Interesting Yosegaki Hinomaru Find

[RisingSun45]

Hello all, first offical post here but a longtime lurker. I wanted to share this Yosegaki Hinomaru that I happened into, but with the amount of fakes of these i wanted to see if anyone could tell if it is authentic. I've had my brother who can read Japanese look at it and he can understand a bit but some of it is throwing him off, so I figured I would ask some experts. I apologize for the terrible pictures in advace, I look forward to your opinions, thanks!

[Nick Komiya]

Funny

[ghp95134]

Sorry Nick! But I just had to laugh with your frustration -- and apropos image!!! However, you and I both know that most Westerners don't know front from back with regards to written Japanese/Chinese.

(^____^)

RisingSun45: a *single* high-resolution head-on (i.e., flat) image suffices. I've rotated one of your images to give you an idea of the proper orientation:


Cheers,
- Guy

[ghp95134]

Verrrry briefly:

Right margin:
空だ男の行くところ
Sorada otoko no iku tokoro
The sky: the place where men go
[I'm certain that Nick can do much better!]

Main dedication:
祈武運長久
Inori Bu'un Chōkyū
Prayers for Continued Luck in the Fortunes of War

海軍豫備學生 [new kanji: 海軍予備学生 ]
Naval Prepatory Academy Student

山田幸作君
Yamada Kōsaku−kun
Mr. Yamada Kōsaku

Looks like the main calligraphy was signed by a navy captain:
海軍大佐 大竹***
Kaigun Daisa Ōtake ***
Navy Captain [colonel] Ōtake *** I cannot read his given name.

The rest will be mostly signatures of well-wishers.

-- Guy

[RisingSun45]

Thank you very much! Again I apologize for the terrible pictures, I just snapped a few quick ones in for a quick authentication. I will keep that orientation for next time! I really appreciate your quick reposnes!

[Bobby]

I have to admit that your response made me laugh. I am new to learning about Yosegaki Hinomaru and am at the stage of not knowing what I don't know. I also learned quickly that the corner mounting tabs go to the right for proper reading. Reading Kanji will take a bit longer...probably forever!

[Nick Komiya]

Yes, that is all too often how Yosegaki flag photos are posted for Guy and me to look at. When that happens, it is my policy to ignore the request, as I don't think I should be expected to attempt horizontal and vertical flips of photos before even trying to read handwriting that is often hard enough to read as is.

If you really cannot figure out which way is up and which side is forward, just shoot to cover all sides instead of expecting us to bend over backwards in doing you a Photoshop favor. As I have already proven to you above, apologizing for bad photography does not help at all in making Russian into legible English.

General rule of thumb is that staff-side is to the right, so the tabs should go to the right. Additionally, remember how the most common slogan of "Wishing You Everlasting Fortune in Battle 武運長久" comes out on a flag, when written vertically in that order or as 久長運武 when written horizontally from right to left. Those words will give you the correct orientation 99% of the time and serve as the North - South orientation keys.

Navy flight related flags like the one in question are the most heavily faked flags in Japan, because of Kamikaze fame. Such examples are more often bad than good, so they need to be approached with extreme caution, requiring minute detail to be checked for correct language use and inflections for those times, etc which is different in many aspects from present day Japanese.

[Razorback76]

I've seen original flags with the tabs on the left. They are usually on the right but some for whatever reason are on the left.
S

[Nick Komiya]

That is why I said right only being a rule of thumb and the additional need to be able to align the main slogan in the right way to get it up to 100%

[RisingSun45]

I finally got back from traveling and here is a much better picture of the flag in the correct orientation. Nick & Guy, please let me know if this is correct and if you feel like taking a crack at it, thanks! I also aquired what I believe is a small patriotic flag on an extendedable pole with carrying bag. It also has some writing on it, but it is very crumpled from being stored, so I'll get some pics of it once it's flat enough to make out the writing.
.