Chinese dadao
 

Hello,

This being my first post here, I'll try to make a good impression by not making any tired jokes about you guys being gentle with me :)

I was wondering if anyone could help me with what is probably a fairly trivial bit of dating. It has been over a year since I bought this piece, but only recently (when I tried to sell it on E-bay during a fit of monetary concerns) have I really paid any attention to it. As far as I can tell it is a typical Boxer rebellion dadao, or perhaps it is of later manufacture circa WWII/Civil War. In anycase, the dadao has an inscription at the guard on one side and an engraved flower on the other (Pics below). The translation of the characters are a little problematic for me: nan giang he cun. The individual characters mean South/Southern, Strength/Force/Rebel, Combine, Village. So I'm translating is it pretty much as United Southern Strength. Of course He Cun may be the actual name of a village.

Does this slogan sound familiar to anyone; can we use it to date the age of the dao? Also what is the significance of the flower engraving?

I did post this question at another forum so I apologize if some people get hit with this twice.

Welcome to the forum. I know next to nothing about Dao so I fear I am no help here but there are people on the forum knowledgeable on these so I am sure they will see this and answer

Hey, that's a nice piece. The blade looks a lot more refined and graceful that what my mental image of a dadao. I have always wanted a dadao, so let me know if you have another fit of monetary concerns :).

Zip actual information for me, too. Hopefully Philip or Scott will help out. They don't pop up here very much anymore, though. :o If you haven't already, post something in the Chinese forum on SFI. That's pretty active in this area, so you should at least get a lot of opinions.

Thanks for the welcome!