Kindjal

[The Double D]

What makes a knife a kindjal?

Where do these knives originate?

What features make one kindjal more desirable than another? Do these features date a kindjal and how?

How are kindjals made?

[ausjulius]

Originally Posted by The Double D

What makes a knife a kindjal?

Where do these knives originate?

What features make one kindjal more desirable than another? Do these features date a kindjal and how?

How are kindjals made?

ok,,
questions ,,

1, A kindjal is a short sword native to the caucasus,, not a knife, later types would be classed as daggers due to the infantile handles and very pointy blades, these are decorative kindjals,, and were not often intended to be used,, other than as an orniment.. many kindjals , aspecialy most russian ones are of the dagger type,, and highly decorated,
...what makes a kindjal,, ok , there s several points that make them satndour, one is theyer double edged,, and normaly the blade is symeterican , also the handle forms the gard and the handle will only be afewmm wider than the blade,, or not wider atall,
the handle is rivited on with large headed rivites , the heads only show on the side facing away from the wearer..
there is a small tab on one side of the sheath for a loop for the belt, the kindjal is normaly worn stuch into a sash or belt,,
there is normal a metal tip with a point on it at the end of the sheath , and the sheath normaly has also a metal throat,, the loop retainer is many times solidered to the meatl throat,

the blade is normaly borad, and has grooves in it , many times the grooves are different on the different sides of the blade, of they are offset ,
the handle has a distinck shape , like that of a minerett on a mosque,,
the handle normal has only two rivets,
they can be big,, or small,, mostly they come in a size of about 45-50cms in blade length,,


2
the originate in the caucasus,,
are are used by all caucasus people ,however i would say there hom would be with the north caucasus people , just puerly because it is a fixed part of there national costume,
the circassians , aydge,, and other north caucascians intorduced these weapons to the russians through contact wiht the cossaks,, they were further populised by the dagestan and chachnya campaigns ,, in the 1800s aspecialy twith long lasting conflict between the avar antional leather imam shamil , as large amounts of the weaponry were purchased ,or caputuered , and they became popular items with the russian soliders serving in the campaing , ,
the russians produced several forms of kindjal in zlatoust,, the russian solingen , mostly of the decorative form ,, with the 3 finger grip..


3 , ok, well that easy,, if its in good condition and has got lots of silver and gold on it then its worth more,,
there is bulat and wootz steel kindjals,, there is damascus steel kindjals,, there is just plain old carbon steel kindjals,,
ones with mamouth ivory handnles, silver fittings, gold inlay,, jewls,, amber and coral,, many things mostly the quality determins the price,, and the blade mateiral , bulat would greatly increace the value of a otherwise norlam looking kindjal.



ok , they are made the same way as other knives and swords,
id upload some pice of how we make them but,, 1 i cant find my charger for my camera.. and this is dagestan , so its going to be fun to get a new one , 2.. its the week end ,
basicly we forge the blades,, or for the ones in stainless steel we grind them , then the etch them and put the handles on and make the sheath ,
and thats it,

some extra infor , some kindjals may also come with a small knif ein the shetha , placed in the back of the scabard, it is like a small steak knife, .
this is aspecialy common in dagestan ,
some kindjals are very crazy , ive seen ones with saws on the edges or scoloped edged like a bread knife,,
ther is also several frorms of curved kindjals, but they are another thing ,
there is many styles of appling the handle,, and the rivets are only one part, many kindjals also have a metal part to the hanlde and this is attached in any number of odd ways..
on the older kindjals ther blade is wide ofr hackinf and the tip of the sword the like a 4 sided sipke for stabbing through chain mail ,, the russiansnever made kindjals as swords ,, but only as decorations that could be used as daggers,,
later in the north cacasus the kinjals became smaller aspecial in the hanlde as ther were no longer used,, as the pistol had killed bother amour and kindjal skrimishes,, which involved a small sheail kindjal and a mail coat,, these were fought on foot,
with a colt pistol or a belgina copy anyway you could just shoot the guy in the face,, and that was it,,


... sorry we haven very good pics on our web but you can see some here,, sorry very few, .. we make much more but you see how much stuff our web has.
www.kizlyar.ru/eng ..
mostly tourist kindjals are shown... they neew no permit in russia to own ,
there is lots of other makers in dagestan , but none other have websites...
firms in zlatoust make kinjals also , www.zok.ru www.lik.ru www.zlatoust-air.ru ther eis many others ,, but mostly the good kindjals are mad ein dagestan,, the georgian ones are mostly bad tourist items these days.. as with azirbijan ,

[Rivkin]

I would say circassians and adighe is the same thing; concerning north vs. south, it is like "whose dance is lezginka" - very hard to understand whether choh was earlier than cherkeska or vice versa, just like it is very hard to understand whose version of lezginka was the first one.

Concerning kindjal as being of a purely caucasian origin, I recently started to doubt it. While we clearly see similar daggers in the late Iron ages, I have failed to find anything like a typical kindjal among 10th-14th century weapons of whether north or southern caucasus. It is damn strange that to my knowledge all of the classical caucasian kindjals are of a later period.

For the references for 10-14th centuries weapons I would refer to:

David Nicolle "arms and armour of the crusading era", volume II for Georgia/Armenia and works of V.N. Kaminsky for northern Caucasus. For traditional northern caucasian dress of the period I would refer to the famous article in the journal of metropolitan museum, I think it is called "analysis of a 9th century costume from northern caucasus". No sign of kindjals or cherkeska there ( what whould they use gazyris for in 9th century ?). Looks like a chalat.

And finally - did anyone see the book "Waffen der Bronzezeit aus Ost-Georgien." by Picchelauri ? I heard it is a fantastic accound of arms and armour of earlier Colchi and late Kura-Arax and kurgan cultures.

[The Double D]

So to recap what you gentlemen have said.

The kindjal is a short sword or dagger. The Short Sword being the original form.

It is assumed to have originated in the Caucasus. But there may be some evidence that questions that.

The blade is broad symmetrical and pointed and will have fullers.

The hilt or handle is distinct in having the shape of a minaret and will not be wider that the blade. There will be to raised rivets heads on one side of the handle.

The sheath will have a loop for belt, metal throat and pointed tip.

How's that?

From viewing the linked websites and looking at EBay, it appears to me the the kindjal has evolved from an ethnographic weapon to an ethnographic weapon that is an artwork.

Is there such a thing as a functional or working kindjal versus a kindjal that is just art? If there is such a thing, how do you distingush a working kindjal from an artwork.

[ausjulius]

Hi , rivkin ,
the kindjal and the shashka are both modern weaponry,
they have not exisited long , and originaly evolved at the same time of the intorduction of firearms,,
the shashka is only 300 years old at the most.. and the kindjal not more,,
in dagestan before the introduction of the palash and shamshir type of swords the dagestan folds used a short one handed sword,, 10th 11th ceutuaries and such , the north caucascians living more on the open steppe always had some nomad type swords, such as the chechens,, and the circassians, sabers of various forms ,, depending on who was invading at the time ,
i think eairler in history they used the short one handed swords as the dagestani groups,,

the shashka evouled in the area around the aydge as they prefered to be very acrobatic with the swords and to perform many tricks to display there horse riding skills,, so the basicly chopped the guards off the swords,, ,, the handle form comes ot for the sabers of the time , but form a kard knife,,
at this time the cossaks were still using a tatar style sword,, suted for fighting against armoued opponents,,, ,, although mostly the western cossaks had discarded amour by this time , there costumes were still more mongolian than caucascian,, but as military contact increased with the caucascians they assumed the circassian costume and weaponry,, you see older pictures of the cossaks and they would appear to be men dressed and armed almost as mongols,, at this time there main opponent was either monols , tatars or the nogai/kipchak people who the were driving out form the southern steppe or assimilating into there hostes... i think that the same happened wiht the causasus,, also the cassaks were many times andits , so wat they could steal they didnt buy and if they won a battel and had a lot of new clothes and swords,, well then theyed use them ,
lezginka is the dance of the lezgins :P... no i thin with lezginka there is no way to know who it belongs to,, its been here for 1000snds of yers, like throat singing,, the mongols and turkic folks all do it but who invented it ... well its been around to long


with the kindjal,, ok , again it is a new weapon , and it is associated with the acrobatic riding or the north caucascians , aspecialy yhte flat form and the firm insertion into te belt , as oppose to a hanger of sorts,, the handle shape allows a high degree of dexterity when performing hand tricks with the weapon , and it can be spun through the fingers and twirled and suc , much more than could be done with a card or a european dagger or another form of short sword,, ...
the later kindjals that the cossaks encountered dasicly had evoulved as trick items and orniments havinf a handle that could fit between the fingers and be twirled and skipped on the fingers and such , aswel as being comfortable when trick riding,, , it could also be used to stabb wiiht with a good leathel effect if needed , ..
i thin the eairlier kindjals came form northen iran,,
just my opinion , either that or the north of the caucasus,,, if they cam form the north of the caucasus then they were very unpopular for a very ong time,, one idea is they came from some sort of leg sword that was used by the sythians and alans and mongola and such ushaly stuck in the arrow quiver or tied on the leg,, mostly for stabbing,,
the iran idea it it was form the roman swords :P or later fomrs like it form the arabs,, .. neither has a great deal of proof behind it,, mainly due to the fact that nobody have ever looked in great detial into it............

[ausjulius]

Originally Posted by The Double D

So to recap what you gentlemen have said.

The kindjal is a short sword or dagger. The Short Sword being the original form.

It is assumed to have originated in the Caucasus. But there may be some evidence that questions that.

The blade is broad symmetrical and pointed and will have fullers.

The hilt or handle is distinct in having the shape of a minaret and will not be wider that the blade. There will be to raised rivets heads on one side of the handle.

The sheath will have a loop for belt, metal throat and pointed tip.

How's that?

From viewing the linked websites and looking at EBay, it appears to me the the kindjal has evolved from an ethnographic weapon to an ethnographic weapon that is an artwork.

Is there such a thing as a functional or working kindjal versus a kindjal that is just art? If there is such a thing, how do you distingush a working kindjal from an artwork.

the dress kindjals have small handles , for about 3 fingers,, and a long pointed blade,, they are for dress and as use as daggers, ive never seen one of these as a "working" kindjal,, theyer always decorated,, as thats what they were...
the working kindjals will normaly have a proper sized handel , and the fittings would be only plane metal , and the blade long enougth and broad enougth to be used for hacking aswell as stabbing,, normaly a one peice buffalo horn or wood handle will be used, and the sheath will be leather couvered wood,,
the blades on the useing kindjals normaly are about 50 cms or bigger,

[Rivkin]

"kindjal-tricks" are surprisingly essentially the same among south and north caucasians. I would guess there are a few "weird" styles that are different (like blind fight in the south), but the basic styles are the same.
You are completely right that no one really looked into it; if its northern iran (i.e. turkish tribes of Azerbaijan), I would see a problem with distinguishing their influence from the influence of other turkoman, timurid etc tribes. Arab influence was strong in Georgia in 7th-9th centuries, but slowly died out since. The problem essentially that besides territories that georgraphically surround Caucasus (Lazika, Azerbaijan, Balkans) no one has this weapon.

[ausjulius]

Originally Posted by Rivkin

"kindjal-tricks" are surprisingly essentially the same among south and north caucasians. I would guess there are a few "weird" styles that are different (like blind fight in the south), but the basic styles are the same.
You are completely right that no one really looked into it; if its northern iran (i.e. turkish tribes of Azerbaijan), I would see a problem with distinguishing their influence from the influence of other turkoman, timurid etc tribes. Arab influence was strong in Georgia in 7th-9th centuries, but slowly died out since. The problem essentially that besides territories that georgraphically surround Caucasus (Lazika, Azerbaijan, Balkans) no one has this weapon.

you are correct with the kindjal and sword tricks being spread around the caucasus , however they and the now caucascian costume originate in the northwest caucasus , in the steppe areas,, and were spread by these folks who worked as mercinaries in the other states , aswell as being used as janissaries by the turks and such , the style seems to have spread quite rapidly , because the circassian culture spread these elerments to quite some areas , and the cossaks spead them also ,
the costumes and horse tricks are not mountian folks traditions,, but have been adopted from influence,

[Rivkin]

Well, I still think it is very hard to say where what originated. I never seen a definite data that would suggest circassians as inventors of dress/kindjal etc. I think all of these is somewhat of an obscure topic. Astvatsaturjan did offer no clue on these questions, I have high hopes that we will be able to get the answer from someone else - I have high hopes that Cholokashvili and other people from Janashia may go down to our level and say something on this issue.

[ausjulius]

Originally Posted by Rivkin

Well, I still think it is very hard to say where what originated. I never seen a definite data that would suggest circassians as inventors of dress/kindjal etc. I think all of these is somewhat of an obscure topic. Astvatsaturjan did offer no clue on these questions, I have high hopes that we will be able to get the answer from someone else - I have high hopes that Cholokashvili and other people from Janashia may go down to our level and say something on this issue.

indeed, still it is common knowlage amongst the folks here that the costume and shashka/kindjal and leather covered pistol brace is from the circassians, even in the 1800s the shashka was still not the most common sword in these parts,, and the shashka and kindjal forms derive from the same use of acrobatic riding techniques and aand weapon trichs of the north west caucasus , and these have spread down , not to say that the larger kindjals did not orignate in some other area,, ,
but the original costume of the other areas of the caucasus has changed in the last 250 years or so ,, and takes the aydge and circassian style,, originaly the mountian folks coustme was far more straterfied, and complex,,
the circassian costume is a simple military one ,

[Rivkin]

No arguments concerning shashka. Kindjals is a different issue alltogether. "Common knowledge" concerning kindjals is very different in different areas, north vs. south. Larger kindjals are more charateristic towards the south, yet I have seen some monstrous examples on photographs of ossetians. Don't think that they descent from something very different than "normal" kindjals. I would guess that the source is the same; however, I would guess even russian royal collections can not shed any light on really old kindjals, since they are mostly composed of very late examples, donated to russian high notables.

The same goes for niello - it has been long noticed that "circassian" niello is extremely similar to some very high quality examples of extremely old islamic niello works, yet again, besides areas surrounding Caucasus one can not find something quite similar. Did it come from south and died out everywhere but in Caucasus ? Or was it originally developed in Caucasus and sold everywhere else ? I don't know.

[The Double D]

The last thing for me Gentlemen is an anlysis of the pictures I took of two kindjals I saw in a local antique shop. I don't own these knives and as of last week they were no longer in the shop.

The first is a black handle with sheath.



To me this knife looks very new. The hilt or handle looks moulded as does the side panel, the pierceings look out of place. This looks like a fairly modern made piece to me, How do you gentlemen see it?

[ausjulius]

[QUOTE=
The same goes for niello - it has been long noticed that "circassian" niello is extremely similar to some very high quality examples of extremely old islamic niello works, yet again, besides areas surrounding Caucasus one can not find something quite similar. Did it come from south and died out everywhere but in Caucasus ? Or was it originally developed in Caucasus and sold everywhere else ? I don't know.[/QUOTE]

hi rivkin, you are correct, in that although many things can be presumed there is little one could say for shure...

the problem is with the nature of the caucascian people them selves, there has been little or no local documentation of the local history,,
and many nationalities possessed no written text even 150 years ago,,
also the religious and political and social systems were vry unstable ,, and fluctuated frequently,, sometime back form ecsample the chechens were christians for the most part,,,,,,,,, then they dropped the religion and wholely took up there local religion again ,, then finaly the converted to moslems,, this has been a common theem amongst many nationalities,, they change greatly fomr centuary to centuary..

[Rivkin]

I don't think the problem is so much with the lack of native alphabets, also it is a big issue. The problems I think are:

a. Poverty and the lack of resourses invested into studying.
b. Absence of "scientific nationalism", i.e. people interested in researching the local history rather than in arguing who has more rights on Prigorodny region.
c. Extreme historical agressiveness of neighbors. We have Iran investing 320 mln $ every year in improving its image, big chunk of it goes into publishing "right" historical books. No Albanian alphabet or language there; only arranis.

[The Double D]

Gent's, I don't mean to be rude, but could we get back to kindjals.

Although I guess the drift of the current discussion shows why there is such a diversity in kindjals.

The black kindjal I posted back up thread has two fuller. One reference I saw said kindjals have one fuller. Is this true?

[ausjulius]

hi , they have many ,, on or 50 , or 3 on one side and one on the other , depends on how the smith felt at the time ,
looks to be a dagger of sorts , not a knidjal , more like iran?? althoug ive seen ones like that fomr turky, but without the preforations.


rivkin , sorry didnt finish my email,,,,,
thing is here ther eis somany national groups , and many of these national groups didnt exsist as they are 400 years ago,, and then 1000 years ago there was other groups ,, and others and such , there has never beed a stabil period,, greater albania was about the height of it,,
the thing is people here have always lived in clans or tribes,, and basicly the social system was not so structured as to allow large settelments to last long , hence poor documentation and little or not local records, also the constant change or religion , anguage,, and population dosnt allow for muh record keeping ,
also because of the clan nature of the society the population can quickly change,, i one clan defeats another , the others was many times eradicated compleatly ,, the dwellings destroyed or captured,, and because of the small size od the clans history of this is poorly recorded, also 75 years of communisim and the 100 or so years of russian control .. combined with an influx of moslem influince have affected local tradition and language greatly ,
also because of the lack of much localy written records and the lack of much interest from outsiders history is pretty patchy,

and dure to the fact that these societies never had much of a hiracial system there as few people recording the history..

dont know how much iran spends on such things, but they have many sources from which to glean information , and there is maybe 40milion iranians
living in iran,, so thats alot more than say 130000 lak.. or 35000 nogai
and even then these groups are seperated by clans and dialect differences, so there is maybe 10 dialects out of 130000 people , ,
......

[Andrew]

Originally Posted by The Double D

Gent's, I don't mean to be rude, but could we get back to kindjals?

I agree completely, DD. Thank you.




Gentlemen, I know certain topics easily lead to socio-political discussions, but let's remain sensitive to how easily such discussions can cause a thread to veer sharply off-topic into unpleasant territory. Thanks.

[Kubur]

Hi I was surprised to see that

Kindjal means Khanjar in Russian!

Kin-jal
Kan-jar

In fact they are all Daggers!!

It's like Kilij (Turkish) = Pala (Greeck) = Shamshir (Persian) = Saif (Arabic)
= sword

sorry my comment is probably very stupid...

[VANDOO]

COMMENTS HERE ARE SELDOM STUPID, HUMOROUS AND SILLY AT TIMES BUT NOT STUPID. TO SOME A COMMENT MAY BE OBVIOUS AND A WELL KNOWN FACT OR FALLACY BUT TO OTHERS IT MAY BE NEW INFORMATION. WHILE WE OFTEN COVER THE SAME GROUND HERE ITS STILL WORTH IT AS WE MAY COME ACROSS NEW INFORMATION AT SOME POINT.

[Sancar]

I have a different theory(though not set in stone) about the origin of "kindjal" or qama; I believe this particular form of shrot sword/dagger to come from Iran and Central Asia and evolved from the Scythian short sword akinakes.

What do you guys think?

[Oliver Pinchot]

There was a substantial, in many cases overwhelming, Arab military presence in Western Asia by the late 8th century. This included wars with Byzantium and several of the Caucasian kingdoms. One of the words which was adopted from Arabic was khanjar: rendered kindjal in Russian and khanjul in Armenian. There were probably distinct characteristics to the weapon itself which accompanied this adoption, such as its form or mode of wear. In Russian, kindjal means generically, a dagger.

Kindjal is an odd term to use for the well-known Caucasian dagger, one which was applied by Imperial Russian soldiers serving in the Crimea and Caucasus and later by arms specialists. It was adopted thereafter by collectors who came in contact with it through Russian sources. Local groups did not use the word "kindjal" until after the Caucasian Wars. Each culture has at least one name of its own; Adighea and Georgian, among others, have a number of terms, each relative to the characteristics of the weapon.

One of these terms in Adighea is kama. Kama is a loan-word from Ottoman قامه, (kama in modern Turkish) meaning a wedge or tapering double-edged blade*. Together with the term, this form of dagger was introduced via Black Sea trade to the Adighea-speaking groups we know as Circassians. It spread very quickly through the rest of the Caucasus, assuming subtle but distinct regional variations in form and embellishment. (The distinctive Circassian tunic and cavalry saber, called by the Russian military, cherkesska and shashka but actually tse and shash'huwa in Adighea, were also adopted throughout the Caucasus during the 19th century; again, with regional distinctions.)

(*The Ottoman term قامه can be found here: https://archive.org/stream/Dictionna...up/search/kama )

The terms kilic, shamshir and seyf (or saif) refer generically to a "sword" in Turkish, Persian and Arabic, however pala, a Turkish word, was used to refer specifically to the curved and back-edged saber we think of as characteristically Ottoman from at least the 18th century. Interestingly, the Turkish word for a straight-bladed broadsword or thrusting sword (an estoc or tuck, in English) is meç (metch,) a cognate with the Russian word меч(mietch) and by extension, the Finnish term, miekka.

[Sancar]

Actually "meç" is a loan word from either French or Hungarian I believe. But it is used in Turkish to mean "narrow straight double edged blade" as early as 1400s.

"Pala" is a very generic term that can mean very different things in historical usage varying from a large gypsy knife( Çingene palası) to even a longer yataghan. Today, people tend to use it for late period ottoman kilij which I find very problematic terminologically.

"Kama" is a Turkish term specifically for a straight double edged pointy, triangular, or tapering double edged blade or wedge. It is a very old word. You can find it even in oldest Turkish texts and dictionaries.

[DaveA]

Here is a previous thread with some wonderful pictures illustrating the kinjal and shashka.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...=1061#poststop

[ariel]

Mech is a slavic word for a straight double-edged sword.
There is an equivalent to the turkish "mech" ,i.e. narrow-bladed, edge-less and very long blade suitable only for stabbing weapon, i.e. Eastern European sword called Konchar ( various writing). Amusingly, this word came from turkic languages ( handzhar is a close relative).

Thus, both the Ottomans and the Slavs used the same weapon, but each called it in the opposite language: Turks took the Slavc term, and the Slavs Turkish.
Fair swap :-)