Yemeni sword

[Jim McDougall]

Naturally in the Ottoman 'sphere' styles and types were widely diffused, and as once told by Torben Flindt (Bukharen arms) in communication, 'weapons and their forms have no geographic boundaries'. This could be carried much further in they equally transcend cultural boundaries.

As far as old forms transcending considerable range of time, often without any linear chronology of development, this is usually attributed to the 'revival' phenomenon. Traditional weapons of much earlier times are often produced mostly in recognition of certain heritage and this often compounds the study of arms as far as historically.

As noted, architectural features are often key in the style, design and elements of sword hilts much as in material culture overall, and it would be most difficult to confine these to specific areas, particularly with regard to religiously oriented instances.

The round or spherical pommel is known in other instances, for example in Sudan, where these unusual pommels are hollow and hold seeds or other items to cause rattling in ceremonial circumstances. The straight double edged blade is known of course in certain cases in Persia (the qama and the quaddara), but as noted, primarily it is to North Africa and the Red Sea trade (kaskaras, Omani sayf, and apparently these Yemeni swords).

So these particular examples with this style of cuffed hilt with varying sphere type pommels seem by preponderance to be hilted in Yemen, using blades from various sources.