Mystery sabre

[Yvain]

Hi everyone !

I'm emptying my room at my parent's house and I found this big sabre that I bought when I was a teenager (most likely because it looked cool and old). It doesn't really fit my collection nowadays, but I still am curious to learn more about it. Is it just a (very) large and fancy tourist item or maybe something else ?


If I should guess, I could see some resemblance with the Vietnamese guom but not much more. It was obviously not made to be used : extremely heavy and unbalanced, the blade shows no distal taper and was most likely cut from a steel sheet, as well as the guard. The hilt and scabbard are made of white wood painted black, the fitting are made out of brass sheets soldered with tin (I think), the whole blade is acid etched with Arabian script (coranic ?) but isn't particularly neat. Overall, it looks impressive from a distance, but is rather cheaply made.



Total length is 138cm, blade length is 108cm



Any information is welcome ! My main area of knowledge is Africa and I'm quite stumped here ... Feel free to ask if you have any question or need more info ! (And sorry for the poor pictures, the house is badly lit)