Documentary from 1997

kobayashi dldg, 4-7 Yotsuya Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo Japan

The Japanese sword is the soul of the Samurai. The crafting of this work
of art - which embodies beauty, strength and tradition - has been
shrouded in secrecy for more than thousand years.

Because of the highly advanced techniques and numerous years of
dedicated effort required in crafting Japanese swords, the skill has
always been a closely kept and jealously guarded secret.

Yohindo Yoshihara is a consummate Japanese swordsmith and a very high
regarded Mukansa craftman in Japan.

He is also the best-known Japanes
swordsmith outside of Japan.

His masterpieces have been purchased for exhibit by the Metropolitan
Museum of art in New York City and the Museum of fine Arts in Boston.

He
has numerous fans worldwide, including His Royal highness, king Gustav
of Sweden.

This video has been produced to appeal to all aficionados of Japanese
sword around the world and is a treasure trove of sercrets to Yohindo
Yoshihara's truly outstanding Japanese sword craftsmanship.

Link: https://youtu.be/gxwWf-MfZVk

Yoshindo Yoshihara

Swordsmith

Yoshindo
Yoshihara is a Japanese swordsmith based in Tokyo. His family have made
swords for ten generations, and he himself learned the art from his
grandfather, Yoshihara Kuniie.

Yoshindo himself gained his licence as a
smith in 1965.
Yoshihara uses traditional techniques in his work, and uses tamahagane
steel. Wikipedia

Deadly weapons forged as art

There's a gory history to every Japanese sword — even those being made today

Apr 27, 2008

The slow, rhythmic thrust of a piston covered in tanuki
(raccoon dog) skin blasted air from box bellows onto the searing-hot
charcoal. A casual glance at his forge was, however, all that Yoshindo
Yoshihara needed to know the fire’s exact temperature.

His sharp
eyes behind his glasses may have been intent on that vital blaze, but
they also appeared completely relaxed as this rather small man with a
goatee beard brought his decades of experience to bear — working, it
seemed, completely absorbed in the moment. Then suddenly, in the blink
of an eye, he yanked the red-hot length of metal off the bed of fire
with a pair of long-handled pliers and across onto an anvil.

No sooner had Yoshihara done this than the two young men
beside him began to bring down their hammers alternately on the metal,
filling the downtown Tokyo workshop with the clanging and ringing of
their blows. Sparks flew in all directions as this master swordsmith
gripped the pliers unflinchingly, staring fixedly at the red-hot metal.

The
days when samurai ruled Japan with an iron fist may have ended some 150
years ago, but in this smoke-blackened smithy their presence lingers
on, as it does in many aspects of Japan’s culture, from the traditional
noh and kabuki theatrical forms in which they so often feature to the
rigidly hierarchical structure of its companies, in which underlings
still often refer to the boss between themselves as the “top samurai.”

Indeed,
some people will tell you that the reason cars are now driven on the
left-hand side of the road is because the samurai, who wore their swords
on their left hips, would walk on the left so the tips of their long
scabbards would not touch. Should that by chance occur, it would be
considered the height of insolence and reason enough to fight a duel to a
chillingly bloody conclusion.

Not that the samurai — the only one
of the four divisions of feudal Japanese society (whose other classes
were farmers, artisans and merchants) allowed to wear swords in public —
would look for any excuse to draw their swords in the way swashbuckling
movies like “The Last Samurai” might suggest. In fact, to members of
that fabled warrior class, the cold, hard steel of their swords
transcended mere lethal weaponry to symbolize no less than their very
souls.

“If the sword was just a tool, why would tokkotai
(suicide-mission) pilots during the Pacific War have one stowed in the
cockpit of their planes that they aimed to slam into oblivion against an
enemy ship?” says Yoshihara, who is one of Japan’s top swordsmiths.

Indeed,
there are countless fables and legends extolling the power and mystique
of the Japanese sword, and its role in Japanese history, with one named
Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi even mentioned in the eighth-century “Kojiki
(Records of Ancient Matters),” Japan’s oldest surviving historical
record. There, it is identified as one of the three Imperial regalia,
along with a jewel and a mirror.

In 1185, it is said that the 6-year-old
Emperor Antoku drowned clutching it in his arms during the defeat of
his Taira clan at the great sea Battle of Dannoura off present-day
Yamaguchi Prefecture, rather than have it captured by the enemy Genji
clan.

For Yoshikazu’s part — not to be outdone by his dad —
martial-arts movie star Jackie Chan popped in recently to purchase one
of his creations.

Sword stores sell both new swords and old swords
that are hundreds of years old. At the Sokendo store in Harajuku,
Tokyo, the cheapest sword costs about ¥300,000 and the average price is
¥1 million.

At 41, Yoshikazu has many years ahead of him to carry
on the Yoshihara style of sword-making, and the future will be even more
secure if his son in turn follows in his father’s footsteps.

Me, though, I was keen to know if Yoshihara thinks this ancient art form would still be around 100 years from now.

“If
you count one generation as lasting 25 years, 100 years would be four
generations,” Yoshihara said. “Judging from the current state of
sword-making in Japan, I think there will still be swordsmiths around a
century from now. How many, though, I don’t know.”

Not that the sprightly 64-year-old Yoshihara is ready to pass on the torch to the next generation just yet.

“With
every sword I make,” he said, smiling, “I try to improve on my last
one. But I still haven’t made one that I am 100 percent satisfied with. I
know that will never happen, though — even to my dying day.”