Officer's tang translation

[dasboot2011]

Hi all,

I picked up a non-traditional made sword last week. I typically avoid them but the blade on this is free of pits and molestation which is very hard for me to find locally. Most swords are cleaned up, pits, or rust. Anyways, despite whining I was curious if anyone would be able to translate? Even though it's a common sword I'm still curious to know. I will work on getting more pics overall tommorow, always a pain for me to photograph a blade.

[dasboot2011]

A tease

[BruceP]

The date is November 1943, but I'm no good at smith names. Guy will see this soon and give that to you. Nice find! It's not often I see a Type 98 with the Nagoya mark.

[GHP]

兼宗
Kanemune

First Kanemune on p. 145. You need to scroll down one page here.

Civilian name Fukamoto Koichi 福本小市
Born 14 Oct 1902
Adopted son-in-law of Fukumoto Amahide 天秀
Died 8 March 1977

Nihonto Club shows his Hawley rating as 8, same as his father.

Since I have no idea what Mr. Hawley's rating scheme means I just did a cursory google search and found a post by George Trotter at this Militaria.co.za link:

Hawley is a valuable tool to the collector as it is compiled from a number of Japanese references and is a quick look-up book that allows you to then check more detail in Japanese sources. The ratings system is arbitrary in that it just gives a "sense" of the standing of smiths...8 points been the starting point used for the (then) emerging smiths of post WWII...rising for a number of reasons to national treasure at 300? points One Japanese source uses a similar ranking based on "yen value".
As has also been said many times, Hawley contains double listings and some erronious listings. That is why other sources should be consulted also. Also, it is good as a quick reference to many smiths not covered in the more "up-market" works and should be regarded as a pretty good starting point reference IMHO.

--Guy

[dasboot2011]

兼宗
Kanemune

First Kanemune on p. 145. You need to scroll down one page here.

Civilian name Fukamoto Koichi 福本小市
Born 14 Oct 1902
Adopted son-in-law of Fukumoto Amahide 天秀
Died 8 March 1977

Nihonto Club shows his Hawley rating as 8, same as his father.

Since I have no idea what Mr. Hawley's rating scheme means I just did a cursory google search and found a post by George Trotter at this Militaria.co.za link:



--Guy

Thank you both very much, and thank you for the link as wel Guy. Finally some pics. Scabbard has all paint and dent free. The gold gilt on metal fittings is mostly gone. Blade is excellent with vibrant hammon. Again for a machine made sword I am very happy with it.

[dasboot2011]

More

[dasboot2011]

Some more

[dasboot2011]

Dhdj

[BruceP]

Very nice!

[Luis22]

really nice!

[BruceP]

I wonder - is that a late war tassel (all brown)? If so, I wonder if it was original? Now that I'm thinking out loud, anyone know when the late-war tassel was introduced?

[dasboot2011]

I wonder - is that a late war tassel (all brown)? If so, I wonder if it was original? Now that I'm thinking out loud, anyone know when the late-war tassel was introduced?

There's blue as well, not noticeable in the dark picture. Sorry