Just a greeting and a question from a new member

Talwyn Aureliano · Post by **Talwyn Aureliano** » Sat May 17, 2008 2:54 am

A Katana can be considered as a hand & a half sword in that it can be weilded one or two handed although most of the fighting strokes are two handed for power and balance.
Its blade is not as long as a european bastard sword as well.

Vherin'Kir · Post by **Vherin'Kir** » Tue May 27, 2008 2:22 am

weeh! all this talk about swords is making me wanna train even more gahahahaha!

hmm anyone know how much a traditionally made katana costs???

Bhaern Quel · Post by **Bhaern Quel** » Tue May 27, 2008 3:12 am

[quote="Vherin'Kir":l9kq63i2]weeh! all this talk about swords is making me wanna train even more gahahahaha! :D hmm anyone know how much a traditionally made katana costs???[/quote:l9kq63i2]

Hmm, a brand new one would likely cost over 50,000 to craft, beaten 1,000 times, tested with beheading a person and so on.

I do not believe there is much an after market for them.

I did some quote searches and it appears 500,,000 for the best crafted if you can get somebody sell it would not be asking too much.

Vherin'Kir · Post by **Vherin'Kir** » Tue May 27, 2008 3:18 am

Thats 500,000 YEN right? hmmm now whats pesos converted to yen......hmmm

Bhaern Quel · Post by **Bhaern Quel** » Tue May 27, 2008 5:10 am

[quote="Vherin'Kir":c81wdxdd]Thats 500,000 YEN right? hmmm now whats pesos converted to yen......hmmm[/quote:c81wdxdd]

I believe price was in USD, however a quality blade, reproduction that might cut off a head, was quoted at about 1,000 USD. It also appeared that for 7 USD you could get something that looked like a weapon that would likely break if used by you.

Your question was about the cost of a traditional blade. There clearly are options to get something that looks like one and prehaps even works like one for far lower cost.

I am not going to do money conversion calculations as the rate change by the minite.

Merinid Tlin'orzza · Post by **Merinid Tlin'orzza** » Tue May 27, 2008 5:25 am

I don't wish to be the bearer of bad news but...

There is a limit to how many can be made per year in Japan. Combined with restriction policies from their government on importation of such weapons would mean you would have to jump through many hoops.

Upon finding this out myself, it crashed my dream of owning an authenic chiisagatana. Well for now, things could change in the future.

Vherin'Kir · Post by **Vherin'Kir** » Tue May 27, 2008 10:17 am

WHAT NO!!!.......grrr.......(sigh)....owell...theres still time....to get one in the future i wonder when.....14+some 6 years=20 maybe? hmmmm

Argoth · Post by **Argoth** » Tue May 27, 2008 11:37 am

It was good to have been an army man during WW2. No one knows for sure how many swords were taken from Japan by the boys comin' home; and how many of those mass produced were authentic traditional ones? I guess it will forever be a secret of hundreds on mantle pieces throughout the States.

I've heard crafting a sword is about $25,000 only that not everyone will be given the opportunity, not for all the money in the world. You have to be befriended by the craftsman. Anyway that's what I've heard.

And Wiki has some info on the [i:15c6e9us]wakizashi[/i:15c6e9us]:
The wakizashi (Kanji: è„‡å·® Hiragana: ã‚ãã–ã—, wakizashi?) (meaning "side arm") is a traditional Japanese sword with a shÅtÅ blade between 30 and 60 cm (12 and 24 inches), with an average of 50 cm (20 inches). It is similar to but shorter than a katana, and mostly shorter than the kodachi ("small sword"). The wakizashi was usually worn together with the katana by the samurai or swordsmen of feudal Japan. When worn together the pair of swords were called daishÅ, which translates literally as "large and small". The katana was often called the sword or the long sword and the wakizashi the companion sword.
Contents

[edit] Brief history

The use of the wakizashi is first written about from the sixteenth century onwards. Originally, the term "wakizashi" was used to mean any sword worn on the side of the main sword. Later, the term was used to denote the group of swords which were shorter than the main sword of the samurai, and as a result, "wakizashi" acquired the meaning of the side sword, because a side sword was shorter than the main sword by its nature.

The samurai used to wear different types of side swords or daggers; for example, chiisa-gatana or yoroi-doshi, and the term "wakizashi" didn't mean any official blade length. The first usage of a wakizashi dates back to the period between 1332 and 1369. For example, Oda Nobunagaã€€(ç¹”ç”° ä¿¡é•·, 1534–1582) wore a daishÅ pair of uchigatana: a Katana with a Wakizashi. This reflects the common practice of wearing a wakizashi as the side sword of a katana.

After the Muromachi period the rulers of Japan tried to regulate the types of swords and the social groups which were allowed to wear them. This was to enhance the reputation, power and the class of the samurai class, who were the only social class permitted to carry the daishÅ. In the late Momoyama period the government passed laws which categorized the swords in accordance to their blade length. Nevertheless, there were people who openly disobeyed the laws and carried long wakizashi (Åwakizashi), which had approximately the same length as the katana. This was caused by the confusing definition of katana, wakizashi, and tantÅ of those times, and some townsmen and members of yakuza gangs carried such swords.

[edit] Use

The wakizashi were used as backup weapons and as tools to decapitate defeated enemies, and sometimes to commit ritual suicide. This led to it being referred to as the "Honor Blade" among foreigners. The master swordsman Miyamoto Musashi (å®®æœ¬ æ¦è”µ, 1584–1645) was known to have wielded a katana and a wakizashi in respective hands in order to fight with two weapons simultaneously for maximum combat advantage.

When taking enemy samurai heads on the battlefield, victorious duellists may have preferred to decapitate beaten fighters with the wakizashi instead of the katana. The executioner (alone or with the help of comrades) would seize the struggling or immobilized victim, remove the victim's helmet, hold the victim's head in place with one hand and cut off the trophy with the wakizashi in the other hand. Slicing off heads single-handedly would have been easier with the shorter wakizashi than with the longer katana. Using a katana to hack off the head of a victim who was wearing armor or lying on the ground would mean to risk damaging the katana blade.

When entering a building, a samurai would leave his katana with a servant or page who would then let it rest on a rack called a katana-kake, with the hilt pointing left so that it had to be removed with the left hand, passed to the right, then placed at the samurai's right, making it difficult to draw quickly, and reducing suspicion. However, the wakizashi would be worn at all times, and therefore, it constituted a side arm for the samurai (similar to a modern soldier's use of a pistol). A samurai would have worn it from the time he awoke to the time he went to sleep, and slept with it under his pillow.

In earlier periods, and especially during times of civil war, a tantÅ (dagger) was worn in place of a wakizashi. Contrary to popular belief, the wakizashi was not the sole tool used in the ritual suicide known as seppuku; this usage was also commonly assigned to the tantÅ.

Merinid Tlin'orzza · Post by **Merinid Tlin'orzza** » Tue May 27, 2008 12:11 pm

Hmm, after much thought, I've decided what the hell, I'll go with Hulaje using my favorite of Japanese swords, the chiisagatana.