Quote:
Originally Posted by Sajen
I am not sure if it is Moroccan or Algerian.  I hope our new member fennec chime in and will be able to tell us more.
I've learned that the shown daggers are all Algerian and called khodmi while the small ones with wrapped wire are called mousse. The Here: http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...lgerian&page=2 #39
Regards,
Detlef |
Hi my friend, and sorry for a so long silence... lot of personal changement, and a book about algerian weapons that I struggle to finish, but soon I hope, "Inshallah"
For the dagger, it is clearly MOROCCAN for me ! Lot of point we dont do in algeria, and even if this knive origin is now obvious, I will give some.
- for exemple that full tang on a dagger, very rare, we prefer a half one, hold by two pins generally, and not hammered in the pommel.
- Another typical "not algerian" point is that bolster running in the beginning of the blade, and a part of the handle, and decorated. The only kind of those things you can see on algerian weapons, are those inspired by ottomans ones (like for exemple those "bishaq knives", made in Kabylie by the Iflissen), but dont look like the moroccan one. Not "staight cut", not othogonal to the spine (except on touareg ones, telek, gozma, etc), but making like a triangle, more ottoman, for algerian kinds.
- Then the handle, typical shape for a morrocan jenoui, not an algerian style.
- And finally, the blade. If the fuller can reminds the algerian khodmi (like the fullers), some others are typically morrocan. No ricasso for algerian daggers, the cutting edge is all along the blade.
For the "sahraoui mouss" (desert knife) shown by Detlef, inspired by the work of bousaada, but that we can find in a much larger area of algerian sahara (even seen some very old models took from tourags), the spine is generally always straight. The genoui gives that drop point blade.
- the maker mark, is actually a bit more complicated... marks on north african swords are very close, for a lot of reasons... shared skills, and common history/culture/religion, even sometimes ethnicity, lot of travel between those territories before the reconquista, and after, etc etc.. and also, the MATERIAL !! analysing the algerian marks, you will notice that the same kinds of tools are usually used to apply them. They are simply "turn", of added to some other to create a new shape, but not complex, and personnal ones. They do not actually mark the maker, but symbolize a "spirit" of the tool, an area of making, a "style of weapon". Of course, a blacksmith (or family of) will generally always apply the same one. But it is common, for Bousaadi Khodmi for exemple, to find same marks, on knives made by different smiths, at different era, and even sometimes, areas (we say "Bousaada", but thats also refer to a style of knives, that was actually made/copied/findable or probably traded in lots of parts of algeria, by the searches I've made recently). SO, for this moroccan one, first of all, I think that the upper part is covered by the bolster, that will give a shape that you can not find (or probably rarely, never seen personnaly) on a bousaadi, a kind of cercle, with two crescent, one up, one down. You can notice that bousaadi ones only have one.
Well, I hope those details will help for some next identification, and sorry by advance if I'm a bit long to answer