is a

Japanese sword A is one of several types of traditionally made swords from Japan. Bronze swords were made as early as the Yayoi period (1,000 BC – 300 AD), though most people generally refer to the curved blades made from the Heian period (794–1185) to the ...

that has a forged and sharpened blade. The term ''shinken'' is often used in contrast with ''

bokken A ''bokken'' (, , 'wood', and ''ken'', '(double-edged) sword') or ''bokutō'' (, , 'wood', and ''tō'', '(single-edged) sword') is a Japanese wooden sword used for training in kenjutsu. It is usually the size and shape of a ''katana'', but is so ...

'' (wooden sword), ''

shinai A is a Japanese sword typically made of bamboo used for practice and competition in '' kendō''. ''Shinai'' are also used in other martial arts, but may be styled differently from ''kendō shinai'', and represented with different characters. ...

'' (bamboo sword), and iaitō (unsharpened metal sword). Shinken are often used in battōdō, iaidō, and

iaijutsu is a combative quick-draw sword technique. This art of drawing the Japanese sword, katana, is one of the Japanese ''ko-ryū'' martial art disciplines in the education of the classical warrior (samurai, bushi).Gordon Warner, Warner, Gordon and D ...

(forms of combative sword-drawing), as well as tameshigiri (test-cutting through targets). In these arts, shinken may be used alongside unsharpened iaitō (居合刀) or mogitō (模擬刀), training swords manufactured for swordsmanship practice. ''Gendaitō'' (現代刀; modern-made swords) are handmade shinken by one of approximately 250 swordsmiths active in Japan at the moment, members of the Japanese Swordsmith Association. These swordsmiths are limited by Japanese law to producing no more than twenty-four swords a year each. This limit, along with highly specialized skills and the need for a great deal of manual labour, accounts for the high price that a Japanese-made shinken (Nihontō) can fetch—starting from about US$6,000 for the blade alone, and going many times higher for genuine antique (Mukansa or Ningen Kokuho are two famous types) blades. There is also a large worldwide market for "shinken" made outside Japan. Many collectors consider these to be somewhat worthless as collectibles (since they are not Nihontō), but some martial artists continue to purchase and use them, because of their considerably lower price, ease of acquisition, and also to spare their valuable Nihontō from what some view as abuse. The vast majority of these are made in China, but there are custom smiths all over the world manufacturing swords in the Japanese style.

References

External links

Japanese Sword Laws FAQCollecting NihontoNihonto Japanese Swords
Practice swords of Japan {{Sword-stub

See also

References

External links