Emura 2-character mei

[nulldevice]

I was looking at a bring back sword in type 98 fittings for a friend today and helped him get it apart and was very pleased to find an Emura signed blade underneath.

 

The books and references I’ve seen posted all have his longer mei references or “Emura Saku” but I haven’t seen many references to just a 2-character mei except for a small handful of posts here. Someone said that blades signed just “Emura” might be made by Emura himself and not one of his prisoner swordsmith apprentices? Any confirmation on that?

 

The blade is in rough polish and the monouchi area has nicks and chips in the ha but it is stout enough that I think the owner might look at a polish for sentimental reasons. I was pleased to still see a pretty bright suguha based hamon with lots of nice small activity throughout even through the old polish. 
 

The saya is the most damaged part of the package and is missing a lot of parts and probably needs a restoration or just a new saya to complete the set. The other fittings are all stamped 231 and match the paint marks on the nakago which was good to see. 
 

[nulldevice]

Hamon photos:

 

[nulldevice]

Some fittings:

[nulldevice]

I didn’t grab any decent sugata shots so that’s my bad. These I had from the owner when he first showed me photos.

 

[Bruce Pennington]

Chandler,

You'll find a more in depth discussion of that here, but I don't think anyone knows the answer for sure:

 

[charlesf]

Chandler,

                I have a two character Emura which I posted many years ago to be told by one of the sites 'experts' that it was a fake because it didn't appear in the Emura oshigata listed on the Japanese Sword Index.However the two character mei was included in the original version but for some reason has been omitted from the current edition,I don't know why.

Funnily enough after having my sword slagged off a well respected member offered some swords for sale on behalf of a non-member and one of them was a sleepy niji mei Emura! The 'expert' refrained from commenting!

The sugata looks typical Emura,stout base gradually narrowing,mine has distal taper too,nice hamon which should reveal ashi and the mounts look to be of superior quality,all in all a really nice bundle!

I'm afraid I can't help with the question about quality/number of characters,unless someone finds reliable source material it can only be guesswork.

Thanks for posting,regards,

 

charles

[Scogg]

Here's another discussion from a while back. Some nice links and images included that show Emura hada

https://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/topic/31267-emura/

Lovely sword. I have always had an interest in Emura blades. 
Very interesting and desireable.
-Sam

 

[Rawa]

What a great find! Mountings are convincing (also assembly numbers on nakago).
I was really hesistant to call my example genuine due to unusual nakago jiri.
I have exactly same variation mei paired with this nakago jiri (typical more for Nagamitsu then NBTHK acknowledged genuine Emura blade). Mine also have bad tsuba swapped from particular type of replica with numbered habaki.