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NAKAYAMA MARUKA AWASADO

212mm x 76mm x 28mm

Reads on the stone top from the upper right down, JUN SHOSHIN HONZAN (pure specially chosen original mountain),

And faintly on the left edge SAIKOKYUHIN (very best quality)

Marked on the end of the stone in a rectangle MARUKA SHO HONZAN (Maruka correct true original mountain)*. This mark is faint and can best be seen when a bit of water is applied.

This Nakayama Maruka awasedo tomae stone is nearly NEW/OLD stock from a closed store in Japan. It looks to have been tried or tested over a period of time. I would guess that it was tested and found to be so hard that it was never purchased or taken out of the shop.

The actual color of the stone is more of a gray color like you can see on the back. There is a bit of color showing on the sides of the stone that indicate the interior of the stone might have some color, but only time will tell. As it sits the stone has a very even tone to the top polishing surface that is typical of tomae strata stones. The top looks a little tan in color now but this is partly because of the oxidized skin that forms over the years in reaction to the minerals in the stone. This skin is microns thin and can be polished off with a diamond plate before using and this will usually open up new cutting material and pores that make the stone easier to use. The back was hand chiseled and flattened and one corner is deeply under cut and shows the original strata skin suggesting that the stone was deemed worthwhile at the mine to take to the next finishing step of final shaping and polishing the surface.

A Swedish blue steel Ishido Teruhide blade was used to sample this stone.

I found the stone to be very, very hard and with the blue steel blade, there was some chattering suggesting that an advanced skill is required to get the full potential out of this stone. I found that a bit of high quality nagura helped a good bit but a diamond plate to create a slurry would be the key to this stone. You can see in the photos that the hagane became very bright and mirror like and the jigane also polished up while still keeping a contrast with the hagane.

Hardness       Grit         Speed/Strength       Price in U.S. $

   10/10           10/10          8/10                         SOLD        

*In usage when you encircle a kanji word as in this case KA, it becomes  MARU (circle) KA or MARUKA.