Horii Hideaki Wakizashi

[SwordGuyJoe]

The sword discussed here (http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/19232-symbol-context/) arrived today. I will try to post some pics later if possible.

 

First, I'll admit that, as this sword is now mine, I am likely biased. Also, it is one of the first swords of the Horii group that has come through the collection so I don't have much basis to compare to (this little number came too by Tanetada - Toshihide's great grandson: http://www.tsuruginoya.com/mn1_3/a00308.html).

 

Second, while I'll stop WAY short of saying that I'm some authority on gendaito, I've certainly seen my fair share and had some pretty nice stuff pass through and stick in my collection at one point or another.

 

Okay. Those disclaimers out of the way, this is seriously one of the most interesting gendai pieces I've even seen. Is the quality top notch? Sure. But that's to be expected from a smith of Toshihide/Hideaki's level. It's pre-war, so you would expect that he took the additional time to make something up to his ability at the time - which should be excellent, but that's not it either. Also, it was relatively early in his career so it's not made by student. Again, not what's so interesting. These facts, the pictures, the interesting inscription discussed in the page linked above, and a fair price were the reason I bought it.

 

The thing that is striking about the blade is the steel itself. It's amazing. Most gendai work is pretty similar even at the high end when it comes to the steel. Tight hada, "fresh" looking, etc. Certainly some FAR surpass the others - Okimasa particularly was impressive with his control of the construction of the ji-hada. I'm not going to say they don't have character because they do and it's something I like about gendai work, it's just different than Shinto and Koto - though similar to shinshinto IMO. The hada on this sword isn't "loose" and far from O-hada, but it has the look and feel of something older and deliberately so. Ive seen Ichimonji, Munemasa, Kiyomaro, etc. reproductions but this is the first time that I've seen a sword that so perfectly captured this aspect of production. It's papered by the NBTHK and there are enough Hideaki works out there to give them enough to accurately base a hozon nod, so I'm not concerned with this being fake in some way. That said, this is one of the only swords that I would expect to legitimately fool a panel of educated and experienced folks doing a kantei.

 

I am simply taking a moment to comment on a particular characteristic of a blade that I'm not used to seeing as a true value of the sword. I'll bring it along to Chicago so if anyone cares to see it in hand, since even if I get the time to take pics, I'm sure to mess it up.

 

I just thought that you guys may be interested.

 

[SwordGuyJoe]

The Tanetada link is broken. Here is the sword. It's very nice too.

 

[SwordGuyJoe]

Here is my terrible attempts to capture the hada.  The last one probably does the best job.

 

 

 

 

Edit - Even looking at these the hada appears coarse which it doesn't in hand.  I guess it may be a "you gotta see it to believe it" type of thing.

[SwordGuyJoe]

And a nice little pic of the hataraki in the boshi

 

[Stephen]

Lovely Joe, hope to hold in hand someday.

[SAS]

Very nice!

[w.y.chan]

One of the most impressive Horii Hideaki "Mikasa" tachi that appeared on a Japanese dealer website about 9 years ago with koshirae, it rivals the quality of swords made by top Mukansa smiths of today but with more character like that of older swords. The dealer offer it to me at 1.9 million or 1.75 million yen without koshirae but I believe was sold locally at 2.2 milion yen. I wonder why it was offered cheaper to buyer outside Japan? Anway the sword recieved Tokubetsu Hozon. I'm sure most Mikasa blades are daisaku and generally of lower quality so this one was an exception posiibly Hideaki best work to advertise Mikasa blades, who knows. I felt some early gendai smiths tries to emulate work of Koto smiths as oppose to continuing what came before it from Shinshinto time and also mixes old iron to recreate koto like blades.

 

With the absent of Chris Bowen you are now the resident gendaito expert on here

 

 

Wah

 

PS just want to add many top gendai smiths do make swords that resembles Koto and Shinto but they do this on rare circumstances when they can devote a lot of time. It is more difficult to find these kind of blades during WW2 due to time constraint to contribute a quota for the war effort even special order blades may suffer to some extent and not representative of the smiths true skill. If you really want to see what a wartime smith is truely capable of you should see some of their post war shinsakuto.

[SwordGuyJoe]

I assure you, my collection easily exceeds my knowledge.

[w.y.chan]

I assure you, my collection easily exceeds my knowledge.

 

 

And your bank balance? 

 

Wah

[SwordGuyJoe]

Sometimes...

[Mark]

i don't want to hijack the thread but as this is a discussion about Hideaki i thought i would add a link to one Grey has. I saw this blade in hand and thought it was a very well made blade. Gedai is not my area but i have seen a number of great pieces lately

http://www.japaneseswordbooksandtsuba.com/store/swords/n100-tanto-horii-hideaki-early-aoe-utsushi

[SwordGuyJoe]

I got a chance to look at that wakizashi and it is quite nice!

[Daso]

That is a beautiful blade.  I've recently become very fond of Hira-Zukuri blades with Horimono and bohi.  It's the next target on my list.

[SwordGuyJoe]

The sword that started this post will be for sale soon...

[SwordGuyJoe]

If anyone is interested, this sword is now listed on Moses' site: http://www.nihontoantiques.com/project/tanto-sword-fss-709/