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    2018/2/12
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If you are a big fan of samurai movies, or learning martial arts, AND have a chance of traveling in Japan, you may be eager to see Japanese swords, katana. But where can you see them? First option is museums. Tokyo National Museum in Ueno.

On the first floor of the main building, you can enjoy collections of precious swords, some of them are registered as national treasure. And the second option is The Japanese Sword Museum in Ryogoku, which locates at just beside the National Sumo Stadium. This is the only museum in Japan that exhibits only Japanese sword all year round.

The pros of enjoying swords in museums is that you

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    2018/2/9
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koi travel, sword smith visit

koi travel, sword smith visit

Japanese swords generally consist of many parts, such as tsuka (handle), tsuba (hand protector), saya (blade cover), menuki (ornaments on the tsuka) and so on. Because Japan is very humid and the blades can be easily damaged if they get rusty or dusty, Japanese swords must be cleaned up regularly and thoroughly. That is why the swords are made to be disassembled easily piece by piece. This characteristic has also made it easy to change the design of the mountings of swords.

Therefore, it was natural that decorative mountings of Japanese swords were developed very much during the Edo period. The same sword can look very different depending on the occasions, such as when a samurai goes to

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    2018/2/7
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When we talk about Japanese swords or ‘katanas,’ we tend to talk only about mysterious beautiful blades. However, do you know that their covers and other parts had also important roles for samurais?

From 17th century to early 19th century, only samurais were allowed to carry swords in Japan, and therefore, swords were important items for their identities. However, using swords were actually prohibited during the same period. In the early 17th century, Ieyasu Tokugawa became the final winner in the battles against other feudal lords, and he started his government in Tokyo (Edo). He and his sons wanted his government to last long and did not want the other samurais to start battles against them.

This was a big environmental change for Japanese swords. All the swords in Japan, which used

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    2018/2/2
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koi travel, sword smith visit

Iron ore needs higher temperature to be smelted, which made iron making in Europe a sort of industrialized mass production using blast furnaces. On the other hand, iron sand needs relatively lower temperature, which made iron making in Japan craftsmen’s work in smaller scale, and sword making as well.

However, the lower melting temperature of iron sand gives Japanese steel an unique feature. According to a sword making master Kawasaki, the steel made of iron sand can be much purer compared to the ones made of iron ore. The high purity of steel allows separated blocks of steel to unite one piece easily by only hammering. And the high purity makes the blade

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