Which tsuba designs tend to be replicated/faked?

[Jesta]

4 hours ago, Spartancrest said:

There are so many of these I can't say it is the same piece, but I wish there was some way to warn the bidders off!  600 euro so far - why don't these buyers do a little image search before they put in a bid?

Yeah… that’s what I did when I saw it. It felt off, so a reverse search and so many examples come up. I am very surprised that an auction house like Christies would allow this sort of crap to go on sale. Again, a little bit of research would show that it’s at the very least suspicious enough to pull…

[Spartancrest]

10 hours ago, Jesta said:

suspicious enough to pull…

Some auction houses do pull these fakes, I have sent messages to some in the past. I have real doubts though that the auctions will pull the lots after they have already received bids.

[Iaido dude]

Early in my collecting I brought a fake to the attention of Galerie Zacke in order to have my bid retracted. They were a bit indignant, but allowed me to withdraw my bid. They did not pull the item. 

[Iaido dude]

Cast tsuba?

 

https://www.jauce.com/auction/1188262208

 

[Exclus1ve]

2 hours ago, Iaido dude said:

Cast tsuba?

 

https://www.jauce.com/auction/1188262208

Yes, it's casting. And of poor quality.

[Exclus1ve]

Auction houses have always sold and will continue to sell fakes. Sometimes it's due to the incompetence of the auction house staff, but often they know exactly what they're doing — they just pretend otherwise.

 

[Iaido dude]

Steve Waszak gave me some advice early on that was mostly about determining if a tsuba attribution is correct, but it extends to fakes and reproductions: “Assume the worst case scenario and only acquire if you have painstakingly convinced yourself that the tsuba is genuinely what you think it is.”

 

I fell prey to a reproduction recently and am implementing a systematic approach to avoid “magical thinking.”

[Spartancrest]

11 hours ago, Iaido dude said:

Cast tsuba?

https://de.aliexpress.com/i/1005003232133421.html?gatewayAdapt=glo2deu  cast iron would be better than this zinc alloy one [but not by much ]