European Maker's Marks on an Indian Firanghi

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Lee

That is one beautiful sword regardless of where the blade was made! My initial impression is for a European origin for the blade and we know from Oakeshott’s writings that inscriptions on many old European blades are incomprehensible to modern minds even if they made sense at the time or perhaps they were decorative all along.

Below (top) is a picture from the blade of a khanda. A wootz grain is perceptible (dark swirls and not light random spots from mildew attacking the waxed finish) and the blade is relatively stiff and heavy. Even when little attempt has been made to use the crucible steel decoratively, areas of carbide grains may testify to the blade being Asian.

The second photo (bottom) is from a firangi with a very flexible blade. There does not appear to be evidence of wootz and fine slag stringers are present and at the red arrow is a nasty cold shut blister from the repeated folding needed with steel of bloomery origin exposed as the blade has been thinned by re-polishing over time. (Such flaws are not reliably absent from all blades of crucible steel origin, but they are usually less prominent).

The last photo of the sword under discussion does sort of suggest such a blister and wootz grain does not appear to be present in the photos, hence my favoring a European blade origin.

[I will, in due course, arrange photos of the whole of these two swords – the early mounting style of the khanda possibly explaining why the hole peeking out by C+ in the second to last image may be there, but that is another discussion.]

Lee, just to say it is fantastic to have your input on this sword, which indeed is a beautiful example!
Also, it is so helpful to have your well explained reasoning concerning the metallurgic aspects of this blade. My thoughts were based on the character of the markings, which as you note correspond to descriptions and notations on these by Mr. Oakeshott.

As you have pointed out the convention of using letters and symbols in arcane arrangements from late medieval into early renaissance periods carried well into 17th century. The political and religious intrigues prevalent prompted cryptic representations, which in degree became associated with quality imbuements.

Thank you!!!

[vilhelmsson]

Lee,

Thank you for the close ups on the khanda and firangi. Very helpful observation on the metallurgical analysis; it's going in the evaluation toolbox.

Jim,

Thank you for your observations. I hadn't well observed how the Indian smith echoed the engraving on the blade in the koftgari. You helped me find more beauty in this sword.

fernando,

It's been 3 days since I made that last post, and I'm still trying to come to grips with 2008 being 11 years ago!

[fernando]

Originally Posted by vilhelmsson

fernando,

It's been 3 days since I made that last post, and I'm still trying to come to grips with 2008 being 11 years ago!

I guess i don't get the meaning of your words.
Maybe it helps if emphasize that my post, that you located, was submitted by me in 2008; and when i said that i couldn't figure out the meaning of the letter combination, i was actually referring to the inscriptions in your sword blade, not those in my old post.

On a different approach and in order to redeem my previous misjudgement on the origin of your blade, i would try and expose some of the signs that triggered my suspicion.
You will notice that, the writing on blade does not start from the hilt towards the point in both faces, resulting that the lettering on the left side appears to have some (two) of the letters upside down. Then if you turn upside down the sword itself, those such letters seem to make sense. Only that the acutely angled 'symbol' that appears in both sides gains two different aspects;and instead of possibly been a latin V or and a A, got me thinking of both or either 7 and 8 in Arabic numbers. In a way that i thought of an Indian 'scribe' playing the Eurpean and not an European playing senseless.
... As senseless must be all that i am trying to say so, just forget it.


.

[fernando]

Originally Posted by vilhelmsson

fernando,

It's been 3 days since I made that last post, and I'm still trying to come to grips with 2008 being 11 years ago!

I think i've got it .

[Philip]

Fernando, did you notice that letters like the C and the L are formed with serifs at the ends of the strokes (the E has dots terminating them), where as those V marks lack them and for this reason plus the slight concavity of the sides, really suggest the Arabic 7 or 8 numerals, especially as they would be written by a scribe with a qalam or reed pen?

What a cryptic mixture! Very interesting, and on a magnificently-mounted sword!

[fernando]

Pretty well put, Filipe ... and recomforting too.
... meannig i am not all that senseless.