Thanks so much Colin! It must have been incredibly interesting to have been there and experienced all of this first hand. As is well known, for quite some time over years I was researching and posting along with Peter (who wrote as Ibrahiim al Balooshi) here. There was considerable consternation in the discussions involving the character of these conical hilt broadswords, most of which derived from the focus of these used in the Omani 'dance' with swords in traditional ceremonies.
As he was in Oman for nearly 30 years as active British military with Omani forces, and was involved in the antiquities trade for much of that time, his observations of course in my view were well founded. As he had occasion to witness these ceremonies often, as well as being active with Omani forces, he was familiar with current and of course the earlier character of warfare there.
With the antiquities, most of his expertise focused on the khanjhar daggers, but of course extended into the swords as well.
It was in this context that my research in those years now a decade ago were centered. While most of the historical research revealed that these conical hilts seem to have derived in almost a simplified revival of much earlier hilt forms in Arabian context, they did not occur in this hilt form until the 1820s at earliest. Prior to this the Ibathi 'battle swords', with guard and much shorter blades were the primary Omani swords.
These swords prevailed in the limited regions of the very fundamental Ibathi Form of the Islamic Faith, which was situated primarily in the interior of Oman in Nizwa. The coastal regions of Oman, Muscat, were quite different as there were more options to foreign trade and influences. Here too, with the factor of trade, were Omani connections to its Sultanate in Zanzibar.
Here as I recall from research then, was where the Omani situation became more open to change from the more fundamental character in Oman, and the Sultan in Zanzibar began implementing changes in certain aspects of weaponry.
It seems as he began developing his more 'modern' form of Omani character, he included breaking away from the traditional form of Abbasid sword that had remained in use for quite literally a millenium, and adopted this new hilt style.
This was before the mid 19th c. and it seems that the Sultan of Zanzibar was pretty much dictating styles etc. to the Omani base in Muscat, which as you note, was quite separate from the Nizwa interior of Oman.
The sword 'dance' (Razha,, if I recall) was either begun or enhanced as part of his campaign to legitimize and to popularize his regime through regalia and ceremony.
While this is sort of a summarized version of what I recall of all this, I wanted to add it here to explain more of how my positions on these interesting swords developed.
The problems began when it seems there was confusion about battle sword vs. decorative status symbol/dance prop and the character of these being entangled.
As Peter often related, in the time he was there, Oman still remained a place isolated from the outside world, and the people there had little knowledge nor interest in its history. In many ways, it was virtually archaic, and not open to most contact. As I earlier mentioned, when I acquired my example of the 'kattara' (as they were incorrectly termed then) these were virtually unknown in most collections here in the US (this was in the 90s). The only data known on them was in Robert Elgood's "Arms & Armour of Arabia" (1994) and even there any history of these was obscure.
While I have the books by Burton, I need to get the one by Peers. Also, hopefully I can find a good history of Oman from 18th century on, which seems kind of hard to find.
Thanks again for sharing all this, and again, my interest is really piqued to go further in learning on this topic.
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