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Japanese swords were often forged with different profiles, different blade thicknesses, and varying amounts of grind. Wakizashi and tantō, for instance, were not simply scaled-down versions of katana; they were often forged in a shape called hira-zukuri, in which the cross-sectional shape of the blade becomes an isosceles triangle. [130]
It is thought likely that the first iron swords were manufactured in Japan in the fourth century, based on technology imported from China via the Korean peninsula. [4]: 1 While swords clearly played an important cultural and religious role in ancient Japan, [4]: 5, 14 in the Heian period the globally recognised curved Japanese sword (the katana) was developed and swords became important ...
Diagram showing the parts of a nihontō blade in transliterated Japanese. This is the glossary of Japanese swords, including major terms the casual reader might find useful in understanding articles on Japanese swords. Within definitions, words set in boldface are defined elsewhere in the glossary.
A Japanese sword authentication paper (origami) from 1702 that Hon'ami Kōchū certified a tantō made by Yukimitsu in the 14th century as authentic. The Hon'ami clan, which was an authority of appraisal of Japanese swords, rated Japanese swords from these artistic points of view.
At least three Japanese terms (budō, bujutsu, and bugei) are used interchangeably with the English phrase Japanese martial arts. The usage of the term budō (武道) to mean martial arts is a modern one: historically the term meant a way of life encompassing physical, spiritual and moral dimensions with a focus on self-improvement ...
Wazamono (Japanese: 業 （ わざ ） 物 （ もの ）) is a Japanese term that, in a literal sense, refers to an instrument that plays as it should; in the context of Japanese swords and sword collecting, wazamono denotes any sword with a sharp edge that has been tested to cut well, usually by professional sword appraisers via the art of tameshigiri (test cutting).
The dachi here (太刀) is simply the voiced compounding version of the term tachi (太刀, great sword), the older style of sword that predates the katana. The second character in tachi, 刀, is the Chinese character for "blade" (see also dāo), and is also the same character used to spell katana (刀) and the tō in nihontō (日本刀 ...
The sword was forged in the 10-12th centuries by the swordsmith Hōki-no-Kuni Yasutsuna (伯耆国安綱). Dōjigiri (童子切, "Slayer of Shuten-dōji") is a tachi-type Japanese sword that has been identified as a National Treasure of Japan. [1] This sword is one of the "Five Swords Under Heaven" (天下五剣 Tenka-Goken).