1) 1871 to 1891

2) 1891 - 1921

The McKinley Tariff Act was established in 1891. From that date items exported to US had to be marked with the english name of the country of origin. The name used at that time was "Nippon". This rules lasted until 1921 when the name was changed to "Japan".

2) Occupied Japan 1945-1952

During the period of occupation by US and in order to restart the economy, the export of products was authorized on the conditions that all exported products be marked with one of the following labels :

Therefore theoretically 50 % of the pieces manufactured during this period should have been marked as "occupied Japan" but in fact far less have been marked such a way and these pieces are now getting rare and becoming collectors items.

3)

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