Here are the names of the parts of a sword. The length of a sword is measured from the tip of the blade to the top of the nakago (the hilt), as illustrated on the following page. The curvature of a sword is an important factor for connoisseurs to evaluate because it often indicates the time and region where the sword was forged.
Published by Yurie Endo 遠藤由利江
I was born and raised in Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan, and then moved to Kamakura. Now I live in Los Angeles. I graduated from Meiji University and received a degree in literature and curatorship. I hold a curatorship license. I also graduated from California State University, Northridge, and earned an Economics degree. My father owned a manufacturing company related to metal. As his hobby, he had been collecting Japanese swords and other types of Japanese art objects. He was one of the administrators of Nihon Bijutu Token Hozon Kyokai(日本美術刀剣保存協会), which is a sword museum located in Tokyo. One of his friends (Mori Sensei), who was also the main administrator, used to hold a Japanese sword study group in his house. I joined his study group. Mori sensei’s group was very rare and valuable because he could bring top-quality swords as our study materials, due to his position in the museum. The kind of swords we could study were top-quality museum swords. Those are the kind of swords people could only see through the glass display cases. Also, I studied swords with my father since he kept many swords in our house. This is how I started to study Japanese swords.
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Study of Japanese Sword 