Excellent thread ...To which I add in agreement that these moons were probably not owned by individual sword makers moreover they were associated with different factories rather as a quality marker...something like the Passau wolf marks...and Ferrera marks. In my view I view Arabian swords with moons placed by local sword smiths here at
https://books.google.com.om/books?id...swords&f=false
I am not certain when all the sword design/decoration influence occurred between Europe and Africa though some sources indicate as early as 14th C...It seems to me that moons were often accompanied by suns in the European examples but the Moons were either favoured by African and Islamic subjects because of the new moon thus must have carried a TALISMANIC IDEA..