#kanesada

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I think the best bet would be if you could find the previous owners and trace it back to the family of a Shinsengumi member.

You might be able to submit the blade for shinsa with the NTHK or NBTHK. This would mostly be for verifying the authenticity of the blade and whether it was really made by Kanesada rather than finding out its history, but I remember hearing stories about how people sent a blade for shinsa only to discover that it's a long-lost national treasure belonging to someone famous.

That said, I can't imagine how someone could determine whether a blade belonged to the Shinsengumi without knowing its ownership history. Unlike national treasures, I don't think there are detailed records about all the blades owned by the Shinsengumi members that we could use to match the blade to its original owner, but I could be wrong.

Another possibility would be to contact a Japanese historian or museum that specializes in the Shinsengumi. Or better yet, a Hijikata family descendant such as the Hijikata Toshizo Museum that's run by a descendant of Hijikata's older brother, but I'm not sure if it's possible to make inquiries in English. The Hijikata family might potentially know whether Hijikata Toshizo owned any other Kanesada swords, since he already had at least 2 katana, a wakizashi, and a tanto by Kanesada (did he collect them? 😅). They might have the documents to identify any of Hijikata's swords that might have gone missing over time.

Just wondering, is the sheath red with a design similar to this?

Most of Hijikata's were red. That must have been his style 😅

And do you see any Hijikata kamon on the koshirae? If that's true, then there's a very good chance it could be one of Hijikata's swords, but even then, it would be hard to tell for sure.

The Nihonto Message Board is another resource. While they probably couldn't verify it for you, they might have more ideas about how you could get verification.

Even if it couldn't be verified as Shinsengumi, it's still really cool to have a sword made by Kanesada.

I would love to see some photos 😊

BTW: Did you get it from the SF Japanese Sword Show by any chance? I went there last weekend and bought a nice late-Edo tanto koshirae:

I need to revived my self by drawing another Kanesada. I’m still working on the watercolor version, a bit slow since I use different size of paper and I’m not confident after finish my Kasen’s artwork. But I hope I can finish this soon! So I can make more Kanesada brothers content! Hahahaha

last minute drawing of kanesada for my art prints! i really want to make prints of the other swords but maybe next year.