Posts: 795 Location: Wyoming
Tue 27 Jan, 2015 4:58 pm
Well it's hard to make any kind of good judgement based on the koshirae (fittings) alone, so try to get a few pictures of the blade and the tsuba (guard).
One primary way of judging the age would be to see what the tang looks like. But someone who doesn't know how to remove the hilt properly might damage it.
That is the hollyhock emblem of Tokugawa family all across the koshirae, but I highly doubt that it is connected to the family. As a whole it looks more recent and probably not Japanese. Because the Tokugawa family was so powerful and well-known, it would be an easy emblem to use to try to show a Japanese origin, like using a fleur-de-lis for french sword or US for civil war sword I guess.
The koshirae actually looks metal or metal embossed, which is not really something you see until a later type of fittings, (gunto, or early 20th century). I can't think of any historical examples with a metal handle like that, from any time. There are some strange and wonderful tanto fittings, but this looks like a katana-length sword.
If it were a gunto I'd expect to see some type of hanging strap because they were hung from a belt, rather than the earlier style of thrust in a kimono belt.
These are all pretty general observations. There are other people here who know far more than I do, but hey, thought I'd start it off. At this point I would be surprised to find out it is genuine, but perhaps it is hiding a great blade...
Try to get pictures of the blade and the guard, and find out what material the scabbard is made of. From here the guard doesn't look genuine.
Here's a link to a simple google image search for "Hollyhock Emblem". They are called Mon and represent a family, clan, tribe, what-have-you.
https://www.google.com/search?q=hollyhock+emblem&espv=2&biw=1366&bih=681&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=qTTIVMvtG4KWONSCgIgO&ved=0CB0QsAQ