Making Katanas the old-fashioned way

golok

golok

Joined
Oct 20, 2000
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I have heard that there are a few "living heritage" persons in Japan who are famous for their Samurai swords.

Knowing the tedium of making such a sword and the intricate processes that go along with it, I wonder how many of such Samurai sword makers left in Japan.

I have watched Discovery programmes a few times which depict such katana makers as grand old men who have assistants to help them forge a blade.

Are there any persons out there who can enlighten me as to the exact number of such Samurai sword makers still living and making swords in Japan?

And their names, of course.

I am thoroughly fascinated by the old-fashioned method of forging katanas. I believe in some ways, they are much better than the new katanas created by modern procedures.



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Make Love your strongest weapon. Compassion your shield and forgiveness your armour.
 
Many!!

In fact, most of the liscenced swordsmiths in Japan still doing it the old way..... even for smiths that are in their 30s.

And they are using steel that are refined with a Tatara furnance that is also the old way of getting iron/steel from ores. Though some of whom already use power hammers.

Joe
 
I read a magazine article a few years back about a swordsmith here in Oregon.

As memory serves, he apprenticed in Japan and now makes swords starting with iron sand and ending with a katana, entirely by hand and with traditional tools.

When I read the article, I thought I would remember the swordmaker's name and community.
The second sign of old age...

Does anyone else know of whom I refer?

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Luke 22:36, John 18:6-11, Freedom
If one takes care of the means, the end will take care of itself.
 
I believe you are talking about Michael Bell, he makes them by hand the old fashioned way after being trained in Japan. However, his swords go for over $5,000 each

david
 
There are probably well over a thousand swordsmiths in Japan schooled in the traditional skills. They take tradition very seriously over there.

Japan have a few masters of various traditional arts and craft(pottery, flower decoration, calligraphy, sword smithing, sword polishing, etc) titled "Living National Treasure" because they are the oldest and most respected among their peers.

[This message has been edited by tallwingedgoat (edited 04-14-2001).]
 
It isn't just that they take tradition seriously they HAVE to do it the traditional way, it is the law over there. They are also only allowed to produce two katana per month if I remember correctly.

[This message has been edited by Triton (edited 04-14-2001).]
 
I subscribe to a service originating in Japan that lists authentic modern sword for sale to non-Japanese nationals.
However, when I put this new computer together I somehow lost the bookmark.

I remember most of the swords selling in the $6500 to $7000 range, and I suspect they do not represent the best of the modern swords available.
I don't think the really good one leave Japan.


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Luke 22:36, John 18:6-11, Freedom
If one takes care of the means, the end will take care of itself.
 
You may be thinking of nosyuiaido.com?

I've seen some of Yoshindo Yoshihara's swords here, so you probably can get mukansa made swords imported. It's just a pain in the butt because you really need to see the sword before you buy it.

That's why you see $6-7k swords in the US more often. No one would buy a $30k sword sight unseen.

[This message has been edited by tallwingedgoat (edited 04-14-2001).]
 
Yoshihara is one of the best smiths in Japan today. He is very well known in the US because he published an English language book "The Craft of the Japanese Sword" to explain his methods. Another reason for his fame is his highly flamboyant style. This is very obvious even to beginning collectors. He is also somewhat unconventional, he perfers a power hammer, much to the annoyance of some traditionalists. You can find him annually at the Nordic Knife Show (or whatever it's called) in Solvang, California.

Every year, Japanese smiths submit their work to be judged. The higher they rank, the higher their price goes. If a smith consistantly pulls the top awards year after year after year, he is no longer required to enter future competitions. At this point they are given the "Mukansa" title. There's only a handful of these smiths, a few years ago Yoshihara was about to recieve this title. I haven't followed up on this though.



[This message has been edited by tallwingedgoat (edited 04-14-2001).]
 
Warning! Topic drift!

I Michael Bell's website.
Very nice.

I presume Michael Bell prefers to work in forged cable.
He has a beautiful photo of some cable in the forging process.

I would like to know more about the carbon content of cable, but even more, I would like to know about the carbon content of traditonal Japanese made katanas.

How do the two compare in carbon content and how do the traditionalists here feel about a sword made of forged cable?

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Luke 22:36, John 18:6-11, Freedom
If one takes care of the means, the end will take care of itself.
 
I'd assume the type of cable he's working with is essentially 1095, and through working it'd lose some of that carbon content. I'm perfectly OK with someone using welded cable for swords, he does a fantastic job of it too, but if I were going for "the whole nine yards" traditional, I'd not go with the welded cable...

Traditional Japanese swords had varying carbon contents. GENERALLY though, carbon content of the edge was around 0.6 to 0.8 percent.

Shinryû.
 
I recently read a book by Wayne Goddard "The $50 Knife Shop" there was some of the best information on cable damascus out in print.

Basically the carbon content of cable depends on a variety of things, the type of cable for one. But also the thickness of the strands. For some reason the surface of the strands have less carbon. Two strands could be made of the same steel, but the bigger strand will have more carbon because it has less surface area.

Smiths can control the amount of carbon in their steels. And they can match carbon content to the antiques if they should choose to do so.

I'm sure there are traditionlists who don't like anything but tamahagane for katana. But I've seen some pictures of Walley Hayes' folded cable katana and it was very nice. When folded many times, the pattern strongly resembles the pattern (hada) on antique swords.
 
I followed the link to Don Fogg's site, which Jerry Hossom so kindly provided.

I must describe the experience as profound.

I also noted that Don Fogg uses cable on request, at additional expense.

In addition to Tallwingedgoat's information about surface area and carbon content, I would guess that smaller diameter cable has more surface area per unit of volume and therefore loses a more carbon as the carbon combines with oxygen and forms carbon dioxide in the furnace and during forging.

With larger diameter cable, the carbon must migrate further before it reaches the surface and achieves the potential to combine with oxygen.

Michael Bell, on his site, says the lower carbon-content surface-iron of the individual cables welds together into a softer and more resilient matrix, which provides a shock absorbing structure for the harder core strands of steel within each individual cable; at least, so I paraphrase Michael Bell.
A person might prefer to read his explanation over mine.
smile.gif


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Luke 22:36, John 18:6-11, Freedom
If one takes care of the means, the end will take care of itself.
 
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