Kana on Medals and Swords

[Bruce Pennington]

Hoping to see if anyone knows the signficance and/or meaning of the kana on the ring attachment of these Red Cross Society medals. There are several pictures, so I'll post the link and then add a sampling of the photos to this post.

I ask not so much for the medals, but because we have a few kaigunto blades with the カ stamped under the Toyokawa anchor. The two may not be related, but we're grasping at straws to find the purpose or meaning of the stamp on the blades.

Marks of the Japanese Red Cross Society Medals | Medals of Asia


It is the KA I am interested in, but if there is a reason for the kana on the medals, maybe it will help us understand.


Here is the KA on a blade

[Akira Komiya]

I can’t help with the kana カ on the blades of Navy swords, but the kana on the ring attachments of the Red Cross medals must be maker marks. In fact, Japan X in the second page of his article shows that the kanji 大 which appears on some Red Cross medals is an abbreviation of 大橋 “Oohashi”, a supplier to the Japanese Red Cross which was located in Shitaya, which is currently the area around Ueno in Tokyo. Although the number has somewhat diminished, there are still many shops which make commemorative medals, badges, etc. per order in Japan and some of them must have won contracts to strike and supply medals to the Red Cross in the old days. Considering the large number of such shops, it is only natural that they be required to mark their goods with their hallmarks to distinguish it from the products made by other shops in case of quality issues.

[Bruce Pennington]

Thank you my friend. In a way, you have helped me with the sword question, as you confirmed another example of shops using one kanji of their name to mark a product. We have been suspecting that was the case in the navy sword stamps, but haven't proved it yet. But your point is another piece of evidence supporting the idea. Here are the known stamps on navy blades that are a mystery. You can see that we have been guessing as to the origins of some: