my Albacete Dagger

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Interested Party

I don't know how germane this is to the design we are discussing, or how anatomically true the explanation is, but I thought it should be mentioned. This is from a discussion of a cut out on a Philipine blade from tanaruz's thread visayan kris http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=28209 post #2 in the Ethnographic forum ".....update on the Visayan kris. Since this was a 'mystery blade' to us(me and my father)-having an 'open groove' in the middle of the blade, we sought the original blacksmith in the hinterlands of Iloilo (and oh, it was scary because of some 'insurgents'). The kris' design was the blacksmith's signature design- to identify it being from his hometown. It was also designed, he said, to lighten the blade and most especially- if 'stabbed into the body (lungs, in particular) it would cause the collapse of the lungs and thus instant death.' "

That is most interesting! and I think very much worth adding here, and Richard Burton in his "Book of the Sword" (1884,p.136)noted, regarded among methods of lightening the blade,:
"...a favorite fashion in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the golden age of the sword, was to break the continuity by open work, which allowed free play to the ornamenters hand. It was also supposed to render the wound more dangerous by admitting the air".

These conventions and notions were conveyed into the Philippine archipelago by the Spaniards, who probably brought these from well traveled European weapons 'lore'. It is remarkable how much cross diffusion there was between the European and ethnographic weapons elements in the times of discovery and colonial occupation.
Most of these kinds of suggestions including the idea of poison in blades (possibly from the poison arrow concept?) are not particularly viable, but interesting just the same.