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Originally Posted by estcrh
"This dagger is exceptional in that its hilt is made entirely of iron." This seems to indicate that in the opinion of the Museum, iron / steel zoomorphic hilts were not common.....humm.
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These additional photos quite clearly prove it is iron.
Maybe they consider it exceptional for 17th century. Maybe they consider it exceptional because thy didn't see another. However, I have seen a few and I don't think it was exceptional in the 19th century.
Moreover, you found yourself a couple of iron carved zoomorphic hilts.
I found others (at least a couple of the ones I indicated are iron).
Now how many more do you think are needed to officially say they were "common"?!
What relevance will it have as the next question might be "how common" or "define common"?!
I believe the essential point was to demonstrate the existence of such hilts as early as 17th century and whether there were only one hundred made or ten thousand is less relevant.