Chinese dagger for comment

[yuanzhumin]

Hello
Henk, your dagger is from China, because it is written on it, unless "yunnan" is not anymore a province of China ;-)

In fact, there are 4 caracters on you scabbard
yun hu sa nan (in this order)

The first and the last have to be read together as the size of their font show they are linked. In fact, they are smaller and from left to right, they mean simply "Yunnan", the province of China. At least, you know for sure the origin of this dagger.

The second and the third caracter, hum... It's something else.
"Hu" means family, house, clan
"sa" means to let go, to abandon, to escape

So there is many ways to understand it, but I see two very different. What is strange is that these two caracters are read from right to left to have the meaning I see. In the other way, from left to right, they remain a mystery.

First explanation, it's the name of a clan : the clan Sa.

Second explanation, there is a very rare Chinese proverb in four caracters that say : Use extreme means so that there is no way to escape (sa chueh hu wang)

The Chinese always reducing the four caracters sentences to two, the proverb in this way would become 'sa hu', exactly what is written on the scabbard. The precise translation in our case, adapted to the knife :
(This knife or the holder of this knife) use extreme means without anyway (for the prey or the opponent) to escape.

On the blade are carved exactly the two same caracters, linking the blade to the scabbard and emphasing on the fact that this blade leaves no way to escape for the one that is targeted.

Sorry, it seems a little esoteric, but I can't tell you more. At least, Henk, you know that your dagger is from Yunnan, China.

Nicolas