Mystery of Muhammads Sword???

[S.Al-Anizi]

Hi,

I have always been intrigued with one characteristic of the prophet's sword, the gold hilted one that is. Im not concerned with the issue of its attribution to Muhammad or not, what concerns me is, does this sword really go back to 7th century Arabia?? Or is it a much later, 16th century reproduction?? The reason I bring this issue up, is because that sword is made of wootz! Yes, wootz, and it shows in "Islamic Swords and Swordsmiths", and other pictures of it.

According to Murdhi ibn Ali Al-Tarsusi in his "Tabsiratu Arabab uli Al-Albab" (if any of you have known of this book), he claims with a degree of credibility that swordsmithing was none existant in pre-Islamic arabia until late 6th century AD, and that the first swordsmith was called "Al-Halik ibn Amr Al-Khazeemi", and that he learned the trade after a trip to India, thus, every swordsmith of that era was called a "Haliki". Anyway, if thats so, how come that in such a short time, such obscure swordsmithing centres somewhere in the Arabian peninsular were forging wootz?? Could this guy had actually learned how to forge wootz and wootz only? But then, why are the other swords in Topkapi from the same era are made from plain steel? Through many of my books of pre-Islamic poetry, Ive read the word "firind", describing a blade's wootz pattern, something that was certified by Al-Kindi himself some 3 centuries later, in his letters. Could a very large wootz blade production have existed in Arabia as early as 5th centruy AD, a trade originating from India??? Or was their large trade between Arabia and India which included sword blades, this raises the question, how old is wootz steel??

I raise these questions up for discussion, all compiled from my numerous readings of medieval and pre-Islamic scripts and texts, and contemporary information and books, of which all are missing this information.

[Ian]

Very interesting questions you raise and I hope we will hear some insightful responses. Just a quick comment about trade with India.

In my travels to southern India in recent years I have asked often about the connections between that region and the Muslim world. Along the Malabar coast of southern India are very old immigrant populations of Muslims that probably date from the early origins of Islam. Their descendants became the Moplah. Trade between northern Africa and the old Indian cities of Calicut and Cochin was established before Islam, so I have no doubt that the import of wootz steel from India would have been quite feasible. Whether the Indian swordsmiths would have parted readily with their secrets is another matter IMO.

Ian.

[S.Al-Anizi]

Thanks Ian. I have always known of a strong trade between India and Arabia, since pre-Islam, and up until the last days of the Sultanate of Muscat and Zanzibar. According to Dr.Elgood in his book, he says that Yemeni bladesmiths referred to good blades as "Muhannad", meaning "from India", and that Indian blades were often re-worked to local styles and grooves in Yemen.

[Rivkin]

Which sword exactly do you mean ? A picture would help. The early wootz is a controversial subject - while I have seen migration time mechanical damascus patterns, I never seen a definite argument concerning the earliest appearance of wootz.

[S.Al-Anizi]

The publication I have is in Arabic, but still, you can see the pics.