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Thanks for that Jim ... there a lot more where that came from !
Thats very interesting and confirms my thoughts ... so this will be found a place on the Indian wall ! I liked it but more importantly .. SHE likes it !
Cheers
Richmond

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

Hi Richmond,
First of all, thank you so much for keeping this array of intriguing weapons and topics coming! Its great to have the opportunity to look into these and learn from them.

This is another of those deeply parabolic bladed weapons which seem to have influence from deeply curved sabres and the clipped tip which aligns to meet the radiused curve on the blade. These features seem to reflect styles popular in Germany and several European countries in thier blades around the end of 19th into the 19th centuries.

This falls into what I think of as a form of intermediate sword which is between daggers and swords in India, more like a dirk, which seem popular in northern India in the 19th century. It seems many of these have khanhjar type 'parrot head' pommels as in these daggers, but are mounted with varying types of recurved, nagan or curved blades like this.

The rams head is termed 'meshamuki' (Pant, 1980, New Delhi, p.113, fig. 294, mesha=sheep, but applies to ram as well). Most of these 'rams head' hilts on daggers or swords seem associated with Rajputs in N. India in the periods noted. According to the Vedas, many animals and creatures are associated as vehicles for various divinities in the Hindu pantheon of deities, and the ram is one for that of the four Agnivashi clans' .

The Rajputs ruled most of the pricely states in Rajasthan and Saurashtra but also extended into other regions as far as the Himalayas and of course Nepal. This may account for the Pahari attrribution for some ram/sheep/goat head weapons.

All the best,
Jim