# Help with Knife identification



## tch757 (Nov 1, 2022)

Hoping someone can help me with the kanji on this knife and anything you might know about it.


----------



## Pikehaus (Dec 24, 2022)

The top says Tokyo, middle two letters say Japan. IDK what the third character in the middle is. The three more intricate characters I can't really read except for the one in the middle, that one means moon. Sorry for my rather poor kanji reading; I'm only Chinese.


----------



## Qapla' (Dec 24, 2022)

The third character in the middle is 鋼 ("steel"), so 日本鋼 means Japanese steel.
The first character among the last three is too stylized for me to identify.
The last character is 作 ("make").


----------



## tch757 (Dec 25, 2022)

Thank you!


----------



## Atso_J (Dec 28, 2022)

I did some reverse engineering on the middle one and my call is 双月 (translator gives Soutsuki as a name). I'm not gonna testify in court, but I'm fairly confident the radical on the right (又) in that middle character is what you need to search by to find the rest.


----------



## tch757 (Dec 28, 2022)

Thanks for trying! I never thought it would be so hard determining who made it and what kind of steel it is.


----------



## Atso_J (Dec 29, 2022)

tch757 said:


> Thanks for trying! I never thought it would be so hard determining who made it and what kind of steel it is.


There are so many blacksmiths, sharpeners and (small) shops out there and any of those could be the one branding the knife. I got several knives that are either too difficult to read because of the stylized kanji or there's just no mention of them at all over the entire Internet. They usually happen to be of quite good quality so it's a bit of a bummer for them to be left unrecognized.


----------



## bsfsu (Dec 29, 2022)

Atso_J said:


> There are so many blacksmiths, sharpeners and (small) shops out there and any of those could be the one branding the knife. I got several knives that are either too difficult to read because of the stylized kanji or there's just no mention of them at all over the entire Internet. They usually happen to be of quite good quality so it's a bit of a bummer for them to be left unrecognized.


Many of the older knives available on auction sites come from old shops/retailer's/blacksmiths that shut down before the internet (the interwebs has only been used by the masses for 20 years, knives a bit longer) hence no information about them.


----------



## Atso_J (Dec 29, 2022)

bsfsu said:


> Many of the older knives available on auction sites come from old shops/retailer's/blacksmiths that shut down before the internet (the interwebs has only been used by the masses for 20 years, knives a bit longer) hence no information about them.


True. However, I've come across several knives that look like they have been around for 10 years max and still found nothing about them.


----------



## Pikehaus (Dec 29, 2022)

Atso_J said:


> I did some reverse engineering on the middle one and my call is 双月 (translator gives Soutsuki as a name). I'm not gonna testify in court, but I'm fairly confident the radical on the right (又) in that middle character is what you need to search by to find the rest.


If it was, then the whole thing means Tokyo, Japanese steel Double Moon something.


----------



## bsfsu (Dec 30, 2022)

Atso_J said:


> True. However, I've come across several knives that look like they have been around for 10 years max and still found nothing about them.


Many shops in Japan don't have an online presence, or if they do it is in Japanese and not English.


----------



## Qapla' (Dec 30, 2022)

Pikehaus said:


> If it was, then the whole thing means Tokyo, Japanese steel Double Moon something.



Yep, it'd mean "Tokyo", "Japanese Steel", and "Made by Soutsuki" [or Sôgetsu, or however the name 双月 is pronounced]


----------



## Atso_J (Dec 31, 2022)

bsfsu said:


> Many shops in Japan don't have an online presence, or if they do it is in Japanese and not English.


That's why I search with kanji if I've managed to recognize them. The hits don't necessarily come from shops but if they're mentioned somewhere that's at least something.


----------

