Kaskara Fuller Styles and Some Blade Marks--a third essay for discussion

[Ian]

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Moderator's Comment:

The following essay on the fullers and some blade marks of kaskara swords was prepared by Ed Hunley for discussion and comment.
As with other recent efforts by Ed regarding silver-covered hilts and quillons on kaskara, this essay is quite long and graphically rich,

and therefore needed to be divided into sections to accommodate posting limitations imposed by the Forum.
My role has been to help place the material on to the Forum pages and provide some editorial suggestions.
All substantive comments should be directed to Ed. Ian.

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Kaskara Fuller Styles & Some Blade Marks

Ed Hunley

August 31, 2018

Recently, I read an article in a 1938 issue of Sudan Notes and Records that provided the names of three distinct types of kaskara sword blade fullering designs. The names are descriptive, and in at least one case the Solingen sword maker's marks have been converted into native cultural relevance. With the exception of my five-channeled Suliman Makhummus, this is the first time I've encountered named fuller styles.

In case you're not familiar with a sword “fuller,” an explanation can be found in this Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuller_(weapon)

There is a vast wealth of information on fullers posted by highly knowledgeable members on this site in previous EAA Forum threads. The fuller patterns of individual blades and blade families have been discussed at length—I have done some preliminary “mining” but have only scratched the surface. We have debated whether certain patterns and forming styles are from imported or native forges, but did not know their names. Hopefully, this presentation can help to better organize and guide our assessments. My goal is to identify and define Clark's typology (below), offer visual examples, and present some analysis. My knowledge is limited, and hopefully other forum members will add their comments and discussions to expand our understanding of Sudan's iconic kaskara sword.

WT Clark was a British colonial administrator who surveyed the ethnological background of the Northern Beja ethnic groups in the Atbai region of NE Sudan. He was specifically assessing the Bisharin, related to the Hadendawa. He commented on the roles that swords played in Bisharin culture and then reported:

… Among the types of swords seen in the Atbai are:

1. Sulimani Daud – the blade has three parallel grooves, the center one of which is prolonged to the point while the flanking grooves are cut short.
2. Sulimani abu Shabeish – similar to 1 but the part of the blade near the handle is decorated with engraved scrolls.
3. El Kar – a single groove running down the blade from the handle to point.
4. Dukkeri abu Dubban – the blade has a short central groove and carries three marks known as dubbana, nugara and 'asad.”
5. Suliman Makhummas – not part of Clark's list, but is included for identification and comment. This form has five fullers that extend down about half the length of the blade.

Clark goes on to name other components of the sword:

• the tassel tied to the handle is el jedla [I assume this is the thick tassel of the Hadendawa and other Beja swords rather than the more stringy item often seen on high-end presentation pieces];
• the cross piece (quillon) is el bershem;
• the (bottom?) langet is el toma [A Kassala informant told me in 1984 this term meant “two boys walking together”]; and
• the handle itself is el gaim.

Rampel in a 2016 thread relayed a portion of an interview by a local news service from the Upper Nile Region refugee area:

Reporter: We have noticed that you sell swords as well as knives. Can you tell us a bit about these swords?
Merchant: The most important swords we sell are Dukari Sword and Suleimani Sword in addition to Kar Sword. It must be noted that the swords are used only in ceremonies and cultural events. (Emphasis added.)

So in 2016, 78 years after Clark’s publication in 1938, the names that define sword styles remained the same. I suspect that the interviewed merchant had commercial ties with the still-active sword makers' suq in Kassaka.

Does anyone know of additional fuller types other than those defined above? Of course there are other kaskara with different fuller configurations. These are usually one-off bespoke designs intended to enhance the intended speciality of regalia, presentation, or diplomatic gifts.

The fuller types also are sword type names and have persisted until the present. Thus, the sword is apparently defined by its fuller pattern. No longer are we limited to generic names like saif and kaskara to discuss these iconic weapons. Now we can use fuller and cross-guard types to define our investigations. For example a Dukkeri abu Dubban blade with a Senneri quillon now evokes an image and has meaning. Let's investigate each fuller treatment style in more detail and see what we can learn. Arabic speakers please chime in to correct transliteration and translation errors.

1. Sulimani Daud

The blade has three parallel grooves, the center one of which is prolonged to the point while the flanking grooves are cut short.”

An online translator says that Daud is Malay, Dawud in Arabic for David. The Hebrew David has a place in Islamic theology. Most relevant to us is “Among the things taught to David was the ability to make armour (21:80, 34:10–11), a suggestion that David’s military exploits were the acts of God.” [Wikipedia article David in Islam: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_in_Islam]

There are apparently many three-fullered blades in collections of museums and Forum members. Talismanic marks are often associated with this type as well as native makers' marks. I have three that were made in Kassala (Figure 1). Their fullers are deep and well formed. They have maker's marks reminiscent of the moon faces of export blades. I would place their quality against any made in Europe for the export trade. The one in the center was made by Hussain Mohammad, and the other two have the mark of Hassan Shaykh Idris, although they vary in punch dimensions. I would date the ones with deeper, broader fullers to the early-20th C due to their similarity to the 1914 five-channel blade below (Figures 1,14).

It's interesting to note that the scratch-engraved half-moon and star designs on the center blade of Figure 1 (see Figure 2 for its enhanced engraving) is almost a duplicate of the blade in Reed's Plate LVb (Figure 3). While Reed's Darfur blade has only a single narrow fuller, it was likely made and engraved in Kassala by the same hands as the example in Figure 1. This Kassala example was purported to have been “a Mahdi sword” supported by the talismanic moons and text engraving suggesting a high level of religious devotion.

2. Sulimani abu Shabeish

Similar to the Daud but the part of the blade near the handle is decorated with engraved scrollings.

Abu means “Father of” in Arabic, but not always in biological terms. No translation of shabeish was available, so I have no idea what this name means. The notion of “engraved scrollings” is vague.

One example of this type is depicted in Reed (1987) Plate LIII. The scroll work is of a flowing design and well executed. Reed estimates that the sword was “probably German, Spanish or Italian manufacture, dating from the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries” (p. 169). His attribution suggests that Kassala smiths used an early imported blade as a model for their work shown in Figure 1 above. Also, no known native-made example of this type of sophisticated scrolling technique has yet come to light. I think it is significant that the abu Shabeish design and name persisted perhaps for centuries even without local interpretation.

There apparently was a consolidation in the Sulimani-type fullers. A member from the Royal Dragoon Guard's Regiment Museum, RDGAC, presented a description of fullers:

It exhibits three fullers, the outer two extending a little less than 11.4in (29cm) from the cross guard, while the innermost runs some 17.25in (43cm) down the blade. To either side of this central fuller sits what appears to be a depiction of a crescent moon, but with an unusually jagged "cut" to its crescent; it may be Arabic text, or perhaps a depiction of something else entirely (sunrise over mountains?).

See Figure 5 [image posted by Katana (David)].

This depiction would fit the Solingen munitions grade trade blades with three short fullers imported during the late 19th Century and replicated by Sudanese smiths. Its reasonable to assume that as market conditions changed sword merchants ordered blades with shortened center fullers and those devoid of scroll engraving. Also, it is not clear that the extension of the central fuller beyond the forte actually has structural benefit. Thus, labor saving/pricing demands and losses in popularity may have caused the Daud, abu Shabeis and Mukhammas variations to collapse into a more basic, Sulimani form.

3. El Kar

A single groove running down the blade from the handle to point.

This style presents a fuller with a larger channel than the Suliman type. An informant in 1984 Kassala called it a Khar (channel) Hongoog (straw) for straw channel, “a wider line than Suliman.” The informant said that Ethiopian swords were blank (no lines), but had a mark. A contemporaneous blade smith, Fateh Hallak, made swords with a scooped-out blade called Khar (canal or channel)) for lighter weight and used the Ethiopian style mark. I have not seen one of his blades, but assume they are heavily fullered.

Lew had one of the few in this style that I have seen (Figures 6,7). Note the Hadendawa tassel at the top of the hilt. These blades seldom, if ever, have European makers' marks—I know of none—although others contain inscriptions.

In 2011, DaveS presented a superior El Kar fullered sword with possible links to Ali Dinar. It had no maker’s mark, but was highly engraved with Arabic text in the central channel. See on this link:
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=13142

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