Where are they from?:-)))
 

Recently sold on e-bay.
Presented as " Middle East, Afghanistan, Persia" and " Indo-Persian, Persian"

Who knows where in fact they are from?
I do:-)))

On the left like a bichaq, and the right of course Khyber, but both have unusual mounts.

Hmm...gee...errr...Pakistan? :confused:

There have been so many conquering hordes pass through Pakistan, they must have left behind knives like these at some time that were then adopted by the locals. Indo-Persian and Khyber knives are found in neighboring countries. Seems like the right part of the world to me.

Ian.

Ariel, the one on the left is "Turkmen from Syria". See THIS THREAD
The second is Central Asian, could be Afghanistan/Pakistan of course, but looks more Turkmen/Bukharan.

i tend to agree with alex on this set.

The top one (brown background) is, I have been led to believe, Kurdish.

There is no stylistic connection with Turkmen work whatsoever in the knife on the left. I saw many of these in Turkish museums while doing graduate research there. They are always labeled the same, Kürt bıçağı (Kurdish Knife.) Some show better workmanship than others, however they are all quite
similar in hilt composition.
That said, if Ariel is able to show otherwise, I look forward to reading it.

Oliver, this may not be Turkmen kard in terms of location, but one theory is that this type was made by Turkmen (or possibly other Central Asian) people living in Syria. This is solely an unproven theory and this could be any ethnic group in the region including Kurds. However, these knifes are not well known to be Kurdish (to me:). Many have re-purposed blades from other weapons which could be an indication of whoever produced them not having easy access or means to producing their own, i.e. a minority group living in a foreign land. I believe Kurds had some access and means resulting in better defined style such as their trademark and relatively uniform "Kurdish Jambiya". Again, just an unsubstantiated thought.

Turkmen.

The one on the left was extensively discussed quite some time ago on a Russian forum
http://forum.guns.ru/forummessage/79/1724159-5.html


They also discussed Kurdish, Syrian etc. origins , but all was based on "personal gut feelings". For me the most persuasive argument was a book page from a German book, where this construction of the handle was attributed to Northern Afghanistan ( likely Turkmen territory), Teke tribe. See also Alex's reference to identical knives attributed to Turkmenistan by Artzi Yarom and AshokaArts.

The "khyber" like knife can be attributed with higher degree of precision: see picture taken from an article by Yu. Botyakov and V. Yanborisov " Turkmeni Weapons"
The leftmost 4 images contain a picture of an identical dagger. They belong to the largest Turkmen tribe Teke, concentrating in the south of the countru, on the border with Afghanistan. Please pay attention to the pommel: just a cap. Very reminiscent to the handles on the earliest Ottoman yataghans of Bayazet and Suleiman and later Uzbek royal examples.
Equally intriguing, IMHO, is the rightmost image : "eared" pommel. This is a Saryk knife. Boldly assuming that this feature is of ancestral origin ( I am skating on a thin ice here!) , can we tie it to the classical yataghan characteristics?