Mutilated Kaskara on Ebay

[Jim McDougall]

RIP

[stephen wood]

...well, going back to the multiple-marked sword from Anthony North's collection for example, where the wolf, the cross and orb, the lion, the pious text and the enigmatic "comet" coexist, I think we could break down Sudanese/Tuareg marks into types: some which are intended to show the quality of the blade, some which are pre-Islamic talismans, some - like koranic scripts - explicitly Islamic. And a single mark might move to and fro between categories. So we get to the point where, for example, a virtually unintelligable Thuluth phrase gets repeated around a blade like a mantra - text becomes talisman.

[Jim McDougall]

Thanks, its good to hear your perspective Stephen. That does seem like a viable solution.

[Rumpel]

Ref trans-Sahelian stylistic transmission generally, the Pitt Rivers is reassuringly vague:

"The flaring leaf-shaped lower portion of the scabbard is said to represent the head of a crocodile and can also seen on the scabbard of the straight kaskara sword of the Eastern Sudan, on the opposite side of the continent’s Sudanic belt. Some scholars think the most plausible explanation for the unusual scabbard form appearing in two places over 3000 miles apart is that it was carried westward across the Sudan by successive waves of Islamic warriors over the last one thousand years."

So, like, yeah. OK.

http://webprojects.prm.ox.ac.uk/arms...ica/1929.12.3/

I guess the same may or may not go for other stylistic aspects. Perhaps.

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Rumpel

Ref trans-Sahelian stylistic transmission generally, the Pitt Rivers is reassuringly vague:

"The flaring leaf-shaped lower portion of the scabbard is said to represent the head of a crocodile and can also seen on the scabbard of the straight kaskara sword of the Eastern Sudan, on the opposite side of the continent’s Sudanic belt. Some scholars think the most plausible explanation for the unusual scabbard form appearing in two places over 3000 miles apart is that it was carried westward across the Sudan by successive waves of Islamic warriors over the last one thousand years."

So, like, yeah. OK.

http://webprojects.prm.ox.ac.uk/arms...ica/1929.12.3/

I guess the same may or may not go for other stylistic aspects. Perhaps.

Its true, some scholars do follow that plausible assumption based on the obvious association by shape on the scabbard tip. In Burton's "Book of the Sword" one of his drawings presumes the kaskara tip also had the flared tip as seen on the scabbard. I personally have never seen a kaskara nor takouba with such a flared tip.

The complexity of the trans Saharan caravans, tribal interaction, Pilgrimages eastward by Muslims to Mecca as well as interconnecting trade via many centers are all factors naturally leading into the diffusion of these influences.
There are many similarities in weapons of Morocco seen on the opposite side of the continent as far as Zanzibar, and the flared tip scabbard seen on the Manding scabbards in Mali is indeed noted. Also notable is the guardless hilt of the Manding sabre resembling the kattara of Oman, whose influence travelled westward from the Omani Sultanate in Zanzibar across the trade routes to Mali, one of the key cultural centers of Islam.