Japanese what is it? Coming up in a auction

[A. F Medic]

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Patrick Chadwick]

Well I'd love to know, because I am going crazy trying to find those signs in a book that lists over 1000 kanji signs. There are so many of them that look sort-of-the-same-but-not quite!

Patrick

[Aragorn243]

Not much help I know but I can tell you what it probably is not, a unit flag for an Imperial Army Air Force unit.

I went through my markings guide and there isn't anything even remotely close to it in there.

[A. F Medic]

My first uneducated guess is that is a patriotic banner of some sort. It is in this auction in Corry Pa. auction_date_page_2.htm

There is a trench gun in there but really can't see much of it. Neat signed German flag also.....

PS. It is not my auction ....

[Patrick Chadwick]

Well I'd love to know, because I am going crazy trying to find those signs in a book that lists over 1000 kanji signs. There are so many of them that look sort-of-the-same-but-not quite!

...And now I now why! - The flag is reversed!

Before someone chips in and says that he can read "shells" on a box at top right of the photo, so it must be OK - well I can read that too. The photo itself is not reversed, it is the flag that is reversed (i.e. placed on the table so that we are, in fact, looking through the back of the markings).

As I already mentioned, I have a list of kanji symbols, in this book:

Attachment 23020

They are numbered according to what is apparently a standard scheme for schoolchildren learning the kanji symbols. So if anyone else has such a book, or knows someone who can speak Japanese, then it should be easy to check what I am writing here.

If you look at the extract from the book cover

Attachment 23022

...and then at the flag photo, as first posted

Attachment 23023

...then you see that the 3rd symbol on the bottom line of the flag is the same as the second symbol in the extract from the book cover but reversed!

So we need to reverse the flag photo....

Attachment 23021

... and then it becomes decipherable.


The kanji symbol numbers are (from left to right)

103 / 248 / ??? / 539.

103: "cho" = long, chief, head ... compounds have the general flavor of "bossness" or "top of the pile"

248 "ya" = field, plain, area (also in the sense of area of research etc)

??? I have not yet worked out.

539 "****su" = room

This gives a transliteration of "head area ??? room" - an impression of "headquarterly-ness".

Note that the ??? symbol is the same as that in the center of the flag. I feel that this is the key to the whole thing. I canot clearly identify it as either a kanji or kana, but it is obviously the main symbol. The trouble with the whole decipherment is that we are looking at a fluid "handwriting" that can deviate from the printed symbols in subtle ways.

Perhaps someone else can build on these beginnings?

Patrick


P.S: that should be s-h-i-t-s-u, not ****su. Not my lousy typing, just a software filter for children. How ridiculous.

[Patrick Chadwick]

The symbol at top left of the flag looks like kanji 716 "jun" =pure

[Patrick Chadwick]

The word "pure", combined with the "splashy/dynamic" nature of the central symbol and lack of any military keyword all lead me to think that it is a political flag.

Patrick

[Patrick Chadwick]

Man this software is stupid. It turned s+h+i+t+s+u into ****su, presumably because it did not like the s-h-i-t

How ridiculous! Let's see what it does with that internationally known company Matsu****a

As I suspected.

Dear site operators,
could we perhaps NOT be treated as children speaking naughty words? Please turn off this nanny software filter.

Patrick


So let's see what it does to the respectable English town of S****horpe.

[Midmichigun]

Patrick,
I can't weigh in on either topic ( nanny filter or reading kanji). However, I am interested in your progress on deciphering this. Good luck... and keep plugging away.

[Patrick Chadwick]

I think the ??? symbol could be kanji 956 "ei" = long