Saudi Saif for comment

[kronckew]

after my decade in saudi as an expat, i kicked myself for not buying a saif while i was there. waxing nostalgic perusing an auction catalogue and noted a saif hiding amongst the crockery and old books. quite low estimated price range. so, i figured i'd put in a lowish bid. looks flashy & probably plastic grip scales, but i can hang it under my favourite photo of a falconer that an Aramco VP gave me, as a remembrance from his office wall when i admired it, sword is likely not decent steel from what i gather here. comments welcome tho, with thanks.

first the falconer, with his faithful .303, then the saif. no info on dimensions yet, i'll have them ship it to me. hopefully here in a week or so.

[A.alnakkas]

Hey Kronckow,

These are made in Syria, some are well made but the majority have extremely weak hilt construction. I'd be cautious with it. Its a nice wall hanger, my first ever saif is similar to this, gifted to me by my mother :-))

[kronckew]

arrived today. specs: unsharpened springy steel blade is 78cm. x 3.2cm. wide at the hilt. approx. 3mm. thick. magnet sticks to it. tip is not as rounded as it appears in the photo & has about a three inch false edge on the spine.

guard is about 13.5 cm. from languet to pommel. the hilt appears to be cast brass, gilded, with thin white plastic scales. there is a steel pin about 3mm. dia. thru the hilt and scales at the lower faux rivet which appears to be a dome headed carpet tack, the dome of the rivet covers the pin and the scales werere not well fitted, glued on (poorly). the blade has some sort of cutlers cement poured into the hilt to secure it, along with the steel pin which i must assume goes thru the end of the tang. aside from the thin white plastic scales, the hilt seems quite sturdy. reminds me of how tulwar hilts are assembled.

weight w/o scabbard is 640 grams, actually feels quite good in the hand, POB 15 cm. in front of the guard. i've superglued the scale back on one side for now, and fitted it a lot better. will likely replace the scales with wood ones a t some point when i have the time and inclination. chain on grip looks kinda flimsy too.

gilding is coming off in a few spots on the scabbard, revealing a dark patinated brass underneath. in the photo the dark patches on the scabbard underneath the throat and between the rings are not shadows or dark reflection. they look like areas where wear might occur from wearing it.

i suspect the sword has a bit of age, not fresh off the assembly line but still late 20th c. might have been used as an ardhah dancing sword.

could have been worse. and the price was a steal.