Help with yatagans' inscriptions
 

A friend of mine from Bulgaria has several yatagans and he would love to learn what the transcriptions on them mean. Can anyone help, I would really appreciate it?
Thank you very much,
Teodor

Pictures of first yatagan attached

Second yatagan, and a stamp from the third yatagan.

W :eek: W!

Are those 4 rows of twist core I see!?!? Please show the rest of the sword! :D

And the inscription on the 4th piece, followed by pictures of the yatagans.

I am not sure Jose, I think this pattern is referred to as Turksih Ribbon. Whatever the case, it certainly took a skillfull smith to produce this lovely blade, and hopefully we may learn his name if the inscription is translated.
Regards,
Teodor

The second one with walrus ivory looks Balkan by the ear profile.

They are all Balkan, collected in Bulgaria, with details such as villages where these were found available for a few of them. Of course, they could have travelled from one place to another in the past, but I Believe they were all made in the Balkans. Based on examples, walrus hilted yatagans are generally from the Western Balkans, such as Bosnia, and in the Eastern Balkans the hilts are mostly from dark horn - predominantly cow or buffalo, although on one of the examples pictured, which has the smallest ears, the hilt is made of rhino horn.

Hello Teodor, could you post some pictures of the rhino horn handle? Thank you :)

This is the only picture I currently have.

All those blades are of Turkish Ribbon pattern; are they not ? :)

Yes Rick, they are, or at least this is what they appear to be to my eye based on the pictures. It appears this pattern was quite popular on yatagans, which is not so surprising.
Regards,
Teodor

With the hope of bumping this thread up in search of translations, here are two Kamas from the Caucasus, also found in Bulgaria, for comments. One of them has an inscription, and the other one a maker's mark with some writing inside. Can anyone read and translate them?
Thanks,
Teodor

Book with inscriptions
 

There is a Russian Book with quite a few inscriptions on yataghans translated, but you need to speak Russian. There are also French articles of yataghan translations. I have heard a couple of the Russian book may be printed in English soon.

Always enjoy seeing a coretwist balde...

rand

Thanks Rand,

I do read Russian (which is different from speaking it) without problems. Which books is it - Astvatsaturian's "Турецкое Оружие"? I did not get it when I should have and I am afraid it is out of print now.

Regards,
Teodor

Punch shape for inlay
 

Would like to point out the use of a retangular punch in a series of over lapping punches used to form the channel for the silver to be inlaid in the first yataghan posted in this thread. You can clearly see the retangular punch marks where the silver is now absent.

Thanks very much for posting these photo's,

rand

I count five on the upper and six on the next sword with a back and edge welded on as well.

Ric

I am afraid my friend has developped an addiction to damascus yatagans now and he is on a quest to acquire them all. Here is his latest acquisition and I believe this time the yatagan originates from Asia Minor as opposed to the Balkans. Here are some pictures along with the usual request for translation - I have not lost hope yet.
Teodor

Hi,
The inscription is "amel-e elhac mustafa, sahib ahmed aga" [made by mustafa the pilgrim, owner ahmed aga]

the date is partly erased, I could only make out the number "88" at the very end, and it's probably 1288 hejira= 1871-1872

This one is "tevekkeltüa'l-llah" [I put my trust on Allah]
The date is 1265 hejira = 1848-1849

The picture of the stamp is too small for me to make out the name, but it's clearly amel-e .......(Melik maybe). A bigger picture might help.

Zifir,
Thank you very much Sir, especially as this is not the first time you have helped me with translations. I will pass this info to my friend, who I am sure will also be very grateful. For me personally the fun of collecting historical weapons lies in learning as much about them and their history as possible, and putting a name to a sword or dagger greatly increases its sentimental value. Once again, thank you.
Teodor

Here is another nice yatagan of graceful proportions. The blade is not damascus, but there are inscriptions in silver. As always, I would be very grateful to whoever helps translating them.
Regards,
Teodor

And yet another yatagan, very similar to the previous one I posted in this thread in terms of style, blade decoration and hilt fittings. The band on the hilt and the bolster are almost identical. Can someone please help with translation? I am particularly interested in the names of the makers, as I wonder if these two yatagans could have been made by the same bladesmith.
Thank you very much,
Teodor

sorry, because if arabic alphabet,
seems not be arabic language :shrug:
Turkish ? Farsi ? :confused:

à +

Dom

translation
1266 Hegire = 1849 Gregorian

à +

Dom

Translation:
"done by Ibrahim Sa'heb
I go with God blessing"

à +

Dom

Hi Teodor
sorry, but even don't seems to be arabic :shrug:


à +

Dom

attached; one pic of a series from 3

Hi Teodor

translation of the upper part of the cartouche;
" 137 (then) I go with God blessing"
no way to found the sense of the lower part, sorry

à +

Dom

Dom,

Thank you very much, this is extremely helpful! I think the inscriptions are in Turkish, not Arabic. To me the date on the blade with the gold inscriptions looks like 127? instead of 137?. 137? would place it in the middle of last century, which is a bit too late, while 127? makes perfect sense.
However, by translating "I go with God's blessing" on both of these blades, you have increased the suspicion that these may have been made in the same workshop. If indeed the date on the longer yatagan is 137(1?) that would place it within 5 years of the other one. No conclusive proof yet, but getting closer.

Teodor

It took me some time to recognize this formula. Finally thanks to a better script I was able to read it in another post.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=5889

The inscription is:
Yemliha, Mekselina, Mislina, Mernuş, Debernuş, Şazenuş, Kefeştatayuş, Kıtmir

These are the names of Eshab-i Keyf (Seven Sleepers) and their dog.

My reading is 1127 / 1715, instead of 127?. In some official and legal documents, I came across the cases when they just wrote the last three digits. But I am not sure about this one.

The last row is:

Sahib Mustafa Aga (owner Mustafa Agha)

Zifir, tahnk you very much Sir!
I think your suggestion regarding the date makes a lot of sense. My friend will be happy with an early yatagan, but from what I have seen (and I have only seen pictures), I doubt this yatagan is 18th century.
Best regards,
Teodor

Zifir, Dom and others who can read Arabic, can you please help with the inscriptions on this yataghan?

Thank you very much in advance,

Teodor

Here is another yataghan with nice inscitpions from Bulgaria - can anyone help translate them?

Many thanks in advance,
Teodor

Hi Teo

except a date, 1288 (1871 gregorian calendar)
and a sentence; la fatha ela Ali, la Saïf ela Zulfakar
no boy than Ali, no sword than Zulfakar

not possibilty to translate the others inscriptions, from Arab to an another language,
because, it's what ever you want excepted arabic language :p

à +

Dom

Thank you very much Dom,

I guess the top row is most likely in Turkish.

Regards,
Teodor

Hi,
The first one is:

Amel-i Şerif Sahib Osman Ağazade Abdülcemil

Work of Şerif, Owner Abdülcemil, son of Osman Agha

The first line of the second script was difficult to give meaning for me although there is no difficulty in reading it.

Kendi nutk-ı pakdır nutk eyleyen Perverdegar


(My somehow nonsensical translation is: He himself is a well spoken word since it is Allah who make him speak. Some Sufi references here that I am not familiar)

that's best I can :(

Zifir,

Thank you very much, I really appreciate your translation.
The line with the Sufi reference is especially intriguing, and since almost all inscriptions had an important, almost talismanic meaning to the original owners of these blades, I wonder how it should be interpreted.

Best regards,
Teodor

Here is a yataghan recently found in Bulgaria - 96 cm long, which is not common, with a Balkan hilt and likely an Anatolian blade, with interesting inscriptions in 3 circles on one side. Can someone translate the inscriptions? I think I see a date 1260, or 1844 in Gregorian.

Thank you very much!
Teodor

Hi Teodor
quality of pic .. :rolleyes:
- too far, please use "focus" fonction
- about the date, I agree with you 1260 H. (Persian writting)

à +

Dom

Dom,

Thank you for the quick response. The yataghan is located half the world away from me and neither it, nor the pictures are mine - I posted it here at the request of its owner. I will see what I can do.

Teodor