KINDJAL?? QAMA?? FOR COMMENT

[kahnjar1]

Picked this up recently and would like some information please as to age, origins etc. Also comment on the blade mark. The top and bottom section of the scabbard is solid niello silver and the middle section pierced silver over leather.
Size 24 3/4" overall with a 17 7/8" blade.
Regards Stuart

[Dmitry]

Beautiful piece.
My knowledge of the kindjals is one small step above rudimentary. To me the blade looks Georgian, perhaps by a Tiflis maker. The mounts are in the Northern Caucasus style.

[Gess]

Nothing to do with the Caucasus and Tiflis. Turkish dagger.

[ariel]

Without holding it in my hands, I suspect that the silverwork is new and assembled from different pieces: look how the middle panel differs from other ones.

[kahnjar1]

Interesting----I was about to repost this as I got no response before. The centre panel is certainly an addition. OK we have 2 differing opinions as to origin. What is reason for the attribution to Turkey?---and to Caucasus? I had been told it came from Dagistan and dated to around 1910.
The niello is NOT new and apart from the centre section the piece looks to be all made at one time and not a combination of "bits".
Regards Stuart

[Gess]

Here's my "Turk", purchased on eBay.
Of course, the more coarse imitation of Damascus, but ... you should look.
False damascus etch in valleys blade.

[Gess]

Here's my "Tiflisky" kinjal. And a sample of grain on my other integrally silver kinjal.

Work on the silver on your kinjal, rather primitive and crude.
Blade itself - may be Dagestan.
If this Dagestan - a modern (2007-2009) and assembly, as said Ariel.

[Gess]

See how to look old rivets.
For the modern masters - too much work.

[Gess]

Dear Stuart!
No injuries. On Turkey, I thought because of the imitation of Damascus, the press and the middle of scabbard.
But everything else looks more like a modern art work of the Caucasus.
Currently works a huge industry, for the production of fakes and replicas. And in Turkey, and in Caucasus. There are some things that to understand difficult, to experts.
I hope you do not pay much expensive.
Regards

[kahnjar1]

DEFINATELY NOT a modern piece. The KNOWN (and indisputable) provenance is that this piece was one of several edged weapons collected by well known local family during a world journey in the 1930s. The fullers are in my opinion NOT designed to resemble damascus but are purely finely decorated in the "valleys". As stated before, the centre section of the scabbard has been added later. The Niello work is not rough. I will try to post better pics of that.
What about a comment as to origin of the blade mark?
Regards Stuart

[TVV]

Stu,

If you trust the previous owner's story based on his word, then I guess this settles it. But if you feel you need to consult the collective knowledge of the forum, then you should be prepared to explore all possibilities, including the ones, which are not nice.

To me, this kindjal looks like an old blade in modern fittings.

There are a lot of reproductions, varying in quality, coming out of the Caucasus nowadays - from the Kizlyar factory in Dagestan to numerous small shops in Georgia. The rules prevent me from linking to eBay, but if you do a quick search, you can easily find an eBay store from Georgia, which offers antiques as well as modern reproductions (souvenirs) of decent quality. Then you can examine the reproductions and see why so many of us here suspect that the fittings of the kindjal you posted are modern - post WW2 at the earliest.

As for the marking, the crescent and star are found on the flags of Turkey and Azerbaijan. I guess this may have prompted the Turkish attribution, along with the multiple, centrally placed fullers. Such blade style is often found on Turkish pieces.

Sorry if this is not what you wanted to read, but I think it would benefit you the most to read as many varying opinions as possible, and then decide for yourself.

Best regards,
Teodor

[kahnjar1]

Thanks TVV. I agree and am always open to all opinions. It would be very naive not to listen to other opinions. However the provenace says something else, so I am in a bit of a quandry. I DO take the point that the piece looks to be in very good order, but then we do not know how it was stored over the years. Many weapons from ages long gone have survived in remarkably good order.
I did originally post this item for comment and am happy will all opinions.

Regards Stuart

[asomotif]

hello Stuart,

Intersting thread.
I have zero knowledge of Kindjals, but of course I am interested in estimating/determaning the age of pieces.

I can imagine why some say that this is a new piece.
The silver work is very clean and shiny
Has the silver work been cleaned recently ?
Can you post another picture with a close up of the back of the scabbard ?
The back seems to have more age/wear and tear that the front

Best regards,
Willem

[A Senefelder]

Howdy, very nice piece. I dabbled a very little bit in kinjal and qama in the late 90's. My little research left me with the impression at the time that qama tended to be completley covered in silve/nickel/ niello both hilt and scabbard ( like the kinjal the front would be decorated, while the back, the side that layed against the hip would be left plain ) while kinjals used less silver/nickel/ neillo decoration, the hilts often being left plain other than the rivets and perhaps a small panel set in the horn. I am far from an expert ( very far ) but from what I remember the pretty complete use of silver/nickel/neillo would have this seeming more possilby to be a Georgian qama. I owned several kinjals with a similar etched pattern in the fullers, and was left curious at the time if it wasn't some kind of Islamic script done in proffusion, given the Islamic influence in the region.

[ariel]

Caucasian masters often employed the technique of false damascening, mainly in the fullers, just like in all the examples shown here.
They covered the blade with a layer of goat fat, then drew the pattern with a sharp needle and covered the blade with sand soaked in acid. After ~one day they had an ~1 mm deep pattern. Cheap, quick and visually appealing.
They rarely made real damascus, because it was ~10 times more expensive to make and took a lot of time. Ordinarily, a master could make 2 regular blades a day.

I also do not think that the kindjal in question is Caucasian; Turkish would be my guess. This is because the artistic motives do not look Caucasian at all. Again, I can only notice that the niello looks absolutely pristine, with unusually sharp and intact edges, and the incised surfaces are also unusually crisp. I do not doubt your reliance on the alleged provenance, but I would not buy this one. Well, I can be totally wrong....

[Gess]

Ariel +1
I have are several old, good Caucasian blades. Was previously thought, buy a modern kinjal and change the blades. But I decided not to do so, find pieces of old, then will gather.
In your case, just such an assembly. Turkish blade and (may be) some sort of a part of the scabbard- in a modern "silver dress".
It's my firm opinion.

[A Senefelder]

because it was ~10 times more expensive to make and took a lot of time.

That it is. Having made a number of knife weight billets of pattern welded steel in the past, several friends and I set about making a sword weight billet one weekend last month. Intended to be a totally random pattern starting with five layers of 1075, two of hand file, one of bandsaw blade and one of nickle, it took three men, using a propane forge with a blower on the air intake ( this allows us to generate forgewelding heat ) and two 15 pound sledghammers it took us a full eight hours to get a billet weighing three pounds with dimentions of 2.2 inches high, 6.5 inches long and 2 inches wide and our arms we shot from the heavy hammer work. We are maybe 5% of the way to having this billet made into a sword blade at this point. This little experiment shed some light on the intense amount of physical work that would have gone into making these sorts of steels.

[kahnjar1]

Sorry it's taken so long. Here are some better pics of the back of the scabbard.
The neillo on the front is as it was when I got this piece, and has not been cleaned by me. The sharpness of the decoration is presumably due to fact that (assuming the provenance is correct) this piece has been in a collection for quite some time, so the normal wear and tear of use has not happened. Comments here have prompted me to realise just how "nasty" that added centre piece is, and I am now very tempted to remove it.......What do you think?? The original leather is underneath.
Regards Stuart

[Sylektis]

A small (22cm) with similar technique from a tourist-antique shop in Greece...