Another old shibriya

[motan]

Hi Klop,
Of course you are right. These rings are attached with a simple split pen, which is a petty. The majority of the older dagger are quite solid, but the ring is the first thing to get lost. Several of my daggers have a hole or and old repair where the ring should be and are therefore incomplete.
In the smaller dagger I showed in the my second post, the back side of the of the pommel is nicely finished, but this is quite rare. Mostly the bent arms of the split pen are visible. See a pic in this post.

[Klop]

Hi Motan,

great, thanks for the extra picture!
Yes, when carried every day it's understandable these things get damaged and also repaired again and again. Fortunately this method is cheap and could easily be fixed by just about anyone, no need to search for a dealer or send for repair :-) .


Kind regards,
Eric

[Yvain]

Hi Motan,

Sorry for the late reply, I had to wait for a day off to take pictures of my shibriya under natural light.


It was bought without provenance in France. As you can see, it is a very flashy, ornate, piece, although it exhibits some features characteristic of shibriya from the early XXth century. It does look fairly new which makes me think that it is a new piece in an older style, or that it is indeed old but was harshly cleaned by it's previous owner.


Regardless, it looks very nice in my opinion and the blade is really interesting.


Let me know what you think of it, and feel free to ask me if you need more information !


(Also, I would be very thankful if someone was able to translate the inscription on the sheath, as I don't read arabic myself.)

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by Yvain

It was bought without provenance in France. As you can see, it is a very flashy, ornate, piece, although it exhibits some features characteristic of shibriya from the early XXth century. It does look fairly new which makes me think that it is a new piece in an older style, or that it is indeed old but was harshly cleaned by it's previous owner.

Let me know what you think of it, and feel free to ask me if you need more information !

Hello Yvain,

I am not an expert by shibriyas but this looks to my eyes like a great antique example, special the blade is great!

I for my part think that this example is just cleaned, let it untouched for some time and the blinky touch is gone.

Motan will be able to tell you more but I like your example.

Regards,
Detlef

[Kubur]

1925 and the blade is amazing

I'm sure Motan will tell you more...

[kronckew]

Excellent!

[motan]

Hi,
I did not expect THIS. It is a very good, interesting and (relatively) old shibriya, but it is also a puzzling one. I can not tell you too much because my experience with shibriyas is all from looking at many examples, but I have never seen one like this one.

The construction and technique are consistent with 1925 and Jordanian origin, but there are several features I am not sure about. First, I am not sure that the scabbard with the date is the original scabbard of the knife. It could very well be original, but usually some elements of the decoration are similar between the hilt and the scabbard and that is not the case here. The numbers could not be interpreted as anything but 1925, but they are badly written, with the numeral 2 on its side.
Further, the blade is remarkable. I have never seen a blade like this on a shibriya and experts I have asked haven't seen one either. Looks almost Indian. Shibriya blades can be different shape, but are always quite simple. Could it be an older blade from thousands of miles away? Is it an imitation of earlier style? I don't know, but I feel it makes Syrian origin more likely.

The writing says A'mal Khalil (made by Kalil, thanks to my friend Mahmoud for helping), but the word in the second row is unclear because the first letter is ambiguous. I added a pic of one that is similar in hilt shape. It belongs now to A.Alnakkas from the forum. Perhaps A.Alnakkas can join this conversation because he knows a lot about this subject. Thanks for showing it.
Eytan