[Steve C.]

Hi -

I recently discovered this forum while researching this dagger or small sword as shown here in the photos.

I think it might be from Indonesia...Indo-Asia...not totally sure to be honest.

I do think identifying the markings on the blade will help...I've had no luck figuring them out. To me they look arabic or islamic...could be tamil/hindi...but I'm in need of some help if anyone has anything to offer it would be greatly welcomed.

The dagger/sword with the wood scabbard measures roughly 16 1/8 inches...the dagger/sword only measures roughly 12 3/8 inches.

Thanks.
-Steve

[Andrew Gill]

I don't know much about south-east asian weapons, so take what follows with a large pinch of salt:

The metal fittings on the scabard look modern to me (in the photos at least); the pommel looks like it started life as a large hex-nut and the ferule looks like a piece of split metal tubing with a modern screw or rivet. At first I thought that this was a dagger-stick, but the overall length you gave seems a little short for that. The blade does look somewhat reminicent of a kard, but that may be deceptive; as this is actually a pretty common shape for knife blades worldwide from ancient times. I have seen a very similar, if slightly more crudely forged blade in a modern zambian tourist-curio walking stick, and another on a scandiavian seax from the viking age. For that matter, the blade on this one does look somewhat cruder than the published pictures of kards which I've seen, with some forge-marks not completely polished out (although I suspect that is more due to a bias for high-end examples in books (and the museums which they usually use to obtain examples from). I would guess that it is recently made, but I'm not certain; it could also be an older blade that had bad corrosion and was agressively cleaned, leaving some of the worse pitting in (leading to what I thought were "forge marks").

For what its worth, I have read that "kard" is actually a catch-all persian word for any kind of single-edged knife (tool or weapon or both); if it originated somewhere where there had been persian influence in the past (eg. India or somewhere nearby), it would possibly have been referred to by this term by the person who made it.

[Eric S]

Steve, this is not a kard, I can not tell you what or were it comes from but kards are a single edged, straight bladed knife that are Indo-Persian in origin, as in Ottoman, Persia and India.


Ottoman kard dagger, early 19th century, extremely long, very high contrast wootz steel blade, walrus ivory grips, silver repoussé bolster and grip straps, typical Ottoman style stitched leather scabbard, original belt loop which is stitched to the scabbard and a small silver chape at the tip. 18.5 inches in the scabbard, and 17.5 inches out of the scabbard.

[Stephane Rabier]

Hi,
that's strange, it looks like if someone had tried to make a Basque makila from an Oriental blade and a military tent pole element

[Steve C.]

Hi Andrew, Eric & Stephane -

Thank you very much for your replies, most appreciated.

This was a recent discovery that seemed very interesting to me, but really had no idea as to what it would have been properly called and thus began my research that opened multiple pathways which weren't yielding anything definitive in my mind.

...the part which has me most intrigued are the symbols etched into the blade, to me (in my mind) that holds the secret of it's cultural decent (...I could be wrong...they may mean nothing and simply represent a decorative feature).

I really appreciate everyone taking the time to reply with their respective thoughts on this piece.

Thanks again.
-Steve