WW2 Japanese Army NCO's Katana, 1935P, rare variant, (sold)

A scarce iron fuchi / steel tsuba variant of the WW2 Japanese army NCO's katana in very good condition, matching serial numbers.

We 100% guarantee this is an authentic WW2 Japanese NCO's katana. Be warned, the vast majority of these swords on the market are reproductions. Again, this one is 100% authentic, guaranteed.

Correctly stamped serial number and Kokura arsenal acceptance stamp to the blade. Correct plain iron fuchi for the serial number, plus correct bohi (blade grove location) show this is an authentic WW2 NCO's shin gunto.

This is one of the rarer plain steel tsuba with plain iron fuchi NOC katanas produced towards the later stages of WW2. The serial number 113550 is found on both the blade and the saya (scabbard) throat, so the sword and scabbard are original to each other. If you research Richard Fuller and Ron Gregory's book on Japanese military swords, you will see they cite an exact same example (plain steel tsuba, plain iron fuchi) on a katana with the serial number 113341, so the sword is 100% as it should be. The same plain steel tsuba was later used on the replacement 1945 model / pattern of the NCO's katana, but to find one on this model (1935 pattern) is quite rare.

The 26 1/4 inch blade (excludes habaki) is in exceptionally good condition and is firm in the hilt. The aluminium hilt has lost virtually all of its copper brown paint and appears to have been painted black at some stage; the few remnants of the black indicate it is period, that the hilt was coated black for active duty purposes. The steel saya / scabbard has most of its black paint remaining; please note, when I say "paint", I do not mean regular (later) paint, but a coating I am sure is period. A very nice example with, I am sure, some history to it. Further / full sized images available upon request. Please quote reference number B39 (500).