Karud: the weapon that did not exist:-)

[ariel]

Jim,
Some of your questions seem to have answers. Mostly , it is a matter of ethnic origin.
Dirk ( or dork, or durk) is considered to relate to Germanic word Dolch, whereas Dagger clearly stems from the Latin group : Dague of Old French or Italian Daga.

Different sosun patas were all "lily leaves", i.e. sharing similar blades, not handles. The Deccani form is a Sailaba; quite likely that swords from the same group but from different localities also had specific local names, but we might have forgotten them.

Salavar ( in "Salavar yataghan") is clearly an English transcription of Selaava ( see earlier in this discussion) and "yataghan" was just added by the Brits from a very familiar to them Ottoman short sword with recurved blade ( see post by Kronkew). And BTW, are Selaava and Sailaba related?

In linguistics ethnicity is destiny: Bichwa is Baku or Vinchu, khandjar is Chhurri or Chaku in different regions (examples taken from Elgood's glossary).


And I am not talking already about Indonesian islands:-)

[fernando]

Originally Posted by ariel

...whereas Dagger clearly stems from the Latin group : Dague of Old French or Italian Daga...

Maybe not so linear, if i may, Ariel.
Listen to what scholars think about this term:

- Some dictionaries say that the word "adaga" originates in hypothetical latin term "daca", which means "punhal". However this is once more an hypothetical word, which existence was never verified. Raphael Bluteau refers a possible Germanic origin (daguen) with contamintion to French (daque) towards the Italian (daga). Curiously the origin of the word may be similar to this proposal, only that the signification and the language of origin are other. Our word "adaga" must come from “ødi” [âdi], which means "adornament, embelishment", and “daku” [dake], which means killing, destroy, submit, ou de “dk” [dake], which is noble [8]. Therefore adaga comes from the expression “ødi dk” [âdidake] which will be noble's ornament, or from "addake", which will be killing adornamnent.

[8] - The form “dâku” is acadian, while the word "dk" is ugaritic. There also exist forms close from the old Hebraic. Possibly all were pronounced in a
close mode and would have similar signification.-

http://fernando-outroladodahistoria....fenicia-o.html


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[Bob A]

I was stimulated by this thread to wonder why "Laz Bichaq", which seems to be a sword, or at least a bladed weapon of sword length, would be named "bichaq', which itself means, as best as I can determine, "knife" or "dagger".

Does this appellation arise from ethnographic sources, that is, a name applied by the original users? It seems sloppy usage to me, as knives and daggers as a term of common usage are generally shorter in length, seemingly topping out at about 12" in blade length.

But then there's the Khyber "knife", one of which in my possession has a 23" blade.

I'm just easily confused, I guess. Else I'd suspect that the natives lacked sufficient education to determine proper nomenclature of their tools.

[ariel]

Correct. I just chose the most direct and believable connections.
Also, "dagger" was associated with "daca", presumably a name for Dacian dagger, although all known Dacian daggers were crooked, and rightfully belong to the same group as "sica" ( sicarii used them), which likely stems from the Hebrew " sakin", knife.

Words mutate: Persian khanjar becomes Georgian khanjali, and from there Russian kinzhal. In Russian usage, any fighting double-edged short bladed weapon is kinzhal: thus, in Russian books one can see " kinzhal bichwa", " kinzhal kris", " kinzhal katar", and even "kinzhal kinzhal":-) etc. Some less picky authors apply it to single-edged implements as well: " kinzhal kukri", " kinzhal karud" etc.

Come to think of it, a large proportion of names for a short-bladed weapon in all languages is just a local moniker or a derivative of "knife".

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Apparently ~ Ugaritic had 28 consonantal phonemes (including two semivowels) and eight vowel phonemes (three short vowels and five long vowels): a ā i ī u ū ē ō. The phonemes ē and ō occur only as long vowels and are the result of monophthongization of the diphthongs ay and aw, respectively.

[Jim McDougall]

Thank you Ariel for these additional insights into these linguistic challenges in trying to describe these many weapon forms. Languages of course have often almost indeterminate degree of dialects as well as vernacular and colloquial terms.
It seems almost reasonable that westerners (Europeans) in these various spheres would misconstrue or mispronounce and transliterate this maelstrom of terminological idiosyncrasies. It is almost tempting to think they may have simply reappointed terms known to them regarding other weapons in more of a colloquial sense, i.e. yataghan for the salawar (though the recurve instance in many is noted).

The term karud, though resultant of phonetic interpretation, still serves as a now well emplaced term in our glossary to indicate this particular form of pesh kabz.

[fernando]

Originally Posted by ariel

... Come to think of it, a large proportion of names for a shot-bladed weapon in all languages is just a local moniker or a derivative of "knife".

Makes all sense; as short blades were more like basic utensiles rather than weapons, villagers had no name to call them but generally knives. It was the wealthy that spent time naming the different swords.
Trying to establish a paralelism, i have learnt that, when a nation is invaded, the successive conquerors keep on changing the spoken language in the cities, courts and palaces, while the villagers keep speaking their old language; resulting that even nowadays there are in the local language hundreds of common words that have such remote origin.
The Iberian Peninsula was invaded by Romans, Barbarians and Arabs but portuguese (for one) still has remnants of its original language, one similar to the old Hebraic, to the Ugaritic, to the Acadian.

[Jens Nordlunde]

Fernando, your observation is very interesting - and logic as well.
I too think that many names could be local, or spelled the way the Europeans heard it.
Europeans from different countries would likely spell the same weapon in different ways, which may be part of some of our problem.

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Jens Nordlunde

Fernando, your observation is very interesting - and logic as well.
I too think that many names could be local, or spelled the way the Europeans heard it.
Europeans from different countries would likely spell the same weapon in different ways, which may be part of some of our problem.

That is a good point Jens, Europeans would transliterate the words phonetically, and miss the salient tones and diacritics pertinent.Depending on what language these individuals spoke, their own grammar rules would apply adding that variation to the transliteration.
Compound confusion!

Bob, you are not alone in being confused, as clearly seen in our attempts at clarifying these linguistic dilemmas. As Ibrahiim has well illustrated, many languages in additional to alphabet differences often have radically varied grammatical protocols and pronunciation conventions.

Actually, it is not as much any particular educational deficiency in native groups improperly describing things, including weapons, as it is the human propensity to seek brevity or colloquial words in common parlance.
In casual conversation or communication the use of slang, nicknames or catchy names often take the place of formal.

We could carry this ad hoc course in linguistics as applied to ethnographica ad infinitum in analogies and analysis of grammatical peculiarities. However, the entire purpose of the paper on the karud in the O.P. was to reveal further evidence on the etymology of the term for this dagger form.
It is well understood that this is far from a singular case of transliterated or transposed terms applied to a weapon form, and not necessarily done in the proper sense, or misapplied entirely.

These cases seem simply a litany of 'Hobson-Jobson' type instances where many perhaps improperly applied terms have become colloquial as collectors terms for various ethnographic weapons. As these terms have become firmly emplaced in our literature, it is at this point counter productive and unwarranted to consider revising them, and as has been suggested numerous times, better to simply include this data as historical footnotes in properly cited material in future reference.

[fernando]

Up to now i realized that, not only Europeans but all those who have travelled around the world, had to catch the sound and eventually write about the name of things they met, using their own alphabet; one may imagine arabic speakers, such great travellers, having to convert into their script whatever objects they heard being named by locals. One even has to consider how such names, once being perpetuated by strangers, were result of the perception of simple people or of intelectuals; it is perhaps pertinent to admit that, the name of a sword perceived by illiterate navigator crewmen might be distinct from that picked by one such Ibn Batuta.
Also we may consider that, the earliest the etymon is, the more corrupted it may have been.
And then we have the optional (different) name peoples use to address the same thing, depending on the area of the country where they reside; all of them good, as consuetudinary.
On the other hand and introspecting into the Western side of things, if we pick the consensual 'knife' term, when consulting the Oxford dictionary, the description includes a couple encrypted symbols, linked to Old english after Old teutonic but, for what is worth, it ends up assuming that, the root of the word is of uncertain etymology.
In any case the object called 'knife', as other, when used in other languages may not be a strict 'transfer' of the term to local composition, but one of different provenance.
Spaniards use 'cuchillo' and French use 'coucteau', both appearing to have a more traceable identification, with direct connection to latin 'culltellus'.
Whereas the term selected by Portuguese, 'faca', appears to have incognito parents. Latin 'falcula' being rejected, as well 'falx'; the arab "farkha" offers no plausibilty, as intrinsically appointing to a completely different direction. It is consensually a term certainly introduced by populars, admitedly pre-Roman, and of obscure origin.
Definitely, life of scholars/academics is not easy, having to deal with all these endless riddles; but there are so many living humans out there that, of those, many are that chose to struggle with such problematic tasks. Much easier for those that are pleased by understanding eachother with whatever means; and, in case spoken resources fail ... we can always resort to sign language .
All in all, discussing the nuances of terminology is not counter-productive nor unwarranted; it is imposing their revision that has no sense, instead.

[ariel]

Bob A:

As a rule, Ottoman " kilich" swords ( sabers) were relatively long, with blades > 70-80 cm. Anything shorter than that was conventionally called "bichaq", knife.

In the largest published collections from Askeri Muze and Zagreb the greatest majority of yataghan blades are between 45-55 cm, and this is likely true for most examples in our collections. Often, Turkish sources refer to "yatagan bicagi" ( Kubur, sorry for simplified spelling) both to standard yataghans as well as to the knives of Yataghan form.

There was a thing called Varsak, referring to a "short saber of Crimean origin", but we have no material examples clearly identified as such. Carrying both varsak and bichaq in peaceful times was forbidden, and this is vaguely reminiscent of a story how yataghans became popular ( I.e. they were not formally swords).

Quite some time ago I posted a pic of the so-called bauernwehr, a variant of grossmesser: its blade in form and dimensions was indistinguishable from the Afghani "Khyber knife". It looked like a big knife to Brits, so it became a "knife".