Kunisada Wakizashi (

[AlphaRaider]

- I received this Wakizashi yesterday, I'm very excited to own this piece of history and wanted to take a moment to share it with everyone.

I will do my best to update this post with some better blade profile and tang pictures.  Hope you all enjoy, and thanks for viewing.

 

Signed: Kunisada 

Blade style: Shinogi Zukuri

Polish: Old full Polish

Temper Line: Gunome - Midare temper w/ a deep temper at point.

Cutting edge: 20 + 11/16"

Width: 1 + 1/4"

Thickness: 6mm at notch

Length in mountings: 30"

Edo Period: Ca. 1660 era made blade.

Tsuba: Marugara shape iron sukashi.

Fuchi / Kashira: Bird with bamboo motif w/ gold overlay.

Saya: wooden w/ lacquered finish.

 

NBTHK Tokubetsu Kicho paper submitted on 7th July 1968

 

- J. Hoff

 

 

[NewB]

Nice photos. I certainly hope this nakago wasn't cleaned.. if it was - yikes. Otherwise, way better photos than the original seller, no doubt.

 

 

J.

[Geraint]

Dear Jonathan.

 

Nice sword and thank you for sharing your excitement.  Now comes the fun part, digging for information and looking for comparable Kunisada mei, learning to see what is in the hamon and so forth.

 

Enjoy!

 

All the best.

[francois2605]

Very nice pictures, Jonathan. Thanks for sharing 

[Michaelr]

Great pictures and great sword. I would be proud to be the care taker of this blade.  Thank you for sharing   

  MikeR

[AlphaRaider]

Below are a few more pictures of the mentioned sword.

 

As I'm sure anyone who's tried to take pictures of a sword will know its fairly changing. Hopefully these pictures tell a little more about the blade. I color corrected these to 55k to match my strobes, the others before were a bit warm toned at like 64k.

 

J. Hoff

 

[AlphaRaider]

Macro images of the Kanji.

 

-J. Hoff

 

[NewB]

Dang.

 

Looks like it could be flipped for more than what was sold for based on the photos. Share the photography set up, if you don't mind 😎 

 

J.

[AlphaRaider]

Thanks,

 

For these pictures I used a Nikon Z7 full frame mirrorless camera body with a Nikon MC 50mm F2.8 Macro Lens. I shot them free hand using Promaster TTL UNPLUGGED strobe lights,  each one is 400 watt light w/ model lamp. I took these pictures inside a 3-foot wide soft box I often use for larger items. Since the sword was in a soft box I just had the strobes basically at 1 foot from the edges of the box and aimed at the center to create a fill/bounce light.

I shot everything at f11  so I wouldn't lose depth to quickly. The strobes are wirelessly controlled, I set the stobes to fire at 1/200th a sec at 1/64th power. The final pictures were color corrected in Lightroom. 

 

I used a 3x3 foot milk white tile for this set. The galaxy white adds sparkles. The black galaxy tile is great too, its one of my favorites. 

 

 

 

 

side note---This also shows up on here: 

 

 

 

 

[MrTT]

On 11/9/2022 at 9:12 AM, AlphaRaider said:

- I received this Wakizashi yesterday, I'm very excited to own this piece of history and wanted to take a moment to share it with everyone.

I will do my best to update this post with some better blade profile and tang pictures.  Hope you all enjoy, and thanks for viewing.

 

Signed: Kunisada 

Blade style: Shinogi Zukuri

Polish: Old full Polish

Temper Line: Gunome - Midare temper w/ a deep temper at point.

Cutting edge: 20 + 11/16"

Width: 1 + 1/4"

Thickness: 6mm at notch

Length in mountings: 30"

Edo Period: Ca. 1660 era made blade.

Tsuba: Marugara shape iron sukashi.

Fuchi / Kashira: Bird with bamboo motif w/ gold overlay.

Saya: wooden w/ lacquered finish.

 

NBTHK Tokubetsu Kicho paper submitted on 7th July 1968

 

- J. Hoff

 

 

Amazing 🤩.

Looks very expensive.

[Ian B3HR2UH]

Hi Jonathan , you will probanly know by now that the way that the strokes are cut does not resemble Izumi no kami Kunisada's signature, so I think that you can safely say that it is not by one of the Osaka Kunisadas . According to my old Hawley there were three Kunisadas working in Rikuoka ( Mutsu ) circa 1661 , 1684 and 1716 . The NBTHK magazine , number 513 , shows a blade by one of this group dated 1659 from memory . This nakago is also reproduced in Sesko's Shinto Meikan. This mei is also two characters and the way that the signature is cut is very similar to yours . I would think your piece is possibly by a later smith in this group .On rereading your post I see that it has papers  so they should reveal all .

Ian Brooks

[AlphaRaider]

Ian B3HR2UH

 

To my understanding its not Izumi no kami Kunisada who was the smith, that would not be in that era I believe.  However Im pretty new at this stuff, is there a way to look at back issues from them? I've found a few other posts and sites selling swords from him and the signature matches. so far mines been the cleanest signature I've seen.

 

 

 

 

[SteveM]

The sword in this thread is supposed to be Aizu Kunisada (会津国貞). 

Not related to the great Kunisadas of Osaka. 

[Char]

Congratulations on your purchase welcome as a new caretaker.

[AlphaRaider]

5 minutes ago, SteveM said:

The sword in this thread is supposed to be Aizu Kunisada (会津国貞). 

Not related to the great Kunisadas of Osaka. 

 

I thought I had read someplace he was a sword smith of Aizu. Not Aizu being his name?

 Some of this stuff is a wee bit confusing. I do appreciate the help everyone is offering.

[SteveM]

Yes, Aizu is the location. This is Kunisada of Aizu. (Aizu Kunisada is what is written on your green paper, and it is what this smith is typically called). 

 

The Kunisadas mentioned in your post above mine are a different group. Same name, but different group. 

[AlphaRaider]

-SteveM

 

The post from the samurai shop correct? That is not correct Information maker wise?

 

So this smith along with possibly at lease one other signed swords in a similar fashion?

 

Do you have any knowledge or links as to a place I can learn about this specific smith?

 

 

[SteveM]

The link to the Samurai Museum is pointing to Kunisada 1st of Ōsaka. 

The green paper in the 1st post in this thread is for Aizu Kunisada, who is no relation to the above Kunisada 1st of Ōsaka. 

I think if you do a search on Aizu Kunisada (aka Kawachi-no-daijo Kunisada) you will find a lot of hits. 

 

The Kunisadas of Ōsaka are much more famous, and their swords are highly sought after, so there is much more information available on them, which is why you need to specify "Aizu Kunisada" in your search. If you just search for Kunisada you will get a zillion false positives. 

[AlphaRaider]

would this be the correct smith?  https://nihontoclub.com/smiths/KUN898. and why there are different Mei?

 

The signature of the one from samurai shop is a good match to my tang, yet you mentioned they are not the same people.

 

The links I'm finding from the name you gave shows a different Mei so far,  Did he sign differently at different points in his life by chance?

 

 

 

 

[SteveM]

Yes, Aizu Kunisada changed his name to a different kanji character for "sada" at some point in his life, so he started out as Kunisada (国貞) and then ended up as Kawachi-no-daijō Kunisada (国定). Its not uncommon for smiths to change their names at some point. It does add to the confusion, but you get used to it after a while. Actually there may even be several generations of Aizu Kunisada who used the same name, so I'd need to dig a bit deeper to pinpoint the exact guy (if that's even possible). 

 

Yours is the one with the green authentication paper, right? If so, that paper identifies your sword as Aizu Kunisada. But as you probably already know, those green papers are not to be trusted. 

 

 

 

 

[AlphaRaider]

Yes the sword in the pictures above are the sword in reference to the "green" paperwork image I submitted.

 

Are green papers in general considered bad all across the board. Would getting new papers raise the potential value? Or Solidify the maker 100%?

 

to my understand to achieve that I would need a new polish or at least touch up, shirs-saya, and then transport and verify. One member stated this could be done for roughly $700 for the papering portion in Japan. I'm aware what a full polish would cost, are touch ups to reach a final state worthwhile or cost effective?

 

[SteveM]

I would recommend enjoying it as it is.

 

If you wanted to go through the shinsa route, you probably don't need to give it a new polish, and you wouldn't need a new shirasaya or habaki to submit it for new "Hozon" papers. You can submit it as is (I think, unless the polish is so horrible that you can't see any of the hamon or activities). If you lived in Japan it would be a no-brainer to submit it, but frankly I don't think its worth the hassle of sending this to Japan and going through the registration and then de-registration process. Others may have different opinions, but I'd say enjoy it as it is. 

[AlphaRaider]

Will do, I'm extremly happy with it, the people I've shown it to so far have really enjoyed it.

 

I don't have any plans to sell this sword in the future, I'd just like to take care of it and display it to people at work and at trade shows.

 

If you find anything additional else please let me know, I'd like to be able to present as much information as possible and make a printout for people to read.

 

I just received a really neat tanto this evening too. I'll work on posting that tomorrow, figured I'd get some more tracking done on this first.

[Franco D]

2 hours ago, AlphaRaider said:

to my understand to achieve that I would need a new polish or at least touch up, shirs-saya, and then transport and verify. One member stated this could be done for roughly $700 for the papering portion in Japan. I'm aware what a full polish would cost, are touch ups to reach a final state worthwhile or cost effective?

 

 

As a suggestion and fyi,

 

Recommended polishers here in the states; Woody Hall in Nevada, Ted Tenold in Montana, and then Jimmy Hayashi who is a top level Japanese trained polisher in San Francisco. Decisions regarding a new shirasaya and or habaki can be made through the polisher. For shinsa, besides sending a sword to Japan, one option is waiting until the NTHK returns to the US. It may be wise to be certain the mei is valid before proceeding with a new polish.