Japanese Swords & Armor

About this book

30 vs 200. The most beautiful recent book on Japanese swords and armor presents the treasures of thirty famous warriors — as a $55 hardcover. This guide gives you 200 entries: every blade form, all Five Traditions, fifty great smiths, fifty named treasure blades, and the complete armor of the samurai — in one uniform format you can actually use in a museum.

From Masamune and the crescent-moon Mikazuki to Date Masamune's crescent-helmet armor; from the Five Swords Under Heaven to the Three Great Spears; from how a blade is folded, clay-coated and quenched to how to tell a Bizen clove-blossom temper line across a crowded gallery — each of the 200 entries gives you the same four facts: where it comes from, its period, the hallmark by which you will know it, and where you can see it.

Inside: a five-minute method for reading any blade (silhouette, temper line, grain, point, tang); the making of a sword from iron sand to final polish; museum itineraries for Tokyo, Bizen and armor country; an honest buying chapter (registration, appraisal papers, and why there are no bargains in Masamune); and a full glossary. Legends are told in full — and labelled as legends, every time.

Written and created in Japan by Japanese author Aki Wakamatsu. Published by Takikawa TOKOTOKO Kids LLC, a Japanese publisher in Hokkaido, Japan. Authentic Japanese content, carefully made in Japan — not mass-produced.