tulwar or talwar

[Jens Nordlunde]

Hi Henk, I did not expect you to tell the price, but if you could convince you wife that it was cheap, it must have been quite a barging.


A farangi is described in two ways, either as a sword with a foreign blade and a khanda hilt, or like an (Indian) sword with a foreign blade – I think it should be understood that the sword has a khanda hilt, although it is not said, just like you see it on the pictures in Stone and other places. The word farangi has a broad meaning, but when it comes to the sword Henk shows I would prefer to call it a tulwar hilted sword with a straight foreign blade. In this way everyone will have an idea of what it looks like, even if they have not seen it. If you on the other hand call it a farangi everyone will think of a sword with a khanda hilt. Maybe you should also have a look in Tirri’s book page 331 figure 251, and while we are at it, what about the tulwar hilted maces, the hit would have been more like chopping than draw and cut, but maybe the hilt was bigger when they had a mace in the other end, rather than a blade.

The sword is unusual/interesting in more than one way. To see a rapier blade with a tulwar hilt is most unusual, when you to this add that where foreign blades were mostly used, most of the hilts had a hand guard, but this one does not. I also find the ‘bulb’ on the grip unusual, almost like the one in Tirri’s book page 328 figure 249C (the second from left), although the one on Henk’s sword is a bit more pointed. All this means that it could have come from within a very big area, as some things point in one direction, other in another direction. The fact that the spike has been sawn off is a puzzle to me, although I doubt that it can have been very long, not on such a hilt, it is likely to have been rather short and pointed.

[Rick]

Originally Posted by Andrew

lol.

I'm not at all debating the efficacy or even the function of the tulwar hilt. Once, I believed the quillion should be fingered, but someone (perhaps Ruel) disabused me of this with well-crafted argument to the contrary. I welcome such attempts.

My only real "problem" here is with the mounting of a straight thrusting blade on a handle which is not only not optimal for the thrust, but limits it significantly. Slashing, slicing, drawing, even hacking or "circular" (i.e. not linear) thrusting, with a tulwar hilt? Yes. Rapier work? No thanks.


BTW, that is really a beautiful sword, Rick. Congrats.

With regards to Henk's rapier blade I must admit to confusion also .

Possibly it is a case of necessity being the mother of invention i.e. here's a rapier blade in a foreign culture with a different style of swordsmanship so it got the traditional hilt and was used (effectively or not) for that different style .
Probably not a great marriage of cultures but still potentially lethal .

As for that wootz tulwar ; it had been sitting in Artzi's inventory for quite some time . A nice light and well tempered sword very reasonably priced .

[tom hyle]

Originally Posted by Rick

When I first got it I looked down the length of the blade and saw that it had a slight twist . At first I thought it was an inadvertent flaw by the panday , then after playing around with it I came to the realization that it had been put in on purpose so that the angle of the cut was naturally adjusted for the wavy style of blade.

I can understand how you'd come to this conclusion, but you were more likely correct at first; I know of no intentional making or using of twisted centrally bevelled cutting blades. (some chisel ground blades have peculiar geometries that could be called twisted that centralize the edge. Many African "Offset" blades have a slight twist, always of the kind that would occur as a result of the forging of the offset, and IMHO incidental, but others claim it has to do with spinning javelins; the offset in African swords seems to descend from spears) First, many old swords acquire a slight twist and/or a cast(sometimes with an e at the end; a bend, not the same as a sett, which is a bend acquired by the blade after hardening, from mechanical forces) in the hardening; in fact ones that I would characterize as having none are quite rare (possible exception for obsessive Japanese cutlers and their after-hardening straightening by both twisting the metal and by grinding). I remember a machete I sold to Carter Rila that comes about as close as any; it is remarkably "true", and it does have a very very slight twist. The following things seem to promote the twist: uneven cooling in the quench; curvature of the blade; waves especially. I believe that in forging kris including kris sundang, it is usually the intent that all the waves conform to a continuous line or curve, crest and trough (not neccessarily all the same height; often tapering curves.....), and all in one plane. This is not that often seen perfectly executed, because it is difficult, both in initial forging and in hardening. IMO spring tempered swords are a bit more liable to this twisting, perhaps because it's harder to evenly cool the whole blade than just the edge; perhaps because the cutlers were more able to straighten a soft-bodied sword. I probably should add that I am a lifelong visual artist who got into a serious argument with his elementary school art teacher because she wasn't able to grasp that we see a straight wall as curved (strange how people can't see this until you explain it to them as the inevitable result of perspective that it is; understanding seems to affect the human eye in interesting ways), and that in the course of martial arts study, woodworking, much of it fancy-fancy, and test/practice cutting I have developed a really really picky eye for things like "flat" and "straight"; probably far beyond the ordinary day to day margins of error they are allowed in vernacular use. Much as with the word "master" I am personally pleased and fairly satisfied with a level of perfection far below what I would call actually straight and true, but my satisfaction does not depend on thinking otherwise.
A good hilter will try to allow/compensate for blade twist in the hilt, to try to centralize the cutting edge as well as possible. A twist in a cutting blade is a serious problem, but very common; perfection has not been the standard.
I'm not saying what you think you see is impossible, but it seems to me it would be very unusual. Whether I believe it or not should be of no great importance to you, especially as I don't know that sword, and haven't examined it, and thus don't of course even know in a precise diagramatic/etc. way what the structure you're describing looks like; may be too subtle for photos? Having each luk in a slightly different plane means each, as it is drawn thru the cut, and hits with its individual saw-tooth impact, is slightly out of line with the previous cut, and instead of deepening it as a "true" blade would do, is hampered in this by the competing factor that what it's really trying to do is to make a new, parrallel cut; it is better to deepen the cut that started things. Also, if the initial impact of the cut is with the angle of the edge off from the plane of motion, some of your energy is wasted in blunt force and vibration; your cut is less effective, and such off-angle cutting can even snap out a fine edge (though kris sundang usually does have a fairly heavy convex edge in my experience; this is what the bad hilt did to my "Me fecit Salingen" sword; it's edge was a mass of nicks from a blade or blades and of torn out pieces from such cuts, rendered crooked in this case not by the untruness of the blade, but by a twisty out-of-plane hilt); a kid at work did it to one of our knives when he made an excessively sweeping cut and hit the hard plastic paper towel dispenser.....) when cutting into hard, stiff things like bone.

[tom hyle]

Interesting point about the maces; I guess we'll have to look at some; I know there are khanda hilted maces, too.

[Henk]

Gentlemen,

I'm very happy with your input and very satisfied with the fact that my sword brought such an interesting discussion.

Unfortunately I don't possess the book of Terri. But it is the first book in my list of desired ones.

[Jens Nordlunde]

I feel sure that Mr. Tirri will forgive me, but unfortunately the book does not say from where the hilt is.

[Jens Nordlunde]

It seems to me, that many of the tulwar hilts must have been too ‘tight’, as the discs were turned upwards. My comment on the hilted maces was more provocative as the khanda hilts mostly used were bigger than the average tulwar hilt.

[tom hyle]

By turned up do you mean angled forward, or dished upwards at the edge? I've seen both, and either allows a greater freedom of wrist motion than the flat discs. In general, it is my feeling that tulwar hilts, and many other old hilts, were meant to cup the hand fairly tightly.

[Jens Nordlunde]

What I mean is, that the disc is often tilted, this would give the hand a bit more ‘freedom’ when needed. The khanda hilt has a bigger grip than the tulwar hilt, and the ‘disc’ is cup formed, not disc formed, both things will give more freeness to the movement of the hand.