WW2 Hill Tribe Dha

[Tim Simmons]

aiontay, you raise some interesting possibilities.

The blade need not be WW2. I have to say even with the use of cycle parts there is nothing to suggest shortage of materials or evidence of hurried production. The work is clean with no tool marks. The Hercules bicycle production started from small beginnings in 1910. Expansion was swift and after war work for WW1 {presumably the army would still need bicycles as well as other military hardware} emerged in the 1920s as the worlds biggest exporter of bicycles. It might seem cheap to us to use bicycle parts but if you are from a non-industrial background, the shiny chrome bicycle parts may have been quite a prize to use in the sword handle.

So we could be looking at two decades or more before 1940.

I really like the idea of Japanese occupation influence. There was a degree of Burman support for the Japanese. Still a fancy blade for the restriction of war time production but not in anyway impossible. ref-Aung San's Burmese National Army

One reason I have no pictures of hill tribes with this type of Dha. May well be as you say: it is Burman. This is the only picture I have of this type of Dha and it is not helpful.

printed 1918.