Board Thread:News and Announcements/@comment-28053036-20151127090612/@comment-27334321-20151202204533

Me and a friend spent all night reading books about them. There might be info missing but this is what we got so far!

I don’t know what the canon will be for the swords when they are released, but the history behind them is pretty interesting. It’s also sad how Higekiri apparently barely remembers his brothers. *From what I read in the text sample of Higekiri’s image post*

They got their names from how they cut they were tested on a delinquent Higekiri got his name because he managed to cut the delinquents neck severing it but he also managed to cut the guy’s beard along with it so his name basically means beard cutter And Hizamaru got his name from being able to cut from the neck down to the knee making his name to mean Knee cutter Then the swords were given to the emperors son and the son gave Higekiri to his general Watanabe No Tsuna.

Higekiri’s name could also be Onikiri because of a legend that the General confronted a demon and cut off its right arm and brought it back as evidence that he did so. And since this is talking about the sword renamings, I assume he used Higekiri. And Hizamaru, used by Yorimitsu was used to slash at a giant shadow while he was in the affect of a fever delirium. Four generals followed the trail of blood and found a dead giant spider (Tsuchikumo) and he was renamed to Kumokiri-maru.

Minamoto no Yoritoshi as given both swords by Yorimitsu to support him in his campaigns against the then still unsecure nothern provinces. Yoriyoshi returned victories and gave the swords to his son, Hachimantaro Yoshiie, who in turn gave them to his fourth son, Tameyoshi. When Tameyoshi was in the possession of the famous and auspicious swords (For the Minamoto), they started to make a noise at night. The Onikiri (Higekiri) roared like a lian and was onced again renamed Shishi No Ko (Meaning lion cub). The sound of Kumokiri-mari (Hizamaru) was similar to a snake and so it received the name Hoemaru (meaning howler). They gave Tameyoshi’s son in law Hizamaru and made a copy of Higekiri and named it Kogarasu.

So by now I know that Higekiri and Hizamaru have been together for a long time up to that point. The smith of Hige and Hiza isn’t mentioned as it says that the smith itself is not mentioned But he lived in Deyama in the Mikasa district. The smith wasn’t as good as expected BUT he wanted to be so the smith prayed to the god Hachiman who heard him and gave him iron to forge the two swords. That’s one version of the story. The other story is where the Japanese emperor divided a Tang-period chinese lance of almost two and a hald meters in lenght into two equally sizes parts and ordered two mastersmiths, Mofusa from the Northen providence and Kokaji Munechika from Kyoto, to both make a sword from each part. But the problem was that Mofusa finished blade measured three shoku (90,9cm) but Munechika’s only two shoku (81,8cm) and the emperor felt he had been cheated of three sun and had Munechika arrested.

Munechika prayed for justice and for a sign to prove the purity of his head, whereupon the blade of the sun-nashi unsheathed itself and cut-off three sun of the makuragami. Deeply moved the emperor pardoned Munechika and sun-nashi, Tomokiri which means equal divider. Mofusa’s sword was named Makuragami and Munechika’s sword was name Sun-nashi. One meaning honest, the other meaning no/missing sun.