Kiko Posted June 15 Report Posted June 15 Hello everyone ! Newbie here, and this message aims to beg some help with Japanese books : I recently had the chance to get my hands on Nihonto Koza and Nihonto Zuikan (shinto, blue one) and the least I can say is that I'm really lost on how to use them. Could any of you please give me some clues about the way this books work ? Quote
nulldevice Posted June 15 Report Posted June 15 I started by making a basic index for the Nihonto Koza with just the name and page number for the blades portion in each book. This serves as a good starting reference for looking up top blades by prolific smiths. im working on adding more details to it such as the full mei reading or mumei classsification, papering of blade (Kokuho, JuBi, etc.) and the measurements. It’s a manual process as I can’t get AI image recognition to correctly recognize the characters. but I started with just a name, book no., and page no. in a simple excel index which I have saved on my phone. As for the contents of the books, the blade descriptions very much follow the Juyo books and Google translate can get probably 60% of it for you and as I’ve learned the sword term kanji, the other sections become easier to understand. (Nakago, Boshi, hamon, kitae, etc.) the sections in the beginning of the books are something I’d like to learn better. It’s all instructional material on various schools and lineages of smiths and the information there is top notch and google translate again does an okay job but I can tell lots of important information is lost. I’m hoping one day tools like AI can give us better translations of these sections of the books. Quote
nulldevice Posted June 15 Report Posted June 15 The JSSUS website also has the books indexed in their Index of Japanese Sword Literature meaning you can search for a smith's name and if its is in the Nihonto Koza or Nihonto Zuikan, it will show up in the results. Quote
Kiko Posted June 15 Author Report Posted June 15 Thank you very much Chandler, the JSSUS index will indeed be of great help ! But as you seem to know your way around the Nihonto Koza, could you explain how it's organized ? I mean, is it by school, province ? When I look at the index of the fourth volume about shinto swords for example (from page 11 of the second part), I only get that it seems divided with references to routes as the Tokaido, but I can't wrap my head around what to do from there, even when I know which school the smith I'm searching for is from. And if I switch to the 6th volume concerning the tsuba, this time I don't have the tiniest clue about the order used... Quote
nulldevice Posted June 15 Report Posted June 15 (edited) The koto books follow the gokaden and typically go from early schools to later schools. The Shinto books are similar but the gokaden is substituted for provinces since we know Shinto blades saw a blending of many traditions. I have not yet indexed volumes 6 or 7 as I’ve been focusing on the sword volumes first. Edited June 15 by nulldevice spelling 1 Quote
Kiko Posted June 15 Author Report Posted June 15 Thanks again Chandler, will try to make my way from there, and if I happen to find how the tsuba volume and the Nihonto Zuikan work, I'll post it here. Quote
Jussi Ekholm Posted June 16 Report Posted June 16 It is bit complicated at first. As you said it is arranged by historical routes, so you will need to know the physical location of the school/smith you are looking to search for. Once you do it more and more it will get easier. For Nihontō Kōza are you using the original Japanese or the AFU translations? Quote
Kiko Posted June 17 Author Report Posted June 17 I use the original Japanese books, and must say that "It is bit complicated at first" sounds like an understatement to me ! I sometimes have the feeling of a strong desire for hermeticism on the part of Japanese authors on these subjects... Quote
Jussi Ekholm Posted June 17 Report Posted June 17 Then I think it is lot more complicated, depending of course on how well you can read Japanese. Japanese sources of have somewhat typical order they go through the various provinces and schools. It will take time to get hang of it. But it does make sense (or I have just forced myself into it beating my head to wall) 😅 Quote
Kiko Posted June 17 Author Report Posted June 17 Well, my Japanese is somewhere between "travel survival kit" and "hey look I can read one signature out of a thousand", so yeah, it will take time ^^ Quote
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