Glorious nippon steel can cut through anything

And the ever popular yari

Did you not read directly after that where it said they had their uses or were you just too asshurt to go on?

The fact is "symbolic" is typically understood as "fashionable but useless", which is ridiculous regarding the japanese sword, as every bushi that could afford it had one on top of every other primary weapons he preferred (be it a polearm or missile weapon). The japanese sword was a very common and regarded weapon, just like many secondary weapons.
Besides, saying the nihonto is "symbolic" is implying that weapons like the yari, naginata or yumi weren't symbolic too, which is ridiculous.

Was it a real nihonto though?
Just buying a "samurai sword" from some American company that has a factory in China doesn't make it an actual katana. I mean the shape is not what people think makes its superior its the spongy tamahagane steel.

I mean did they really just blow 5000 dollars minimum for this test? Or is it more likely they spent 500 dollars on a Paul Chen?

Not saying an actual katana is going to cut through steel like butter, just questioning the accuracy.

>Katanas generally weren't even the primary weapon either.
Rare are the swords serving as primary weapons.
>They were symbolic and sure had their uses but spears, bows, guns, and naginatas were preferred.
You could literally say the same thing of many cultures. Yet nobody says the European Arming sword or the fucking Jian is symbolic.

Go back to /k/ or something if we're peddling that shit around.

those were duel weapons mostly. Not something you would use in war.

I think one could compare swords of all sorts to pistols and spears to rifles. First are good for civil enviroment and self defense, second are used in wars

Yeah well except every mid to high-rank bushi had a nihonto during the feudal wars, so yes they were used in war, as backup weapons, for sure, but they were used. If they weren't expecting to use their swords, not every bushi would had one besides their bows, spears and anti-armor knives.
So no they weren't only civilian weapons, they were used by samurai and other bushi all the time as it was the "easy to wear weapon".
Bushi didn't "choose" between spears and swords, they had both and more.

The swords and the blacksmith (Peter Johnsson) were both legit, the fact that they hit the japanese sword full strenght on a sword held in a vice just demonstrate it's not what the kind of abuse the nihonto is suppose to receive, then again in what kind of conflict are you expect to bash swords held by a vice ?

So, they still ended up with a broken sword. What does it even prove?

As far as I know they were used frequently when the fighting moved from open spaces to limiting terrain or enclosed spaces like the insides of castles. You don't really have room to do shit with a 3 meter long shaft when there are walls surrounding you everywhere.

So basically, they compared high quality pure modern steel, one through hardened to a spring temper for durability, and another one with a differentially quenched to emphasize the hamon, which was primarily done for aesthetics on symbolic swords.

Okay.

And in case people don't know what I'm talking about, a hamon is a blade-design, which is a line created by different phases of steel. Emphasis on hamon is found in modern swords, because hamon is one the the defining characteristics of an aesthetic sword, and an aesthetic hamon is what elevates swordsmithing to an art. It also means that it's just for looks. A Tokugawa sword is much more likely to have an emphasis on hamon over functionality or use of a weapon like a sengoku blade, because by then it was a status symbol. Tokugawa swords also tended to have a focus much harder and sharper edges, rather than durability, because when a samurai guy did draw his sword, he just cut up tatami mats for shits and giggles and going wow its so sharp, like a modern day kid who buys a katana.

It historically has roots in differential hardening or laminated blades which let a sword have an sharp cutting edge, but would not shatter into a million pieces if it hit something hard, especially with the impurities in ancient steel. Instead it bends like that gif. But there was not as much emphasis on absolute sharpness and aesthetics. War swords had less dramatic hamons and were more durable.

But if you order a differentially hardened today, it's done for aesthetics and achieving the sharpest possible edge, just like Tokugawa blades, and if you buy one, you're not taking it to war, you're just cutting random things for shits and giggles and admiring the aesthetics, just like a Tokugawa samurai.

soldiers also have backup pistols, doesn't mean they use them most of the times

Many soldiers don't have a pistol though... Besides I would happily make a(n educated) guess and say that during the medieval and early modern times, they used their sidearms much more than nowadays, since the range were much shorter and the perspective of being up close and personal with the enemy was a much more common occurence.

We can't make an analogy (rifles as polearms, pistols as sidearms) and then say "how but today we don't do this a lot, so accordin to this analogy, they didn't do it too half a millenia ago". This especially when we have occurences of sword and dagger being used in battles at very close range.

sure, those analogies dont work 100%.
For once, a rifle is more expensive than a pistol.
Sword, one the other hand, was a status symbol and far more expensive than a spear

>Was it a real nihonto though?
It depends on what you mean by "real nihonto". It wasn't made by a Japanese smith, in that regard it wouldn't have gotten a certificate. However, it was made from tamahagane and it was differentially hardened.
The fact that it bends rather than snapping apart should indicate that this is not a weapon made of modern tool steel.

>Not saying an actual katana is going to cut through steel like butter, just questioning the accuracy.
A katana made of modern steel would perform much better than a historical katana, which were mostly made of iron, with only the cutting edges being made of steel.

>It wasn't made by a Japanese smith, in that regard it wouldn't have gotten a certificate.
Except that (iirc), Peter Johnsson has the certificate to produce tradition japanese sword. Being japanese has little to do with that as they, in many things, accept and value the experise of strangers.

>
A katana made of modern steel would perform much better than a historical katana, which were mostly made of iron, with only the cutting edges being made of steel.
That's just plain false, it's different steel hardening, not iron and steel. Besides, a katana isn't just a shape, a "katana" made with modern steel wouldn't be, for that matter, a "real" katana. That's why gunto for instance aren't katana either but... well gunto.

>So, they still ended up with a broken sword.
See pic.

They put a katana and a longsword to the test against an arming sword since they wanted to see whether there was any truth to the myth that katana could cut through other swords.

DELET

>That's just plain false, it's different steel hardening, not iron and steel.
Obviously, nobody in the antique world had pure iron at his disposal since the process of smelting itself infuses the material with carbon. However, the vast majority of what you get out of an early medieval smelting process using a bloomery - and the Japanese way of doing this wasn't so different - is rather low carbon. Only a fraction of it is high carbon steel.
What characterised the katana was not just the differential hardening though but also the matter of construction. The standard way of doing this for most of the Japanese history would be the kobuse fashion, where a low carbon core steel would be wrapped with a high carbon edge steel. Only the high carbon steel can be properly hardened. This is also how most Seax blades were made during the migration period and early middle ages for example, which is why you can actually see a "hamon" resembling that of a katana on them if you polish them. In that regard, calling the core of a katana "iron" rather than "low-carbon steel" isn't really out of place.

>Besides, a katana isn't just a shape, a "katana" made with modern steel wouldn't be, for that matter, a "real" katana.
That's a misunderstanding of the word. "katana" merely means "sabre" or "single-edged sword" in Japanese - in contrast to the "tsurugi" which describes a two-edged sword, like the earlier Japanese swords vaguely resembling the late Roman Spathae. When the Japanese describe something which in the west would be called a katana they'd likely use the term "nihontou", meaning "Japanese sword". "Guntou" is written with the symbol for katana too - the "tou" part is how katana is read in this context. Occasionally you see the use of the term "shinken" for these historically accurate swords, but in other context it merely means a sharpened metal sword opposed to a wooden weapon, so even that isn't certain.

For comparison, here we have a 5th century Alemannic Sax. On the right it's seen in the state it was found, on the left it can be seen after having been polished. Hada ("skin"; i.e. the pattern on the blade resulting from the folding pre-process for homogenisation before the actual smithing is done) and hamon resemble that of a katana.

>"shinken" for these historically accurate swords
Well that would ridiculous because shinken means "new sword", which are not traditionaly made and therefore, not seen as worthy, shinken are just functional swords.
A katana (to my understanding) is a traditionaly made nihonto (which refers to the general form rather than the actual construction method), so a katana, a shinken and a shin-gunto are all "nihonto", but a shinken or a gunto don't have the same worth (symbolic worth, not efficiency that is) as a properly and traditionaly made "katana". Of course, now, very few nihonto are "real" katana because very few people care about having a painstakingly traditionaly made nihonto, especially if it's not for show, but for test-cutting, for which a shinken is purposedly made.

Anyway, that's how I use the term, it looks like it's a semantic argument rather than anything.

>Well that would ridiculous because shinken means "new sword"
That is not correct. 真 means "serious" or "earnest", it's read as "shin". 新 means "new" and it's read as "shin" too. There are lots of more ways to write something as "shin". Deriving meaning from the reading alone in Japanese is hard if you don't see it written out in kanji or the context is clear, since the language is filled with homonyms.

In any case 真剣 (which uses "tsurugi" here, read as "ken", rather than "katana"), does not mean "new sword", it means "real sword".

>a shinken or a gunto don't have the same worth (symbolic worth, not efficiency that is) as a properly and traditionaly made "katana".
That's not what we were debating. The debate was about efficiency. And a sword made of modern steel. Not to mention that a "new sword" in the sense of "shinken" would be a traditionally made katana too.

>And a sword made of modern steel.
By that I meant:

And a sword made of modern steel would perform better than a traditionally made one - assuming it has been properly heat-treated.

>There are lots of more ways to write something as "shin".
I know that, then I have been said that it meant new sword (mainly because the word shinken in itself is recent).
Nonetheless, it doesn't change (that much) what I wanted to point out. Shinken aren't necessarily traditionaly made nihonto but practice ones. I would even argue that someone who use a traditionaly made blade, that probably costed a quite good deal of money, for regular practice, has quite a lot of money to spend but well... Shinken therefore says nothing on the method of forging, so it's not correct too to assume it's traditionaly made (I made the mistake in reverse)

Then again, if you were to use a modern steel, you wouldn't need the traditional method of forging, therefore it would have in fact less (symbolic?) value even though it would have better efficiency at cutting. I wasn't talking about efficiency myself, but to the fact that a modern steel nihonto would... well be a glorified shin-gunto at best, it wouldn't have the worth of an actual traditionaly made katana.
Now, as the actual use of the blade is concerned, a modern steel blade may well be "superior", but then, if you are studying an ancient style with a modern blade that doesn't act like a traditional and ancient one, you could be well do yourself a disservice.

If your goal is to have a good, reliable and efficient cutting sword, then yes, modern steel is no doubt better. But if your goal is to study ancient styles of japanese combat and you want/need a blade for that, going for the modern steel isn't necessarily better (even though it's probably cheaper). It's always the question of better at what.
If you wanted to study the toughness of say hoplite cuirass and said, "we might as well make it with steel and not bronze since steel > bronze"... that would be silly. So why do we assume "modern steel" is always better in any configuration ?

>Shinken therefore says nothing on the method of forging, so it's not correct too to assume it's traditionaly made (I made the mistake in reverse)
Pretty much. It is occasionally used to distinguish traditionally made weapons from other types of weapons though. Sometimes it's merely used to differentiate between practice weapons and sharpened weapons however - no matter whether they were traditionally made or not.

>Then again, if you were to use a modern steel, you wouldn't need the traditional method of forging, therefore it would have in fact less (symbolic?) value even though it would have better efficiency at cutting.
I don't think it would cut much better. The primary difference would be that it would be more resilient - assuming it was properly heat-treated.

>if you are studying an ancient style with a modern blade that doesn't act like a traditional and ancient one, you could be well do yourself a disservice
As long as it's balanced the same and shares the same geometric features there'd be no difference in terms of wielding it. If you want to be subject to the same limitations as past periods - obviously using a modern material wouldn't do you much of a service though.

Weren't the porkchops banned from bringing their rapiers on shore?

fuck off with your shop, weeb

It could well be because they didn't want drunk sailors starting fights with their vassals, as fights, without even having to know about who won or lose, were a diplomatic problem by themselves.
It's nice to think it was because rapiers were 2dedly4u, but limitating diplomatic problems were most likely the reason they weren't allowed to bring swords in mainland, at some point and in some regions anyway.
This and the japanese being paranoid and wanting to control the strangers getting into their cities and ports...

not 2dedly for you, just better than the piece of shit katana

see >Slashing using a part of your edge that is intended for slicing certainly won't help matters.
Of course a sword that's slashing with a part of the blade intended for slashing will come out less damaged.
>they wanted to see whether there was any truth to the myth that katana could cut through other swords.
That's a retarded way to waste swords.

because the long sword was almost twice as thick.

One problem with the katana vs longsword test is that katana in modern proportions really are not really analogs. A sengoku style tachi would be the proper test, which would have had a thicker cross section.

Though in any test like this the thicker piece of steel will have a big advantage.

“Maybe no recorded personal duel per se but the story about the Portuguese being banned from bringing swords (rapiers) ashore during the extensive trading exchanges in Kyushu is documented. The reason for the ban was linked to the fact that the Portuguese originally cut down so many samurai. The local samurai responded by having new swords made which were much lighter than the battle blades they normally carried. Later, another encounter occurred and a virtual small scale war ensued with many Portuguese dying in the skirmish. I know about this because a distant relative of my teacher actually took part in this bit of historical trivia. My teacher (Takamura Yukiyoshi) still owned
his relatives sword which was made specifically in response to the Portuguese sword tactics the samurai encountered in Kyushu. Like the famous Kogarasu Maru, this sword was double edged from about 5 inches to the kissaki but much lighter and faster. This design was adopted to allow a swift back-cut like the ones the Portuguese employed so effectively against the samurai with rapiers. Once armed with swords of this style, the samurai turned the tables even on the Portuguese in the second encounter. This is when the ban was finally instituted. The whole trading relationship was threatened….”

Not better, the samurai were carrying war swords, its not like they couldnt adapt

>One problem with the katana vs longsword test is that katana in modern proportions really are not really analogs.
I wouldn't say anything so different then again you have to point out that by the time the portuguese, spanish and dutch came to Japan, the longsword was certainly out of favor compared to single-sword, spada da filo and early rapier-like blades.
Comparing longswords to katana is already setting a subjective view on what represent best the two swords of either the japanese and western world.

I would certainly argue that comparing arming swords or spada da filo with the katana or tachi is in fact more interesting than comparing it to the longsword.

>That's a retarded way to waste swords.
You'd be surprised by how many people believe that katana were capable of cutting through swords.

And I doubt many of them have any experience with eastern or western swordsmanship

Was it an art piece or was it a war blade? I already know the answer.

>he has a certificate

this whole thread

ITT:
>people who do not understand the different roles of these swords

That getting said, Japs only folded their steel because their iron was shit.

It was a differentially hardened katana made of tamahagane.

Wasn't there a viking/celtic sword(can't remember if it was the ulfberth one) that was pretty much on par with the katana in every way except a lot more bendable and in that way more durable?

How many European blades of the period 13th-15th century, actually had s spring temper? Was it universal? common? or could only the rich afford it?

The idea that katana were exceptional is nonsense in the first place. Swords were made in Europe in pretty much the same fashion from the late antique well into the late middle ages.
What made Ulfberht weapons, or at least some weapons that carry this name, exceptional is that they had a very high amount of carbon and structural homogeneity which was uncommon during the early middle ages. These weapons had qualities resembling that of a modern tool steel which surpassed katana by quite a bit. There's the theory that they were made from crucible steel imported from Persia. However, there is a sword from the 10th century which is comparable in quality to Ulfberht weapons, the Sword of Saint Cosmas and Damien which belonged to Emperor Otto III (HRE) and material analysis has shown that it was likely made of steel from Lorraine. It's well possible that also other weapons are comparable in quality it's just that nobody bothered to look. In any case, it cannot be said for certain that Europe was lacking the ability to produce steel of comparable quality to the middle east during the high middle ages.
However, only during the late middle ages, high carbon steel became accessible in large quantities, since this required the invention of the blast furnace.