Can you please help identify this chinese sword?

fearn · 2nd June 2005, 08:04 PM

Hi Ariel,

Personally, I'm not quite as worried, simply because a high quality fake is still pretty expensive to make. Part of the trick for the forgers is having a big enough profit margin to make accuracy profitable. The nice thing with many of these weapons is that we're paying for quality in the antique, as well as age and authenticity (not always, I know, but often enough).

Personally, I'll worry when metallurgy (or nanotechnology?) gets to the point where fakers can cheaply afford to produce quality weapons, using silver, rhino horn, or whatever. I'd also pont out that, if wages get high enough in China, we might see a sudden end to this flood, at least for a while. Much of this is only possible because skilled labor is still reasonably cheap over there.

I also wish that there was a good market for "high quality reproductions," but I suspect that enough people were just born crooked that this will always be a dream. It could also be Gresham's Law at work, I suppose (bad swords drive good swords out of the marketplace).

Fearn

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2nd June 2005, 08:04 PM	#8
fearn Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 1,247	Hi Ariel, Personally, I'm not quite as worried, simply because a high quality fake is still pretty expensive to make. Part of the trick for the forgers is having a big enough profit margin to make accuracy profitable. The nice thing with many of these weapons is that we're paying for quality in the antique, as well as age and authenticity (not always, I know, but often enough). Personally, I'll worry when metallurgy (or nanotechnology?) gets to the point where fakers can cheaply afford to produce quality weapons, using silver, rhino horn, or whatever. I'd also pont out that, if wages get high enough in China, we might see a sudden end to this flood, at least for a while. Much of this is only possible because skilled labor is still reasonably cheap over there. I also wish that there was a good market for "high quality reproductions," but I suspect that enough people were just born crooked that this will always be a dream. It could also be Gresham's Law at work, I suppose (bad swords drive good swords out of the marketplace). Fearn