African small sword id request

[colin henshaw]

Originally Posted by Tim Simmons

Colin if that is the case, I know the blade is rather like a giant hand made nail, why spend so much time on the scabbard??

The comment by Iain must be the correct reason, it makes the object both pretty and exotic looking. There seems to be a clear genre of these West African "made for sale" items.... spears with rough metal heads, tins with lids, walking sticks, batons and odd-looking daggers. They all seem to have the same wine coloured leather base with plaited leather-work in narrow strips. Occasionally bits of leopard or other wild cat fur is incorporated. Some of these "tourist" objects can be fairly old, even going back to the 1930/40's is my guess ?

But I also think its true to say that African tourist objects often derive from older patterns made for purely indigenous use and usually of a much higher quality (time and labour). The dividing line between tourist and indigenous use is often blurred and hard to define...

[Tim Simmons]

Just thought this is worth some follow up.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...d=1#post187616