual papers on individual blades but it is meant to represent the whole which is more sketchy than what may be stated on one piece. And the Juyo index follows this same structure when it is theory vs. fact. Regardless of how well accepted the theory is that seems to be the line. Unless they know for sure it is grouped.

[kunitaro]

Thank you very much for good discussion with sharp discernment.

and Thank you Darcy san for your very interesting picture comparison of Nakago, That is WOW !!

 

As I wrote "This is not really for Kantei.."

because, it has no answer….

 

The mei is "Hiromitsu", but, it is Gimei….

But, The quality and condition of the blade is excellent.

My photo doesn't show enough, however, I think that the blade is late Nanbokucho Soshu.

as Darcy san wrote, the Hitatsura of Muramasa or Sue-Mino, even Sue-Soshu are more Nioi-deki, and more looks like Hamon than Utsuri. and this Utsuri is besed on Nie, much brighter than Bizen utsuri, and Shirake-utsuri of Mino is more whitish cloud without activities.

This has very complex hataraki in bright utsuri and it mixed ji-nie and chikei makes more complex….

The Hamon itself is Nie-deki based on Gunome-midare and Nie(s) are all over in ha and on ji, so the border of nioi-kuchi and ji (utsuri) are not clear. so, if the blade is old Sashikomi polish, we can not see what is what,,,,,,

When you see close up photo of Ha.

There is many activities IN Ha. also, you see many very strong Kinsuji(horizontal dark line) and Inazuma (vertical dark lines), some are thicker dark lines. That is called "Strong excellent kinsuji" that is the sign of old and high class activities.

Ji and Ha looks like Soshu Akihiro or Hiromitsu.

 

the mei was cut in Edo period, and it has old Torokusho 1955 from Kyoto. It is called Daimyo toroku.

This kind of sword (very high quality old Gimei blade) is called "Daimyo Gibutsu".

Daimyo(s) must have certain sword collection, but they were not enough for all Daimyos, so, They made Gimei blades for their collection. sometime, they made new swords, sometime they made signature on old high quality blade.

 

Many of these kind of sword were taken the mei off, made it Mumei and got high Papered and sold after modern kantei system.

because, Gimei swords don't get certificate. If the signature is Gimei, they don't examine the blade.

When it is un-signed, Mumei, then it will get paper,

Many of modern collectors are relay on papers to estimate the value…

If the mumei blade is attributed as Kamakura or Nanbokucho period, good quality and good condition, It would become Juyo-token. sold for high price. so, many of these blade's mei were taken off…

I think that it is pity, because, it is part of history of the sword as formal Daimyo collection.

when you take mei off, then Old torokusho also gone, get new torokusho. then interesting history of the blade is gone.

 

It is possible to be attributed to mumei "Soshu Hiromitsu" after the mei off, and get high rank paper.

It is often happening, because, put the Mei on the blade which look like.

However, I prefer to keep this way, not for investment but preserve its history.

and we can enjoy high class blade with low price.

These kind of blades were treated as treasures under high ranking Samurais during Edo period, Meiji priod till before ww2.

 

I would like to ask people about this concept.

What do you think ?