Origins of Gorda/Gurda

[ariel]

Anyone into Caucasian weapons knows what I mean: shashkas with the "eyelashes" mark were called Gorda ( or, apparently in Russian pronounciation, Gurda) and were viewed as the cream of the crop. The origins of this word remain murky.
During the recent long and boring X-Mas/New Year break, I read Askhabov's book "Chechen Weapons" " ( among others).
He attributes the word Gorda/Gurda to either aul (village) Gordali, or to a semimythical master Gordali. In between, there are the usual legends about one Chechen killing another while screaming " Gur Da!' ( i.e. "I'll show you!"), quotations from Lermontov and Tolstoi, crazy derivations like " owner of a trap", "master of power " etc.
None of this is convincing.
The reasons:
1.The Gorda/Gurda blades all ( by definition) have the "eyelash" mark. Thus, their origin must be somehow connected with Europe.
2. The earliest the word Gorda or its derivative appear in Chechen vocabulary is 17th/early 18th century. Thus, we have a time frame.
3. There are no Gorda Kindjals. All of them are shashkas.


I suggest that the true origin of Gorda/Gurda is Hungarian word "Kard" i.e. simply "sword".

European blades of 17-18th centuries were immensely popular all around the Caucasus, Hungarian especially. A good chunk of them were made not in Hungary, but in Germany and N.Italy. This may explain the Genoese eyelashes. In Poland, whose blades were also widely used and highly respected in the Caucasus, the Hungarian Kord was called Korda.
The phonetics, the timing and the location fit.
What I think happened, the merchants brought Hungarian/Polish blades and called them by their real name: Korda or Kard. Subsequent importation of mass-produced Genoese and German blades required marketing tricks. These were just called by the known name. And the idea stuck.
No different from many manufacturers of soft drinks calling their brown goo " cola". Or,we "xerox" documents, even though the actual machine might be Fuji or something else.


Any counter-arguments?

[Jim McDougall]

Very interesting theory Ariel, well thought out.
It does seem that the 'eyelash' or 'sickle' markings do appear consistantly in some interpretation on these blades in the Caucusus, and I think Askhabov's book on Chechen weapons addresses this quite well.
It seems that some time ago it was suggested to me that the term 'gurda' interpreted loosely to mean 'good blade', which I think is in line with what you describe, but I'm unclear on the etymology. I think that the reference to the eyelash marks associated with the quality inference. I agree that the rather romanticized and fanciful suggestions remain just that.

As you note, many of the blades that turn up on shashkas were at some earlier point, East European, whether Polish or Hungarian, and I was not aware of the term 'korda', which seems to be a plausible association. It seems also interesting that the term 'gurda' is applied to shashka's, and not to other weapons, further suggesting reference to the 'quality' of these sword blades.

I also wonder more on the counterpart blades that occur concurrently on shashkas with the equally significant 'running wolf' mark of Passau/Solingen/Styria and as Askhabov describes as 'ters maymal'. This again seems applied in the same sense, and it would be interesting to know more on that term as well.

[TVV]

Askhabov's teories are interesting and quite entertaining, but I am afraid that just like Ariel I am somewhat sceptic. From blessed shield to screaming monkey, I am not sure anyone knows what the true meaning of ters maymal was.

[Marc]

To be sincere, for my experience, Ariel's hypothesis holds far more water than any of the others. First of all, it's well-formulated, uses the data available and works with factors known to have had similar influences in other fields (names given to import products based in those they had in their place of origin. It happens even today). Theories regarding "names" or "marks" on weapons have an undeniable tendency to fall in the direction of what any bazaar seller would instantly recognize as "the coolness factor". You know how this goes, any notch on the handle of a Colt Army must be a man gone down, never a sign of mistreatment. I also tend to be quite sceptic about these stories, and although some of them are true, these tend to be not only somewhat obvious but normally they're also verifiable via some independent sources.

Also, the kind of explanation Ariel's putting forth is also mirrored in other similar cases, like the Canary Islands knife "naife" or the Filipino "punal".

[Jim McDougall]

Exactly right Marc! The lore of weapons is rich with vernacular terms that have become associated with particular weapon forms, and it often becomes difficult to separate them even when facts are discovered that contradict the established use.
The nim'cha term applied to full length swords, the term claymore used to describe Scottish basket hilts, the term katar used to describe what is properly termed jemadhar, etc.etc. Most are typically transliteration and semantics, and in many cases writers and adventurers embellished thier work with colorful stories about the weapons.
The note on the notches on the handles of guns is coincidentally something I had just noted on the thread on the marking of weapons, and of course in reality, gunfighters did not place notches on their gun grips.

As has been noted, the lore is great for entertainment, but for our purposes often confounding.

All very best regards,
Jim

[S.Al-Anizi]

Hi All!

Interesting topic. Strange thing is that this word has also been passed to Arabic, specifically the Nejdi dialect, in which it is used to name a straight bladed sword, Gurda.