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Rai Kunizane Nanbokucho?


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62E24E16-16CA-449F-A291-CFDFE6DE3CD3.thumb.jpeg.421265c539a7acfba8b4caaa72d56d2c.jpeg7861555B-C875-4F87-A167-5872275BF817.thumb.jpeg.2aa71f4ad0b890736703d88a9aabbb6b.jpeg62E24E16-16CA-449F-A291-CFDFE6DE3CD3.thumb.jpeg.421265c539a7acfba8b4caaa72d56d2c.jpeg3BA0727F-0661-45C6-90F1-AF8AC130B5A2.thumb.jpeg.4bf83294c4c0a8e92b042e8850f05b1f.jpeg2CA8F991-66EE-4EA7-B9ED-E9D0CFB37E03.thumb.jpeg.6703b61f923f8badf1e04de108e7d6b7.jpegE797E6E6-B0C0-4D9E-B8C3-39BB9C9BF541.thumb.jpeg.0165e29aae2c9cb524e144103bc185ee.jpeg0D265530-3B2C-4FF3-9BF1-F29D2C02E96C.thumb.jpeg.cf081a9158267d1abeccb3e75dab9005.jpegFCFCF0A5-C473-4D63-9097-84C7560BFABA.thumb.jpeg.21ecb2d93509ca9e8d0cfedca959b72a.jpegC8A38EE9-0B43-4D5F-BDF8-D2B1C991E430.thumb.jpeg.228a3d90bd78f3b221541515ce130cfb.jpeg7861555B-C875-4F87-A167-5872275BF817.thumb.jpeg.2aa71f4ad0b890736703d88a9aabbb6b.jpegI just acquired a new katana. Have not received it yet but so far I just have the pictures of the blade and wanted to share them with the board. The nagasa is 27.75 inches and is in a bad state of condition unable to make out the hamon. Signed Rai Kunizane dated Bunwa Ni Nen Hachi Gatsu Hi, also read as Bunna-year of 1353. Needs to be polished. There is a nasty deep wide chip and probably won’t polish out if the polisher even takes on the risk of doing the work or ever worth it. Anyways still it looks like an interesting blade with nice Tokko-tsuki-ken, Tsume-tsuki-ken

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08CEE6E6-A538-4201-BC95-A05CE445268D.jpeg

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Hey John, Yes I agree with you. That chip likely goes thru the hamon I would guess even tho it is not visible it goes quite a bit into the hada. I negotiated the price down taking that into account. It still makes a nice study piece but still not even sure if Gimei or not. I think the only original fittings to the blade are the saya and a habaki not in the picture. The seller was going to send me a Gunto tsuba and Tsuka but not original to the blade

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Just a few caveats: very very few zaimei shoshin blades by Rai Kunizane (and only shorter blades).

 

Secondly, even Kunzan sensei and Kanzan sensei in one of their Koto volumes of the Koza say that the pieces which can be absolutely believed to be by him are hira zukuri wakizashi and tanto only

 

Thirdly, the only long blade oshigata I have access to (Tsuchiya oshigata) has tachi-mei. The short blades are indeed signed on the same side as this blade. 

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9 minutes ago, Gakusee said:

Just a few caveats: very very few zaimei shoshin blades by Rai Kunizane (and only shorter blades).

Yes you are right of the known verified existing examples which are very few. I’ve read a little about the 2 generations of Kunizane and other theories of Kunizane which some examples may surface which may be verified and proven in the future to paint a better picture. The seller said the nagasa on this blade was 27.75 inches but it looks a lot shorter in the picture. Maybe because it is ubu and has a long nakago and the angle the picture was taken. Do you think all the things we can see are congruent with the possibility which probably is slim to none

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Hello,

 

Never mind the chip and the mei, to my eyes, unfortunately, the steel of this sword looks lifeless. Which according to Yamanaka is a sign of heat exposure one should look for when evaluating a sword. Also, I see no evidence of the presence of a hamon. That and the chip kind of supports this notion, too. Hopefully I'm wrong.

 

Good luck.

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1 minute ago, Franco D said:

Hello,

 

Never mind the chip and the mei, to my eyes unfortunately the steel of this sword looks lifeless.

I did notice that and I asked the question if the blade was in a fire or signs of retemper. The seller said no. It could be that someone used some kind of metal cleaner which reacts with the metal and gives it that dull lifeless non reflective look on the surface. Curious to see it when it’s delivered. I am not expecting the blade to look any better and what I have seen is prob the best images from the seller. Prob other issues 

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23 minutes ago, Utopianarian said:

I did notice that and I asked the question if the blade was in a fire or signs of retemper. The seller said no.

 

A reputable seller should stand behind his words. A healthy dose of cynicism goes a long way when it comes to nihonto collecting. Yamanaka's is one publication that describes things to look for when assessing nihonto. That alone is worth the price of admission.

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27 minutes ago, Utopianarian said:

Yes you are right of the known verified existing examples which are very few. I’ve read a little about the 2 generations of Kunizane and other theories of Kunizane which some examples may surface which may be verified and proven in the future to paint a better picture. The seller said the nagasa on this blade was 27.75 inches but it looks a lot shorter in the picture. Maybe because it is ubu and has a long nakago and the angle the picture was taken. Do you think all the things we can see are congruent with the possibility which probably is slim to none

Theoretically there could be a second generation, and Kunzan/Kanzan mention this in passing.  But the smith is not that well studied. Kunzan/Kanzan mention a Rai Kunizane tachi in the Ise Jingu shrine (so likely still zaimei). 

But here, I am sorry to say that the sword does not look healthy, the horimono is not good,.....hopefully you did not pay too much. 

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Well, it does look aged. The hamachi is small so it's been polished more than a few times. The horimono attest to this also, at least on the Ura side, judging by the pictures. Ubu. Sometimes you can tell fire damage on the nakago, though the blade could have taken fire damage on the body only.

 

Having a few out of condition blades, I can attest to how well corrosion of many kinds can hide hamon. A couple of mine (80% covered in rust of one type or another or staining) began showing traces of hamon after repeated uchiko ball treatments. It's got a nice sugata.

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8 hours ago, WillFalstaff said:

Well, it does look aged. The hamachi is small so it's been polished more than a few times. The horimono attest to this also, at least on the Ura side, judging by the pictures. Ubu. Sometimes you can tell fire damage on the nakago, though the blade could have taken fire damage on the body only.

 

Having a few out of condition blades, I can attest to how well corrosion of many kinds can hide hamon. A couple of mine (80% covered in rust of one type or another or staining) began showing traces of hamon after repeated uchiko ball treatments. It's got a nice sugata.

Gabe, look at the ken horimono and how it is executed. Look at the symmetry, consistency of lines, straightness or not,  etc…All of it indicates a non-Kunizane. And that is fine, provided that one does not go into this in the belief that is a genuine shodai Kunizane which is implied by the inscribed date….I think we ought to take a sober look at the facts and accept the blade for what it is and what is not. 

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10 hours ago, Gakusee said:

Gabe, look at the ken horimono and how it is executed. Look at the symmetry, consistency of lines, straightness or not,  etc…

I wouldn’t necessarily say you can discount the horimono on a worn down blade with patina build up unevenly in the crevasse’s which in turn is not worn down evenly in all areas of the hada. The patina build up on one side or edge and not so much on the other may show a skew in evenness on top of uneven wear. Fresh horimono of this type almost have a 3 dimensional effect to it versus one with uneven heavy wear. Here is a Kamakura blade which horimono is worn down showing unevenness and appears less than quality horimono which prob was not the case 700 years ago. The blade pictured was also polished without patina build up in the horimono crevasses 8AAFE463-BE36-4757-AE40-42EA2534B4D9.thumb.jpeg.23121c3f577d55c43353f1a63f762b60.jpegABE6AD9C-FFED-419C-8742-D3691955CA70.thumb.jpeg.a6239a3a7691931f057301618a01133a.jpeg

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2 hours ago, Utopianarian said:

I wouldn’t necessarily say you can discount the horimono on a worn down blade with patina build up unevenly in the crevasse’s which in turn is not worn down evenly in all areas of the hada. The patina build up on one side or edge and not so much on the other may show a skew in evenness on top of uneven wear. Fresh horimono of this type almost have a 3 dimensional effect to it versus one with uneven heavy wear. Here is a Kamakura blade which horimono is worn down showing unevenness and appears less than quality horimono which prob was not the case 700 years ago. The blade pictured was also polished without patina build up in the horimono crevasses 8AAFE463-BE36-4757-AE40-42EA2534B4D9.thumb.jpeg.23121c3f577d55c43353f1a63f762b60.jpegABE6AD9C-FFED-419C-8742-D3691955CA70.thumb.jpeg.a6239a3a7691931f057301618a01133a.jpeg

George, thank you for posting the ken. If you notice on the ken, the claws and the lines are perfectly symmetrical and well formed. There is harmony and symmetry and straight, smooth lines with equidistant lines from the shinogi. 

 

Look at the horimono of the OP's blade and observe how the claws are (not talking about depth of incision but direction, smoothness, harmony, continuity). Compare their position to the shinogi, how they look when you compare left side to right, etc. 

 

I believe we jointly need to develop our eyes to notice such details when evaluating blades. Anyway, I suppose we are delving a bit too much into that and I did not wish to sidetrack the discussion. Apologies. 

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On 5/10/2022 at 6:14 PM, Gakusee said:

Gabe, look at the ken horimono and how it is executed. Look at the symmetry, consistency of lines, straightness or not,  etc…All of it indicates a non-Kunizane. And that is fine, provided that one does not go into this in the belief that is a genuine shodai Kunizane which is implied by the inscribed date….I think we ought to take a sober look at the facts and accept the blade for what it is and what is not. 

 

Yeah, I just zoomed in and did a careful study. I do see what you are describing. I know that horimono were often added later (sometimes much later) to blades, so this might be the case with this one. 

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Unfortunately pictures are lousy.

 

I would like the measurements :

 

nakago, nagasa, motohaba, sakihaba and kissaki.

 

 

the way pictures are taken, the blade looks disproportionate (nakago vs nagasa, kissaki ridiculously small)

 

Forget the horimono, it does not belong to Rai school, the blade is destroyed, nothing to study

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Nagasa 71cm. Nakago 21.5cm. Sori 1.6cm. Motohaba 3.26cm. Sakihaba 1.98cm. Motokasane 0.68cm sakikasane 0.45cm kissaki 3.2cm

the appearance of the blade in hand doesn’t have the dull dry lifeless look to the metal and doesn’t look like it has sustained fire damage or evidence of retemper but the chip is almost close to going completely thru hamon line. The hamon appears suguha and present throughout the entire blade. Here are a few pics. 27FC31BB-4551-40BF-A157-E7CE9D7017F1.thumb.jpeg.27025df323a10f029ec10b28085dc46a.jpegB32A3BB4-CE99-4CED-B6FD-F66132D2C543.thumb.jpeg.1607b466b7803d1c619ea774c3e981d2.jpeg76E1BFDA-1A4F-4F54-81DF-1D05AFE52A71.thumb.jpeg.35cc0040fb932182d0cf0932707b387a.jpeg110DC997-C2EC-4C15-8B05-F94C19752F03.thumb.jpeg.7d255334fb0242a21a78412a805aa5c0.jpeg

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The gunto scabbard the blade fits in nicely like it was made for the blade and was told it was originally with the blade. The rest of the fittings were not original to the blade and were thrown in the deal. Some of the fittings look to me like they were artificial aged and the wrap on the tsuka feel different than the silk wrap on my other guntos so probably cotton. The other fittings are questionable. I am not an expert on Gunto fittings. I was just interested in the blade purchase. Here are pics for those of you into Gunto fittings.

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833CFC81-C043-4C62-B289-06E730DEE3E3.jpeg

DC6EF68A-C19C-46BC-8678-D9D0405FDE6F.jpeg

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