mysterious marking on kaskara

David R · 16th February 2012, 03:29 PM

Back in the days before the Chinese started making replicas a lot of kaskara and takouba were revamped by reenactors into "medieval" swords, and for swords used in cutting demonstrations this still goes on. I have two such myself, originaly a kaskara and a takouba, the one with an old (17thC) Solingen type blade and the other native made. Both came to me as unmounted blades, but I have seen complete swords reconfigured even quite recently.
I am now looking to retro fit my two, and another unmounted takouba blade I have back into their African form.
Myself, I am more than happy to have a trade blade in an ethnic sword ..Interestingly Ian Bottomly at the Royal Armouries tells me that the starting point for some Western collections was native blades from all over the world brought back to use as models for trade blade production. Thus producing what the market already wanted, rather than trying to sell the locals an unfamiliar item.
There is also the wonderfull post by S.Al-Anizi about the Bazaar in Riyadh, in which a respected local dealer claims that European blades are second only to the best Indian wootz.

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16th February 2012, 03:29 PM	#27
David R Member Join Date: Jan 2011 Posts: 1,120	Back in the days before the Chinese started making replicas a lot of kaskara and takouba were revamped by reenactors into "medieval" swords, and for swords used in cutting demonstrations this still goes on. I have two such myself, originaly a kaskara and a takouba, the one with an old (17thC) Solingen type blade and the other native made. Both came to me as unmounted blades, but I have seen complete swords reconfigured even quite recently. I am now looking to retro fit my two, and another unmounted takouba blade I have back into their African form. Myself, I am more than happy to have a trade blade in an ethnic sword ..Interestingly Ian Bottomly at the Royal Armouries tells me that the starting point for some Western collections was native blades from all over the world brought back to use as models for trade blade production. Thus producing what the market already wanted, rather than trying to sell the locals an unfamiliar item. There is also the wonderfull post by S.Al-Anizi about the Bazaar in Riyadh, in which a respected local dealer claims that European blades are second only to the best Indian wootz.