(Part 2) Best products from r/SWORDS

Yes, this is possible. However, there are a number of factors to consider and things to clarify.

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First, why do you want a sword, exactly? What kind of sword? What do intend for it? Just some reasons people may want to acquire a sword, all of which influence what sword is right for them, and some of which have overlap:

• Martial arts
  
  • Test cutting
    
  • Solo forms
    
  • Paired forms
    
• Decoration
  
  • Wallhangers
    
  • Iaitō / mogitō (more accurate, still not real)
    
  • Modern budget
    
• Art
  
  • Modern nontraditional
    
  • Modern strictly traditional
    
  • Antique
    
• History
  
  • Vintage, militaria
    
  • Antique
    
• Souvenir
  
• Props
  
  Even making the reasonable assumption that you want a real sword, what counts as real to you? For instance, just in the case of Japanese swords, you can get:
  
  
• Modern
  
  • Production (models made by companies, usually in China)
    
    • Budget (monosteel, no hamon, etc.)
      
    • Premium (folding pattern, real hamon, etc.)
      
  • Japanese-style art-grade custom (made individually by smiths)
    
    • for martial arts (focus is on modern materials, strength)
      
    • for art (focus is on classical techniques, traditional-style activities in the hada & hamon)
      
  • Genuine nihontō (strictly traditional swords made by licensed Japanese smiths)
    
    • for martial arts (focus is on relatively affordable, within the restrictions that licensed smiths must work — meaning they are still very expensive)
      
    • for art (focus is on perfect execution of traditional techniques, excellent shape, polish, hada, hamon, hataraki, adherence to or emulation of a particular school / style, etc.)
      
• Vintage
  
  • WWII-era guntō (military swords), functional, varying degrees of traditional; e.g. may be rail steel, oil quench, etc.
    
  • More artistic gendaitō, basically older version of modern nihontō
    
• Antique
  
  • Munitions-grade stuff, e.g. Muromachi period "bundle blades"
    
  • Average quality, some artistry, maybe base-level papers e.g. NBTHK Hozon
    
  • High quality, masterful artistry, smith is well known / famous, typically has high-level papers e.g. NBTHK Tokubetsu Hozon, Juyo Token, higher
    
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    Second — what is your budget? You can expect stuff around the following just for Japanese blades (all very rough price ranges, use these for order of magnitude rather than reliable marks):
    
    
• Wallhanger: $10–100
  
• Modern chinese production: $100–2,000
  
• Vintage guntō: $300–3,000
  
• Vintage gendaitō: $3,000-6,000
  
• Japanese-style custom art blades by foreign smiths: $3,000–10,000
  
• Modern martial-arts grade nihontō: ~$5,000+
  
• Modern art-focused nihontō: $5k–$30k+ (as in, multiple tens of thousands of dollars)
  
• Entry-level antiques: $1k–$3k
  
• Good-quality antiques: $3k–7k
  
• Excellent-quality antiques: $7k–$100k+ (as in, $100,000)
  
• Top-level antiques: $100k–$1M+
  
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  Also… there's a lot of complexity and semantics involved here, but Korean swords aren't katana. Some of them look quite similar to katana, but it seems fairly incongruous to me that you are ambivalent about whether this hypothetical blade comes from Japan or Korea. That's not to say Japanese blades are better than Korean or vice-versa, just that (meaning no offense) treating the two as equivalent suggests you don't really know a lot about swords in general, and nihontō in specific.
  
  The best metaphor I can think of is someone saying they'd like to buy a premium champagne, and holding up a bottle of actual champagne next to a bottle of prosecco. That person isn't saying they want champagne, they're saying they want a sparkling white wine. There are both good / exceptional prosecco bottles, and mediocre champagnes! The point is they are actually different in a fundamental way. They're made from different grapes, using different processes, and they don't have identical tastes even if they are superficially similar.
  
  To you I would strongly suggest that if you are at all interested in commissioning a shinsakutō (newly-made Japanese sword), you learn a bit first, starting with the wiki here: https://www.reddit.com/r/SWORDS/wiki/nihonto and the book suggestions therein. I also strongly recommend the book Modern Japanese Swords and Swordsmiths.
  
  You should understand that to become a swordsmith in Japan requires a lengthy apprenticeship and a legal government license. There are strict controls on what counts as nihontō, designed to preserve a craft that has been transmitted for centuries.
  
  There isn't anything comparable from a systemic and legal perspective in Korea (that I know of). I cannot say much more about Korean smiths; I know there is at least one researching and making traditional Korean weapons, and they may be making heroic efforts of their own to preserve that craftsmanship. But my point is if you're going to spend a lot of money, you should understand precisely what you are buying and why it costs what it does.
  
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  Finally, if you are still interested in commissioning a blade, especially meeting the smith first… I'd get in touch with Paul Martin. He can help with the arrangements.
  
  Regards,
  
  —Gabriel

A cheap katana is a good one to start out with, since you won't feel bad when you screw it up. :)

Generally speaking, that maintenance kit has pretty much all the basics for general care. you'll probably want to oil it with the choji oil every few months if you're not using it. If you are using it for cutting practice or the like, make sure it's oiled at least once a week. (Or after each session, if you're cutting water bottles.) A few drops is plenty.

If you want to practice sharpening, there's the super-traditional way, which would take up several pages. Feel free to research that on your own - I don't really bother since it's a pain, involves taking out the mekugi pins and all, and I'm not quite comfortable doing that yet. Plus, don't have replacement pins, and the ones I've got aren't loose.

Katanas are supposed to be pretty darn hard steel. Depending on the kind of steel you've got, you might use different care than the traditional kit uses. For instance, if you've just lost a slight 'true' from your hard edge through use, the uchiko ball there is plenty enough to fix that. You tap it over the blade, and it releases some very fine powder from sharpening stones, which you then rub over the blade (carefully) with rice paper, and that re-sharpens the edge.

If you've got a regular steel (or even mild steel) blade like me, though, you'll need a whetstone of some nature to sharpen it. I do use Japanese water stones for sharpening. They're pretty easy to use, and if you've got rust spots from not oiling your sword regularly, you can actually take some of the slurry off the top of the stone and just rub down the rust spots with it using a small cloth and they'll come right off. That uchiko ball might also just do the same thing - I have to confess, I haven't used one.

If it's mild steel, though, you may just well develop nicks and dings in the actual blade itself. You can feel these running your fingers gently along the sides of the edge (not directly on the edge!). If that's the sort of blade you've got, well... fixing small ones is simple. Use a brillo pad, squeezing along the sides of the edges, and they come right out. If they're large, and you're CERTAIN you've got mild steel, you might need to file the edge back and then sharpen the whole thing.

I have that one! It's huuuuuuge and deadly sharp made by Dragon King. I would comment that it isn't a typical Chinese saber or sword both the blade and grip are much, much longer and the weapon is heavier than is normal for a Chinese sword or saber.

Honestly, there's better "first choices" on Seven Stars. My advice:
for the money you are looking at spending, you could get:
the cutting jian ($295) https://sevenstarstrading.com/site/hanwei/cuttingjian/
AND
the oxtail dao ($179) https://sevenstarstrading.com/site/huanuo/oxtail/
BOTH!

That would give you an excellent starter sword and a saber. I was in your shoes in 2015 and wish I'd heard what I just told you...

Yes, these are kind of stripped-down designs without the fancy finish but I think Scott is trying to offer affordable quality here. They had more offerings a few months ago in the $800-1200 range but again more fancy than introductory - and looks like they sold out - ago so keep tuned in.

Go ahead and email Scott Rodell at Seven Stars and tell him - briefly - about your interests and that one of his customers is making that suggestion - ask him what he suggests given your interests.

Scott Rodell owner of Seven Stars also published the 400 year old manual for this saber or "dao" - this is a miao or dan dao - so you can read about the history of this weapon's design. In short, it is a battlefield saber designed to counter the long blades of the katanas used by Japanese pirates who where beating on eastern China. Generally the Chinese military used shorter sabers or dao.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01A0EM6WK/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1

Scott Rodell has an impeccable reputation as a teacher of Chinese sword jian or gim and saber dao. He is also a highly reputable dealer in antique and modern reproductions - he designed the cutting jian based on his knowledge of antique Chinese swords.

https://www.google.com/search?q=scott+rodell&oq=scott+rodell&aqs=chrome..69i57j35i39j0j69i65l3.3637j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

The fork in the road in Chinese sword collecting / training is: saber / dao or a sword jian / gim?

Generally, in Chinese culture, sabers are fighting oriented and less sophisticated / subtle / intellectual than swords. If you watch kung fu movies, the mass of bad guys who get chopped up by the hero are all using sabers. Some heroes do as well.

In those movies, a sword always indicates someone of skill and education - thugs and rustics don't use swords.

There's a kind of Chinese sword called "Han jian" which is from the ancient Han dynasty https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_dynasty
and the emergence of the great schools of Chinese philosophy: daoism, Confucianism, legalism, etc. They look cool but the hilts on Han jian are ROUND and not good for blade indexing. They are popular because it points to a nostalgic "golden age" of "pure" Chinese culture before it "mixed" with Korean, Tibetan, Mongolian, Manchu, Japanese, etc. But the martial arts forms for Han jian are long lost. Current martial arts are based on the weapons Seven Stars sells.

Additional resources:
https://www.mandarinmansion.com/ - go here, read everything, you will learn a ton.

https://www.chineselongsword.com/ - books and videos Jack Chen is a good guy - video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zi8jWeBNyU

and the Great River Taoist Center - Rodell's school in VA
https://www.grtc.org/

There's a lot out there so let me know if you have any other questions.
干杯 Gānbēi - Cheers!

There are plenty of Indian temple swords with hilts like this. Don't know whether they're usually called "khanda". ("Khanda" basically just means "sword", but in English is usually used to refer to swords with the Indian (half-)basket hilt (unless they have long Solingen blades, or Indian imitations thereof, in which case they're "firangi"), but "khanda" is also used for swords with the south Indian non-basket hilt like this example, as long as the blades are not too non-khanda, whatever that might mean - isn't Indian sword terminology fun!) The temple swords usually have pretty funky blades.

But yes, there are many ceremonial Indian swords, just as there are many ceremonial Western swords, Chinese swords, and Japanese swords. For old khanda (basket + south Indian hilt), say mid-19th century and earlier, most were battle swords. Later than that, and there are lots of tourist swords, fake antiques, and religious/ceremonial swords.

As for the example above, it looks like a temple sword:
http://www.icollector.com/A-SOUTH-INDIAN-NAYAR-SWORD_i15525414

The guard is the same as on battle swords; the one I got to play with was a battle sword. If you're OK with a hilt like a tulwar hilt that stops you from bending your wrist (much), you shouldn't have any problem with this style of hilt.

A similar, but less severe, bent-down (up?) guard is usual on the khanda basket-hilt. These are comfortable; lock the hand in place, with a bit of room at the top for comfort.

Not so much good reliable info on Indian swords out there. There's some in the old classics like Egerton and Stone, and Rawson's "The Indian Sword", G. N. Pant's books (mostly drawings, not photos, at least in his multi-volume Indian arms & armour books; his museum catalogue books might be more photographic), E Jaiwant Paul's "By My Sword and Shield: Traditional Weapons of the Indian Warrior", and the splendid Hindu Arms and Ritual, by Robert Elgood; there's also Elgood's new Arms & Armour: At the Jaipur Court the Royal Collection, but I haven't had a chance to look at it.

I like these vertical wall mounts: https://www.amazon.com/Hanger-Sword-Medieval-Arming-Dagger/dp/B01MXVADIU/ref=pd_day0_200_5?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=00VBBVFRR6YKQ0K1KTD8

Works great for medieval european swords, and yes it should be fine to hold them long term. I use them for many of my swords

Horizontal mounts usually hold the sword by the blade portion with handle hanging off one end. So you are correct in your assumption.

Most of the sword hangers you get online are cheap pressboard. If you want something truly nice, you may wan to build it yourself... it's a pretty easy thing to do.

Edit: also mounting swords horizontally is usually done on the spine of the sword for single edge blades like sabers or katanas(edge pointing up).

http://www.amazon.com/Flitz-BU-03515-Plastic-Fiberglass/dp/B001447VB2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1415075546&sr=8-1&keywords=flitz


This stuff works wonders. I use it to take off surface rust on my swords and knives. It smells terrible, but it's non-toxic, food safe, and most importantly, non-abrasive. It uses some sort of proprietary chemical effect to react and lift off iron oxide(rust) without damaging any actual steel. It's pretty awesome stuff, and one bottle will last you years.

$35 and everyone loves it.

I don't own it, but I've seen it in vidyas, and it's on my to-buy list. It's usually priced at $60.

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EDIT:

I just saw this Amazon comment:

>I first ordered this in early June and liked the sword so much, I ordered another just to have around in case I damaged the first one.

>The second one I recieved was completely different from the first: I don't even think it's from the same manufacturer. It's definitely not the sword shown in the picture and it's no where near as nice as the first is.

>I suspect the seller ran out of the original sword that everyone was giving positive reviews and decided to ride the gravy train by quietly switching to a different sword.

>EDIT: I've added an image of the two side-by-side to show some of the differences.

It might be wiser to pony up $60 to True Swords, which is a very reputable seller.

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