Cost is the main reason many do not indulge an interest in antique arms I think. Most people I know find my collection interesting - but are somewhat staggered by the investment it takes. It takes a fair bit of sacrifice for most of us I would guess to put the money into this hobby. On the plus side I like putting my spare cash into something that will be around for years and years.

[QUOTE=fernando]Not so fast, Jonathan ;)
You must widen your search;QUOTE]

I thought I would point those interested in the right direction to the well... :D

Glad it quenched your thirst Fernando!

Back to the topic..... Sorry for an interuption to your normal service!

J

I know some young collectors with a lot more money than me, just if there under 40 they dont seem to collect weapons......

Just old moter bikes, rare guitars, cameras, certan watches... stuff like that.

/j

I'm 48 - I've had a long time interest in weapons since my younger days as martial artist and then fencer (not hard to see why I like swords). I got my first replica katana at 21 but then it was many years before I could afford to venture into antique weapons (for all the reasons mentioned by others), probably started actually seriously studying and collecting about 5 years ago. Seems like when I was young I could actually use the things, in the intervening years I had neither time nor money, and now I can't use them I can start to afford nice old weapons :)

Hello all!! Interesting Thread. Don't know how I missed the earlier Posts?
I am 62. My first item was a machete I paid $3.50 for in 1959.
I do have a few blades in my collection, but mostly firearms. I have both original and custom made replicas that I collect and shoot. American, European, and Ethnographic. I belong to a local (33 miles away) private gun club.
My main area of interest is Ethnographic firearms. I've wanted a Moroccan Snaphaunce since I was about 14 years old, but never did anything about it. Well, about 45 years later, I now own two. One in shooting condition and the other will be sometime next year. I own a variety of Moroccan, Algerian, Turkish, Persian, Indian, Afghan, etc. pistols and long arms. My favorite pass time is refurbishing these Ethnographic firearms into safe shooting condition. I've only Posted a couple of these refurbished pieces here on the Forum. I guess I should Post some more. By early Summer, 2013 I should have a large variety of these guns completed. A friend has talked me into doing a series of You-Tube type videos with me actually shooting these guns. Even loading with original flasks/horns.
I guess I've been collecting since I was about 12 years old. What I call my collecting hobby, my late wife called a disease. Of which there is no known cure. :D Now, if my bank account can only keep up with me. :rolleyes:
It is such a pleasure to be a member of this Forum. Rick.

Without doing an actual calculation i'd say we seem to be averaging somewhere in the 50s. :)

I welcome this suggestion!! :D :D ;)

I also hope that those rarest of Weapon collectors *hushed tone*
"The Ladies!" Will also join in with the thread.

As Jonathan says, weapon ownership in the UK is somewhat frowned upon and after many years of misrepresentation of collectable (those no longer usable or intended to be used) weapons by the media, many people sadly do seem to see those who 'still' collect them as being in some way either aggressive or maladjusted.

Many small 'traders' shy away from any weapons here now (even edged ones). They are sometimes 'unsure' of the overly complex laws surrounding weapon ownership and many venues won't allow their sale anyway.

Which takes us onto 'what attracted us' to collecting these cultural icons.
When I was a child, I grew up on a diet of Zorro, the Three Musketeers, Robin Hood.
I went to school and was taught about history including the Empires and wars, the great battles and pivotal moments where history's great cultures and ideologies clashed.
When I was a child I loved my toy swords and guns.
I remember my father making me a wooden sword when I was about four years old and how I treasured that sword as it didn't buckle like the hollow plastic 'crusader swords' that could be bought in Woolworths!

But these were different times! Even in the 1970s/80s you would often see swords on peoples walls. Pub 'decor' was not complete without a sword or two hanging on the wall or a muzzle loader over the fire.

But then something changed.
It took a while but the end result was quite profound.
The emphasis in teaching history in schools was moved to economic and social history.
The laws on edged weapons were tightened and tightened further still.
And 'anti social behaviour' was linked to all manner of causes including violence on TV, violent play in children, toys, video games etc, etc...
But I think most importantly, weapon ownership (that was deemed to be 'without good cause') was made 'illegitimate' in the minds of the general public.
Over the years, people have asked me "Why" do I "need" to own these weapons?
Which makes me wonder whether they would ask a collector of antique porcelain dolls 'why?' they 'need' to own toys that they will never 'play' with?
Or a coin collector why they would own money they would never spend?

As though the lack of ability to use an antique weapon for it’s primary purpose invalidates it’s historic 'worth' as an item.

Which leads the rambling waters of my river of thought to my next point.
I think that the cultural connection to the blade has been severed in the UK.

I can’t imagine anyone questioning the mental stability of a collector of nihonto in Japan! But the sword is every bit as iconic an item to European culture as to Japanese, in fact I could easily argue that it is MORE important to European history and culture!

So is blade ownership in the UK or more specifically the once widespread appreciation of vintage and antique blades now destined to join the category of ‘nostalgia collectables’ as in the main the collectors are those brought up with what is now an anachronistic appreciation of them, and as such we are a diminishing 'breed'?

Do British collectors any longer have any natural successors to bequeath their collections to?
Or are ’we’ destined to become the next set of ’old boys’ with their train-set dioramas in the attic? Or like collectors of ‘tin plate toys’ and nobody who wants to inherit them?
If so it will be the foreign collectors who save the value of our items, but many will eventually end up going overseas.

Sorry for rambling on. Thanks to anyone who stuck with it this far!

...hmm all things that they can show off in public to impress the ladies.

The only attention from the fairer sex I'd get showing off my latest acquisitions would be a policewoman with a taser.

But yes, there does seem to be a misunderstanding in the media about us, and that makes it hard talking about our hobby outside of like minded company.


And excellent post Atlantia, you had many good things to say there.

Very accurate, conscise & well worded statement of the issue Gene...

I see your point shimmer, but by the same token I ve found women a lot more accepting of a few walls covererd in kukris ,swords & knives then most "modern" men... The women go O wow hes a real bloke into that sort of stuff..& accept it easily.Where some men go, O wow hes got things that can kill people.. {read subtext ..me..}.. & due to thier own insecuraties feel threatend..

Girlies seem to accecpt my hobbies... soft lads feel threatend... :in my expierience...shrug:

Spiral

Hi Gene,
To follow on from your deliberations a selection of T.V. programmes shown at 5 p.m. weekdays when I was a lad. Things were definitely different in those days. I remember vividly as an adjunct to our History lessons our teacher arranged to take us to Kelvingrove Museum and once there the class was taken down into the basement and given a lecture on Medieval Arms and Armour complete with the curator dressed in a suit of armour handing round actual weapons for us to look at, I was 9 years old, happy days. The Museum used to be 'chock a block' with A&A including an Ethnographic Hall, now there is one small gallery upstairs for everything. It is very sad as Kelvingrove has one of the best collections in the World mostly in storage now. It seems anachronistic to me that movies and games are so much more violent and visually graphic these days and yet historical A&A is hidden away and shunned like a leper. As a kid everybody had a 'tin hat' and a bayonet or two with badges, patches and the like, I suppose this was more due to the period being in the first few decades after the war and these things were readily available at not a lot of money and no stigma attached to collecting these objects. My mother always knew what kind of movie was on at the local cinema on a Saturday afternoon as the children, me included, would be coming up the road fencing, pulling bows or drawing six guns all imaginary of course the game continuing all week until the next Saturday and another visit to the cinema. Both my children, boy and girl, played with wooden swords, "By the power of Greyskull", and toy guns and when old enough an air rifle and pistol, amongst other things of course, and neither of them are raging sword swinging gun toting bampots in direct contradiction to what some would have us believe. There are some young and energetic collectors in our Forum Family and hopefully they will keep the flame going and if there are any more out there who are interested JOIN IN you don't have to spend a fortune to have an interesting time here.
My Regards,
Norman.

Absolutely beautifully written and perfectly said Gene!!!
It is great to learn more on all of us and how we became 'afflicted' :)
As for the ladies, it is remarkable and fantastic to have a wife who understands, tolerates or best of all participates in this 'hobby'. It took me three ex wives and my wife now is fantastic at listening to my ramblings...I dont collect anymore so that is not an issue.

I would point out that we have some wonderfully knowledgeable and outstanding ladies with us, Tatyana and Cathy who visits occasionally and I think there are others. There have been some great references and articles written by women who are great arms scholars as well, so actually our interest in arms is hardly gender sensitive, and gratefully so.

All the best,
Jim

Great points Norman, the only thing more violent than the movies and games these days is the news....yet the now archaic historic weapons of yesteryear are stored away out of public view for fear of disturbing or offending?

All the best,
Jim

When the names are mentioned one cannot hide anymore :) Great posts boys!
I am 39; toy arms were my best toys as I was growing up in the former Soviet Union: a self-made bow, a wooden Gladius and a wooden Indian rifle that my father has made for me. I was dreaming of real swords of course, but possession of arms was strictly forbidden. Moving to Germany 12 years ago, where acquiring of arms is both affordable and acceptable, has made my dream come true.
I am working in a small computer company (about 25 persons), and two young men there (about 30 years old) collect antique swords as well. My 6 years old son really loves his wooden swords and takes them with him when walking around :) There is still hope after all :)

Hello peeps,
It seems I fall into the average age group! I'm 43 and have been involved with ethnic bits and bobs since a wee boy. my father was a cabinet maker and on accasion took antiques as part payment for work undertaken-my mother was not always so keen on this practise! My partner in collecting karina has been a keen lover of Indian weapons for several years and has it must be said caught the weapons bug-she's a younger 40 years old.

We buy and sell antique to help pay for our interest, it solves the money problem and allows us to own if only for a short time a wide variety of weapons and artifacts.

This is a wondeful thread, very cool to put ages to names...perhaps character profiles next............. :D !!

What is funny is the misconceptions we had regarding peoples ages, perceived youngsters are older, whilst the ageing wise ones are mere youths! It just shows never buy unseen! :D

Cheers to all. A & K

I'm 53 years old and I've been collecting since the early 90's.

Although I must say that I've always been interested in knives and this from my early childhood. When we went on schooltrips (e.g. to the Zoo), I always came back with a small tourist penknife. Now, I wished I kept these. :shrug:

Well, I am not sure about people losing interest in either history or historical items. Certainly there are plenty who are interested, but life is getting harder and other hobbies fill the vacuum easily and far cheaper.

I always liked swords since my childhood. But I was never able to collect so early so was satisfied with just drawing or designing swords. With time I forgot how much I liked swords, but I still would watch documentaries or read any information about them, just never thought of collecting them (there were some tries, where I would save and buy some Chinese made katana or a Syrian made ardha saif. But I knew these arent real and never gave it much attention) but only when I travelled to Greece in 2009 and visiting the military museum there did I get the bug back once again. When I went home, I bought my first 'real' sword and ever since I started collecting AND studying the field more seriously.

When it comes to jambiyas, my first real one was actually given to me as a gift from my uncle, he got it from his wife's family who live in Yemen. Its nothing fancy but an authentic dress piece non the less. Its one of the reasons why I developed an interest into Yemeni (and Arabian) daggers as a whole.

Sometimes I feel alone here when it comes to our hobby. There are people interested but not many willing to spend the cash on it. almost 4 years have passed and I have only met one Kuwaiti collector who is just a mere beginner, I rarely even hear from him. Saqir is another, he used to be in the forum but he no longer is interested in collecting swords though.

I reckon that we collectors are perhaps a part of why the hobby is not so wide spread, ofcourse that can be good and bad at the same time, but wouldnt the fact that we as 'private' collectors are a reason of holding historical items from the public? museums from what I read here seem to have an effect on alot of us which drove us to collect but as time passes and the more we collect, the more of history goes private for decades with only a selected (or overly interested) minority gets to view it.

Some people I know who tried to pick up the hobby felt crushed by the amount of fakes around. They never recovered from their mistakes and simply gave up on the hobby all together. Its their mistake though :-)

Museums are a double edged sword in this regard - yes some exhibit ethnographic arms and do it very well. Unfortunately most museums do not have the space to exhibit all their collections and a great many objects are never available for the public to view.

On subject of fakes - I think it very much depends on the area one collects in. Personally my area of interest doesn't have fakes per say - just things that are less old. :)

While there are many expensive cultures and types to collect there remain quite a few areas where things are still pretty cheap. To be totally honest that's one of the main reasons I got into takouba in the first place - it didn't require a huge investment to acquire a few examples.

I am 48 years , I have been collecting for about 10 years

antoine

I am 50, and I have been collecting and trading things since very early in life.

n2s

22 currently.

I like history and martial arts, and it led me to collecting antique weapons. But I am not much of a collector... I buy, enjoy it for a bit, and then sell to recuperate the cost. So I'm not big on collecting, due to a combination of cost, taking up space, and not really using them.... but they are very nice.

45. I'm a martial-arts oriented collector, weapons as objects of use, rather than objects of art. So I have modern replicas, mass-produced military edged weapons, and ethnographic weapons. Some stuff purely as art, but that's a spin-off from the main "user" collection.

lol.

ITF Taekwon-do
Chung Do Kwon
Muay Thai
Western boxing
Submission wrestling (w/a little BJJ)

Wot? No weapons?

ITF TKD
Liechtenauer, mostly longsword
Chinese spear
Chinese archery

In the past, foil fencing and SCA heavy if you call those martial arts.

Keep it clean! ;)

Wow! Nice! Thank you Andrew.

I did Tae Kwon do once, then Shotokan, then Judo, then Chinese Kenpo, an intro to Winchun and an intro to Arnis/Escrima. I am currently working on American Kenpo (with a small mixture of other stuff).

Also I got started collecting in my mid-twenties right after I got married.

My first piece was a Nazi SA dagger, but soon ditched that and got into pieces from the Philippines (and a few other countries).

Absolutely mate.
Although your pictoral examples are all middle aged men with weapons, so they do perpetuate the steryotype somewhat ;)

I've had an interest in knives since childhood.
I remember being on holiday in Jersey at age 7 or 8 and using my spending money to but a sheath knife (yes really) while my parents backs were turned!
It was a different time. The shop keeper just said "are you sure your dad said it's ok?"
Then when I was about 10/11 a family friend let me fire a flintlock dueller in his garage!
Click, fizzzzzzzz................ BOOOMMMM!!!! LOL

And I was hooked from that moment.

EDIT: My mother took the knife away and said I couldn't have it back until I was 11!
I got it back at 10! (yay)

Martial art's don't get any purer than Fencing!
Makes me wish I still had two ankles made of bone :shrug:

My collection has waxed and waned over the years.
I've always been of the opinion that if circumstances demand the sacrifice of the collection then that's OK.
Several times I've been forced to liquidate my collections entirely.
Thankfully I live in a country where there is no shortage of things to spend money on when circumstances allow.
We are custodians of these items for a short time. We keep them for a while, preserve and even at times restore, then they are passed to the next person. It's all part of their story.
They pre-date us and will outlive us. So we are just a small part of their story.
My collection now is probobly as good as it's ever been, but it's an evolving thing.
It's difficult to directly compare it with 'high points of the past'.
I still miss some of the items I've owned in the past. But It's more diverse now than it's ever been.
I decided a few years ago when I wanted to appear more 'rounded' to "Mrs Atlantia" that I'd soften the 'theme' with some associated items.
http://s25.photobucket.com/albums/c5...view=slideshow
I find now that I enjoy some of these items as much as the weapons.

I am 31. I started with a souvenir knife from a trip to Turkey when I was 14, if that counts as a beginning.