Hello,
I really enjoy the board, it is very comfortable for beginners in the hobby which is what I am. Some of the other boards can be a bit stuffy. Anyway, I picked up this old tanto at the flea market pretty cheap. I think it is a Shitahara school from the first two Kanji, also the blade characteristics match perfectly with a few Shitahara polished blades on the web, however cannot find a match for the swordsmith. My friend in Japan could not match up the kanji either. Can anyone tell me it's origin?
Semper Fi,
Bob
www.okinawarelics.com
Teruhiro?
Hi Bob,
I would read it as (however, not 100% sure):
(Shitahara can also be pronounced Shimohara)
There were 2 Teruhiro from Shimohara: TER10 and TER11. I'll try to find examples of their signatures to compare.
Regards,
Stan
Thanks for the help Stan, I
Thanks for the help Stan, I do see where the kanji for Teruhiro look very close from the picture submitted. I printed out your response and the pages you've I.D. and will match it up when I get home with the blade under light and magnification. The blade is out highly out of polish, lacking koshirae, and has only it's beat up saya and silver wrapped habaki, it also has fukure but once upon a time was probably magnificant.
Hi Bob,I wasn't able to find
Hi Bob,
I wasn't able to find any examples of Teruhiro's signatures. However, having compared your sword with Terushige, a better known smith and a father or teacher of Teruhiro TER10, it seems more likely your sword was made by TER10 and not by TER11 (a Shinto smith). But that's just a guess.
Regards,
Stan
P.S. Forgot to mention, here is some information on Shimohara and Teruhiro: http://www.sho-shin.com/tokai8.htm