The Omani Sayf. ( The Omani Straight Dancing Sword)

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by SwordsAntiqueWeapons

Thank you for your insight.

Other curved sword dancing will surface in the near future.

The straight swords pictured are however long handled Saif in the hands of Zanzibar slavers, look close to their rifles too and their faces too, they are from Zanzibar, one of the many accounts written about in the 1870's.

I doubt they are anything other than tribal Africans in the employ of some slaver group... Not Omani. Zanzibari perhaps...but not Omanis. Africans used different weaponry. I wrote extensively about Ingrams accounts of the Zanzibari population ...they are distinctly different... he mentions the dancing and which groups used what swords..In fact generally speaking this is the region I commenced my research ... Zanzibar... since it is pivotal to the question when did the Omani dancing sword adopt the Slavers sword hilt?

Curved sword dancing...I mentioned several times that for dancing if the Omani Dancing sword was for some reason not available then the exponents in the Funun sparring competition could use another sword... I have seen this done in the UAE... Where a shield was unavailable a sandal could suffice...I have seen it done with curved Kattara and sandal ...but only rarely.