Nihonto Months

[md02geist]

Hello all,

 

Simple question; are there "lucky" or more important months for swords to have been completed? I seem to see lots of Hachigatsu blades. I did some searching and research but didn't turn up anything...is there anything special about August or am I just running into coincidence? 

 

Thank you!

[b.hennick]

I thought that Feb. and Aug. are the best two months because of the temperature. 

[md02geist]

I thought that Feb. and Aug. are the best two months because of the temperature. 

 

 

I thought that might be it, but wasn't sure. Those are primarily the two months I've seen, more of August.

[ROKUJURO]

As Barry writes, both months were believed to have the best water temperature for the quenching of sword blades. That is what I have read, but it does not make much sense as the water was heated up for this purpose.  

[Ray Singer]

I have been told a smith will try to do his best work in forging the first sword of a given year. I have always given a bit extra attention when a sword is dated shogatsu, and it does seem generally true that swords dated to the first month show good quality for that particular smith.

[Shugyosha]

I read that the 2nd and 8th months were considered auspicious by sword smiths because of the way the numbers are written in Japanese:

 

二 八 

 

They imply something being cut or cloven horizontally and vertically. Is that just apocryphal?

[Vermithrax16]

This reminds me of when I used to work on hot rod engines. When selecting a block, people would avoid this made on Monday and Friday, feeling they were paid less attention to

[Carlo Giuseppe Tacchini]

For hachigatsu we might consider that the number eight is generally considered lucky in Japan.

There are many superstitions  about numeral and their writing and reading in kanji like the one that ask to sew a coin of five cent of Yen on the senninbari as the reading of the matter might be the auspicious "just Beyond the line of Death" considering that 4 (cent) would have been read as "shi".

[paulb]

In an 18th century text which was translated in the first decade of the 20th it is suggested that smiths chose specific months (I think in this case they state August and May) for quenching. This was because the natural light was more consistent allowing them to better judge the temperature of the steel by the colour reached in the forge. 

[ROKUJURO]

Paul,

for YAKIIRE (quenching), the forge is darkened so you can judge the temperature of the steel much better.  

[paulb]

Yes I know. I think they meant the evenings were consistently dark weird though it sounds. 

[md02geist]

Lots of interesting thoughts here everyone, thank you

[Gabriel L]

Month dates on old swords should probably be taken with a grain of salt. Do you really think that smiths waited until hachigatsu or nigatsu, quenched most (80%+) of their swords, and didn’t produce anything else for the other ten months of the year?

 

It was considered lucky to have those months written on the nakago, so smiths wrote those months on the nakago. I don’t think you can ever take it 100% at face value. In Japanese art, sometimes the appearance was considered more important than fact.

[Surfson]

I doubt it has to do with water temperature.