And here....possibly...further explaination as to the design of the restrictive hilt/pommel . An extract from A New System of Sword Exercise for Infantry
By Richard F. Burton
London: Printed and Published by William Clowes and Sons, 13 Charing Cross, 1876



"The Sliding Cut, common throughout the East. In this movement the elbow and wrist are held stiff and the blow is given from the strong muscles of the back and shoulder, nearly ten times larger than the muscles of the arm, while the whole force and weight of the body are thrown in. Hence the people of India use small hilts with mere crutch-guards, which confine the hand and prevent the play of the wrist; the larger grip required for the Chopping Cut only lessens the cutting force. The terrible effect of these cuts is well known. "

The whole article shows various sword cuts, parries etc. link below

http://ejmas.com/jnc/jncart_burtonnewsword_0200.htm

Katana, you really have done a lot of ‘homework’, thank you for taking the time to find these interesting links. I always felt that this must be the answer to the question, as all the Indians I have met have much slimmer hands than the Europeans I know. This does not mean that all Indians have slim hands, as I am sure one can find Indians with big hands, but in general the hands are slim.

Hi Jens, I agree that we are talking the 'average' size of hands. I have a Tulwar which has a hilt slightly larger than the average.

It certainly seems to be true that the small hilts are attributed to the smaller (on average) hand size of most Indian fighters.

The form of the Tulwar hilt (the disc pommel especially) seems to suit the 'style' of the sword technique used. Which I suspected from the beginning and which started this thread.

The 'riccasso' question is the 'only fly in the ointment', IMHO risking unprotected fingers to gain more control of the blade seems unlikely. If good sword technique required this technique .....protection would have been 'incorperated' into the design. Afterall if your soldiers were losing 'digits' in battle, assuming they survived the conflict, they would have lost the abillity to 'control' the blade in future fights. If this 'fingering' technique was important to Tulwar use......protection would have evolved.....it didn't.

So it seems almost certain that Tulwar sword technique did not need extra control of the blade (using the ricasso). This sword, I feel, has been 'viewed' with 'Western eyes' with western sword techniques 'imposed' on an Eastern sword. Possibly 'blinding' the likely and obvious truth........after all the simplist answer is quite often the right one ......Occam's Razor seems to have cut through (pun intended) this 'clouded' issue

Hi Katana,

I agree very much with you. As I believe the ‘fingering’ technique could/would only lead to a missing finger, and who would want that in the middle of a battle?

The Europeans made use of the ‘fingering’ technique, but they fought in a different way, and the finger was protected. Had the Indians used this technique, they would at least have made sure the finger had some protection.

When this is said, I must add, that we have another question. We have tulwars with or without ricasso (shamshir/tulwar blades), but why did the Indian blades have a ricasso? Sometimes it is short, and sometimes it is rather long – but why is it there?

Could it be from ancient times, before they used quillons, if the hand slipped a bit, you did not cut your fingers at once, only if it slipped a lot? After they got the quillons, they still made the ricasso – be course that was the way blades were made. A lot of the things done when making blades or marks on blades, had no doubt a meaning, but I also think it was used long after the original meaning was forgotten - it was tradition.

Hi Jens,
perhaps the 'ricasso' on Tulwars and similar swords is not a 'ricasso' at all.
As the blade edge does not end at the hilt ....we would assume that it is a ricasso ...as a number of European swords have this feature for a functional reason. Could it be ...simply...that an edge so close to the hilt would have little advantage, as it was almost exclusively a 'slashing' weapon ?

Other 'simple' explainations could be that it allowed safe handling of the sword blade whilst it was being fixed (resin) to the hilt. Or as Jim suggested, made sharpening safer.

Excellent observations Jens, and I am inclined to agree, I would be extremely nervous having my most important finger out there subject to such danger!
While the Europeans did of course fight differently (actually parrying with the sword itself, while Indian combat practice typically seems to have dictated the use of the buckler to parry), it may possibly be a structural feature of the blade taken from the European blades?
Possibly it was perceived that the thickened area at the root of the blade would give more strength to the blade in its seat, and as Katana has mentioned, my suggestion of the 'choil' concept in sharpening the blade.

I think that we have established that there was distinctly a difference in hand size by mention of this in a number of sources, so the idea of the 'finger wrap' has lost a great deal of its feasability in general. There would remain of course a certain selectability, where in key instances it would be quite possible that a warrior might have held the tulwar with finger wrapped to insure firm grip in attack to assure solid hit, and if little or no opposition was seen or expected (i.e.surprise attack on camp etc.). Such application would seem a matter of choice, not necessity.

Again, if sword to sword combat possibility existed, it seems that finger should stay 'inside' the guard! :)

Best regards,
Jim

tulwar grip size
 

I have 16 tulwars and can only get a comfortable grip on one of them. Smaller Asian hands? Perhaps, but I can get a good grip on the 2 koras I have and the Nepalese certainly aren't very big. My kukris also have a comfortable grip for my Western size hands.