Swordsmith Signature?

[Majestic]

Ted Tenold is another respected sword polisher.

About Ted Tenold | Legacy Arts

Ted Tenold has specialized in Japanese sword restoration since 1996 and apprenticed under top polishers within the antique sword community.

www.legacyswords.com

 

[TomBell]

Thanks for the link to Legacy Arts. I have tried Benson but he is busy. Hall seems to have dropped off the face of the earth. I see references to him but I can't find any contact information. Jimmy Hibiachi in San Francisco also seems to have gone missing. I have a phone number for him but no one ever answers. I must have seen Tenold's website but forgot it. I will contact him.

I have searched far and wide for swords with a sosho mei and the oldest one, I could find was mid 17th century, consistent with your observation. "According to Yoshida, Shinkai Kunisada started daimei for his father in the second year of Shoho (1645) with a sosho mei ("grass" or running/cursive style mei) ( Fig.4, 5) . Yoshida said that the reason for starting with a sosho mei may be as follows: Since this daimei was still unofficial, Oya Kunisada did not want Shinkai Kunisada to put the same kaisho-mei (normal or "block letter" style mei), written by an obviously different hand, on the daimei products. Because sosho mei was new, nobody would immediately notice that this was daimei. This may be a reasonable guess".

More on sosho mei origins: https://www.touken.or.jp/Portals/0/pdf/english/tobi_translation/687_NBTHK_April_2014.pdf

Now look what you have done. One more rabbit hole to plunge down. It looks like the plot has taken an interesting turn.

 

[mdchachi]

Thanks for the link to Legacy Arts. I have tried Benson but he is busy. Hall seems to have dropped off the face of the earth. I see references to him but I can't find any contact information. Jimmy Hibiachi in San Francisco also seems to have gone missing. I have a phone number for him but no one ever answers. I must have seen Tenold's website but forgot it. I will contact him.

I have searched far and wide for swords with a sosho mei and the oldest one, I could find was mid 17th century, consistent with your observation. "According to Yoshida, Shinkai Kunisada started daimei for his father in the second year of Shoho (1645) with a sosho mei ("grass" or running/cursive style mei) ( Fig.4, 5) . Yoshida said that the reason for starting with a sosho mei may be as follows: Since this daimei was still unofficial, Oya Kunisada did not want Shinkai Kunisada to put the same kaisho-mei (normal or "block letter" style mei), written by an obviously different hand, on the daimei products. Because sosho mei was new, nobody would immediately notice that this was daimei. This may be a reasonable guess".

More on sosho mei origins: https://www.touken.or.jp/Portals/0/pdf/english/tobi_translation/687_NBTHK_April_2014.pdf

Now look what you have done. One more rabbit hole to plunge down. It looks like the plot has taken an interesting turn.

Did any of the guys listed as Benson's proteges go into business for themselves?

Hacked By MR.GREEN

There's also this site. https://www.tokyosword.com

 

[Majestic]

Woody (Woodrow) may have branched off to his own business. I don't know for sure. For some reason I think he may have gone to Las Vegas to start his own polishing craft/business, but I could be mistaken.

There is also David Hofhine.

Japanese Sword Polishing David Hofhine Togishi

Professional Japanese sword polishing and restoration services by David S. Hofhine, Kensei LLC Impeccable references. Top quality togishi service

www.theswordpolisher.com

You might search his name on the NMB website for comments regarding his services. I have no direct experience with him, or indeed with any of the other polishers. They all seem to be knowledgeable and are interested in preserving Japanese swords, and they will not take sandpaper and an angle grinder to your sword just to make it shine.

Another name is Fred Lohman

Japanese Sword Restoration Parts - Sword Polishing Services

And also Moses Becerra

Sword Restoration - Nihonto Antiques

nihontoantiques.com

These guys are all in the US. There are many Japanese polishers, but using a Japanese-based polisher would entail packing the sword up, insuring it, and shipping it to Japan, where it would have to get import permission, get registered, and then get sent to the polisher. Then when the polishing is finished it would have to get export permission, insured again, packed and then shipped off to the US. So unless you are already in Japan, or have a museum-level sword that requires one of the top 3 or 4 polishers in the world, I would be hesitant to send a sword to Japan.

 

[ajc98]

I have been fortunate enough to have borrowed Otome Daniels Dictionary of Japanese (Sosho) Writing Forms published in 1944. The dictionary has an interesting history. I have attached what little documentation Ms Daniels included in her dictionary but have not copied all of the tables. I have searched it for the characters above and arrived at some possibilities for their translation though not to their English equivalent. I hope that this might help anyone who has followed this provide me with a translation.

The dictionary is a very rare book and the copy I have is very fragile due to the poor quality of the paper and binding. It took several months to track down a copy and borrow it through interlibrary loan from the MIT library. After reading UK copyright law, it appears to be out of copyright so I am comfortable including these images but respectfully cite their source.


View attachment 85184

I have also found similar characters on very old swords but lack the language skills to fully understand their significance. My skills at pattern recognition are OK but that is as far as I can get. Here are some examples.


View attachment 85187View attachment 85188

Hello Tom. I was wondering if you could share the rest of this dictionary. I have been looking online and I cannot find any PDFs or links to buy or borrow it anywhere, other than your forum post. As you said yourself, it should be out of copyright by now.

 

[Majestic]

I wonder if @TomBell ever found his togishi. I heard Woody is moving to Hawaii, and will continue polishing there. He is still polishing, but he's got a long waiting list. Last I heard it was about 1.5 years. Bob Benson is handing off work to his son Nick, who is also a polisher. No doubt they have a waiting list as well. Fred Lohman, who I mentioned above, actually passed away in 2021, and his son was carrying on the business, but I don't have any recent news on them. Ted Tenold is still around and does good work from what I hear.

 

[TomBell]

Hello Tom. I was wondering if you could share the rest of this dictionary. I have been looking online and I cannot find any PDFs or links to buy or borrow it anywhere, other than your forum post. As you said yourself, it should be out of copyright by now.

I got a copy of this through University interlibrary loan. It took about 6 months to get a copy which I think came from an obscure place in Germany. I had to return it long ago. I scanned 20 pages. Follow this link to download a compressed folder with those 20 pages. Microsoft OneDrive
You can try a public library to see if they have the ability search and get it on loan or better yet if you know someone affiliated with a college or university, they can request a search and loan. I searched my email and can't find any further details to aid you in the search. I can say for sure it exists in a library somewhere. Best of luck.

Tom Bell

I will remove the link in 48 hrs

 

[TomBell]

I wonder if @TomBell ever found his togishi. I heard Woody is moving to Hawaii, and will continue polishing there. He is still polishing, but he's got a long waiting list. Last I heard it was about 1.5 years. Bob Benson is handing off work to his son Nick, who is also a polisher. No doubt they have a waiting list as well. Fred Lohman, who I mentioned above, actually passed away in 2021, and his son was carrying on the business, but I don't have any recent news on them. Ted Tenold is still around and does good work from what I hear.

I submitted the katana for evaluation by NTHK and received a certification. This is the worksheet the judges produced. I shipped the katana to Robert Benson who rejected the NTHK evaluation and refused to polish it in a very pointed email containing some disparaging remarks about NTHK among other things. I don't know what to believe about this katana after these conflicting opinions and have abandoned the idea of having it polished.

I bought a copy of Zusetsu Illustrated Bungo Japanese Sword Katana by Yamada Masatoh (1974) to see if it contained an image of the signature but it did not so I put it up for sale on eBay. This was my final attempt to validate the katana.

Thanks for all of your help with this.

Best
Tom

 

[ajc98]

I got a copy of this through University interlibrary loan. It took about 6 months to get a copy which I think came from an obscure place in Germany. I had to return it long ago. I scanned 20 pages. Follow this link to download a compressed folder with those 20 pages. Microsoft OneDrive
You can try a public library to see if they have the ability search and get it on loan or better yet if you know someone affiliated with a college or university, they can request a search and loan. I searched my email and can't find any further details to aid you in the search. I can say for sure it exists in a library somewhere. Best of luck.

Tom Bell

I will remove the link in 48 hrs

Hi Tom,

Thank you so much for this, this is very useful!

 

[TomBell]

Please confirm your download. I would like to remove the link.