Need help identifying this Japanese sword (image intense)

[DaveBB]

My grandpa served in the 38th infantry division in the Pacific.  He was on the island of Tongareva in 1943.  Brought back this sword with him.  I would appreciate any info you all could give me on it.

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[DmdJJ]

Look up "Wakizashi" and see if it matches.

[bustr]

It looks like a wakizashi made from a broken sword or from a very tired blade that has been polished too many times. The habaki is a two peice and has a rain fall pattern and is covered in gold foil. Habaki are ubiquitous in japan and that one is not from a sword. The machi area it stops at has been reshaped and the reshaping didn't create a lower notch and is why the habaki has been driven forward and you have that small gap between the back of the habaki and the face of the fuchi. The file marks on the nakago are kind of a give away to a cut down blade and the nakago shape is contemporary to the gendiato era. The fuchi, that metal band set on the mouth of the tsuka is standard issue gunto from WW2.

Worst case scenario, during the war when rail was being laid all over asia, china and manchuria. Some of the Japanese rail workers would use the forges for heating rail to make swords out of pieces of rail or spikes as theater commemorative items. I've seen them and worked on one, they look a little bit like this one with no hamon. Still there is a ghost of a hamon(that wavy pattern) which this may just be a really tired old sword that someone had cut down. The well shaped modern nakogo and clean round mekugi-ana is a good indication the work was performed in Japan during the gendiato era. Also the very clean file marks are an indication of a recent, 100 years at the oldest cutting down of an old sword. The red rust is an indication of exposure to moisture, not age. Just as the red rust on the blade is an indication that the habaki has a very poor seal in the koiguchi of the saya. Habaki were tapered and many had some kind of a file pattern on them so they would plug into the koiguchi to make an air tight seal and the pattern created friction to hold into the wood.

When swords were used regularly before the Meji restoration, you had your saya cleaned and serviced to ensure a good fit and seal along with occasional polishing to clean up nicks, scratches and any edge dulling. Polishing removes metal and over time blades would be polished down to thin elegant things that some modern sword students doing cutting with them bend their very expensive old swords.

[DaveBB]

Thanks for the info Bustr.  You seem very informed on Japanese swords.

This amalgamation sword was captured in 1943 or earlier.  I wish I knew more of the story behind it. 

On an interesting note, my grandfather also brought back a Japanese rifle.  It didn't have the mono-pod on it.  My dad traded it for a toy cap gun in the 50s...  My grandpa didn't care though, he wasn't much of a fan of guns after the war.

[Gman]

I was hoping Bustr would do an analysis, very well done IMO.

DaveBB, if I may, Bustr has posted before here about Japanese swords, you're fortunate there is such a knowledgeable person here, again, I was waiting to see if Bustr would post.   http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,388141.15.html

Isn't the length closer to the ko-wakizashi than anything else by the pictures? It's at the very, very low end length wise for what's considered wakizashi length, but right in the heart for ko-wakizashi, or even a long tanto.  Bustr, the man I've purchased many of the swords I've owned over the years (Canadian that has a business in Japan and imports/exports/sells Japanese blades, Pablo from Unique Japan) also the Japanese Sword Society up here, have told me it was very common during/pre WW2 for Japanese military members to have even their family blades cut down and modified for military use.  I'd not heard some of what you just posted before, particularly the track steel parts.  That makes perfect sense as well, even today many, many modern Japanese swords are made from track steel, Swedish track steel made up a huge percentage of Bugei's offerings early on.

Interesting piece DaveBB, make sure you hold on to that...

I'll take some pics of the last blade I bought, it's a Soshu-Ju Hiromasa, who was a student of the famed Masamune (I've written short stories about the Honjo Masamune, and used the sword as a sample for cover artwork, making it a business expense, heh).  DaveBB, I got into Japanese swords, armor, and other weapons mostly from a bring back that made it's way to my family, it's a very typical NCO sword, nothing special, but it's special to me.   

The sword market up here is pretty lively, as it is in the USA and elsewhere.  This link is to Unique's catalogue they issued less than 2 months ago - every single item is sold already, but it'll give a good idea of just one single guy's business and what the market is like. 

http://new.uniquejapan.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Japanese-Sword-Catalogue-28-From-UJ.pdf

[morfiend]

I'm no expert but it looks to be of the shota era!  A simple removal of the handle will show if it's marked but I suspect it's a shota blade as I dont see any signs of hamon.{sp}

  The link Gman gave is a good one,you should find what your/'re looking for there.


  Nice trophy non the less!!!



   

[bustr]

Sometimes, mostly, not always a rule of thumb, when a sword is cut down the smith does a coarse obvious file pattern to communicate that.

If you search for gunto nakago you will see pictures of nakogo the gendaito style of your nakago with very sharp or coarse yasurime. One good feature about the internet versus when I worked on koshirae and had to beg for books and put up with and make a one sided deal with a collector to learn. If you search for say muramachi nakago, the shape will be different and the file patterns will be mostly in a single direction. Each smith tried to have sort of a unique file pattern once they had a name and reputation versus using their master's. Sometimes when two collectors are trying to justify their newest hot item, the arguments will even get down to file patterns of a master's students versus a copy by an unknown smith. Or perish the thought, a forgery, which there are some famous ones that are valued in their own right.

Don't get carried away with yasurime on the nakago , if you search masmune nakago you will notice he didn't make any on his nakago while some of his students did or if there are two mekugi-ana the smith doing that may have added some. Yasurime was a later affectation to help keep the tsuka on the nakago. Just like the cat scratch pattern on habaki are to create friction in the koiguchi. Old versus modern yasurime is the same as looking at old steel items with tools marks versus new with clean tool marks. Many of the old file patterns were not as coarse as the gendaito patterns as much for age and for esthetics of the eras.

Then if you do a search for modern nakago, you will get roundly confused because the nakago will be very delicately cut to communicate a refined sensibility towards sword making. So a very coarse pattern is often a functional shortening not an artistic shortening while if you look at mass produced gunto you see the same functional patterns.

Confusing ain't it? Find a reputable collector to talk with about your peice. There is not a lot to go on other than the hamon for possibley the era and the nakago, kind of ubiquitous.

[Reschke]

I learned more about Japanese blades in these few posts than I ever thought possible. Thanks for the information there guys and DaveBB...nice piece. I wish my grandfather still had his Japanese pistol he brought back from Luzon. He told me he traded it for a diamond ring that he gave my grandmother when he landed in San Francisco in 1946. They had gotten married in 1943 and basically only saw each other once until 1946. She passed away 2 weeks ago this coming Friday and they had been married for 75 years.

[bustr]

That is an inspirational story, I bet she was one heck of a "woman"....

[Reschke]

She was bustr....she was...Many things about their relationship and the way they treated each other and other people as a whole can/should and were learned from them.

[Ack-Ack]

Could it be either the Type 95 NCO katana or the Type 98 officer's katana?

[bustr]

To have been cut down from either issue gunto it would have a shinogi raised area about 1\3 down from the back of the blade. The type 95 NCO also has a hi(groove) and is serial number stamped in front of the habaki. The type 98 looks like old style katana or cut down tachi that have both been polished thin and elegant and made very weak for combat. Some have a hi and some don't. The new sword gendiato gunto do have a bit more meat in the cross section and were good enough to use on unarmored people, just not bone cleaving. Over the years when I practiced tamashagiri, gunto bent from cutting bamboo, rolled up straw mats, and I had to make sword straightening tools. The 98 often have a hamon becasue they were being made for officers. Katana cross section is diamond shaped, not long triangle. This sword cross section is hira-zukuri, the edge plane drops down from the ha or blade back. Which is a style used primarily with tanto and not wakizashi or katana. Some art swords and some historically important swords were made that way. But, the depth from the ha to the edge with a daito in this pattern is 3x this blade to give strength to the edge for cutting.

Contact a dealer and get an appraisal, for 10 years I worked on gunto for sword students. I have a gendiato that was made in the muramachi style and it was made with a very deep cutting edge and much more curvature than issue gunto. It still ended up in gunto livery and worn in WW2.  I'm curious if the shinogi has been polished flat which I've only seen once on a very old tired blade. That does not mean this is an old blade, could just mean someone changed the cross section pattern. Because there is so little to go with, who knows. A sword dealer will have at least his experience to conjecture with.

Think of WW2 gunto like the US ARMY post Civil War where the ARMY was issued firearms, some officers purchased their own custom made, or carried a family heirloom. And some vets kept an extra none issue pistol with them just in case. I spent 10 years working on and with a dealer in SF, and training with Japanese swords.....who knows unless there is a signature or that hamon is someone's signature pattern. I'm only applying personal experience working with swords and dealers to these pictures. Who knows.....

[bustr]

Since this has gone on farther than I thought anyone would have experience with Japanese swords and by no means am I an appraiser. I just worked on the things for a living to feed myself. Can you post a close up picture of the kissaki(tip) and a complete photo of the whole blade nakago to kissaki? If you contact a a dealer and he wants pictures, he will want these along with the ones you posted and close ups along the blade anywhere the hamon(wavy temper line of crystal formation) is best visible.

I'm curious why a short blade with a katana or tachi curvature has a  hira-zukuri cross section or maybe it's the light angle at which you took the photos and there really is a polished very tired shinogi line 1\3 down from the back of the blade. Otherwise those conditions are not any era's blade standard.

[DaveBB]

Not a problem. I'll take some more pictures tomorrow.

[bustr]

Is what you have like this?

It's a hira-zakuri wakizashi style, I have one the blade was made in the 1700's. It's just as tired as this one which was shortened a few inches. This one has been polished down due to use and the shortening may have been to keep the line of the handle with the change of the edge. You can see the edge no longer matches the curvature of the back. This pattern was popular in the muramachi era and the curvature made them easy to draw for close combat. See how the bottom notch is almost gone, I'm wondering about your blade and it's tang. It's obvious your blade is very tired and polished many times. It's the kissaki or tip I need to see.