What were the regulations for the Army civilian employees to carry swords?

[Nick Komiya]

I'll give you a simpler theory. The tag and writing was not done by a Japanese and is fake. Where is the all important name of the man, more critical than the rank? Why does a Japanese need the aid of a ruler for drawing the lines of the characters? Why did he not use a contraction for his rank, if he had found himself running out of space to write?

[ghp95134]

... Where is the all important name of the man...

Nick, it looks to me like the name is folded up within the knot -- you can barely see some inkling [see what I did there?] between the crease and the rank. It also looks to me like the rank was just very clearly and precisely written, but without a ruler.

-- Guy

[Nick Komiya]

I did see the sloppy staining above that could be a name, but what's the point of writing your rank like the last writing you'd ever do in your life, if you make the name illegible? If at all, it should be the other way around. Given the length of the strip, the space allocation of characters don't make sense to me either. Anyway unless photos of the full tag are available, we are wasting our time here.

[Bruce Pennington]

It is a sale item on fleabay, and I have requested a full photo of the cloth tag from the seller. Hopefully he'll respond.

[toot]

any photos' of them?

[Bruce Pennington]

any photos' of them?

Post #63

[Bruce Pennington]

Nick, it looks to me like the name is folded up within the knot -- you can barely see some inkling [see what I did there?] between the crease and the rank. It also looks to me like the rank was just very clearly and precisely written, but without a ruler.

-- Guy

Guy & Nick - here's the full cloth strip. I don't know what it is above the rank, maybe you can make it out.

[ghp95134]

小谷軍曹
Ōtani Gunsō

[Nick Komiya]

For the reasons I already gave, that is not a plausible name tag. Thus it serves as no proof that the owner of the sword was a master sergeant.

As a matter of fact, as I already explained here before, the Type 95 gunto's nickname was 曹長刀、Master Sergeant Sword. The sword was initially a trademark of that particular rank, like the two sleeve Kolbenring stripes on German der Spieß uniforms. Sword-wear was expanded later to other lower NCO ranks, but the Type 95 was the Master Sergeant trademark. 　

Also, Gunzoku were not highly respected in the army and navy, so military personnel would never have wanted to be caught with Gunzoku tassels, in violation of regulations handed down by the Emperor. Tassels with brown backs were specifically for Gunzoku and would have been actively shunned by men of the fighting branches.

Wrong tag, wrong sword.

[Bruce Pennington]

Thanks gentlemen.

One last question for clarification - could Ōtani Gunsō just be a name? In English, there are people whose names are "Major" and "Sergeant" for example. But I don't know Japanese names.