Is this an "old man's hobby"?

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Norman McCormick

Hi Gene,
To follow on from your deliberations a selection of T.V. programmes shown at 5 p.m. weekdays when I was a lad. Things were definitely different in those days. I remember vividly as an adjunct to our History lessons our teacher arranged to take us to Kelvingrove Museum and once there the class was taken down into the basement and given a lecture on Medieval Arms and Armour complete with the curator dressed in a suit of armour handing round actual weapons for us to look at, I was 9 years old, happy days. The Museum used to be 'chock a block' with A&A including an Ethnographic Hall, now there is one small gallery upstairs for everything. It is very sad as Kelvingrove has one of the best collections in the World mostly in storage now. It seems anachronistic to me that movies and games are so much more violent and visually graphic these days and yet historical A&A is hidden away and shunned like a leper. As a kid everybody had a 'tin hat' and a bayonet or two with badges, patches and the like, I suppose this was more due to the period being in the first few decades after the war and these things were readily available at not a lot of money and no stigma attached to collecting these objects. My mother always knew what kind of movie was on at the local cinema on a Saturday afternoon as the children, me included, would be coming up the road fencing, pulling bows or drawing six guns all imaginary of course the game continuing all week until the next Saturday and another visit to the cinema. Both my children, boy and girl, played with wooden swords, "By the power of Greyskull", and toy guns and when old enough an air rifle and pistol, amongst other things of course, and neither of them are raging sword swinging gun toting bampots in direct contradiction to what some would have us believe. There are some young and energetic collectors in our Forum Family and hopefully they will keep the flame going and if there are any more out there who are interested JOIN IN you don't have to spend a fortune to have an interesting time here.
My Regards,
Norman.

Great points Norman, the only thing more violent than the movies and games these days is the news....yet the now archaic historic weapons of yesteryear are stored away out of public view for fear of disturbing or offending?

All the best,
Jim

[Tatyana Dianova]

When the names are mentioned one cannot hide anymore Great posts boys!
I am 39; toy arms were my best toys as I was growing up in the former Soviet Union: a self-made bow, a wooden Gladius and a wooden Indian rifle that my father has made for me. I was dreaming of real swords of course, but possession of arms was strictly forbidden. Moving to Germany 12 years ago, where acquiring of arms is both affordable and acceptable, has made my dream come true.
I am working in a small computer company (about 25 persons), and two young men there (about 30 years old) collect antique swords as well. My 6 years old son really loves his wooden swords and takes them with him when walking around There is still hope after all

[Andy Stevens]

Hello peeps,
It seems I fall into the average age group! I'm 43 and have been involved with ethnic bits and bobs since a wee boy. my father was a cabinet maker and on accasion took antiques as part payment for work undertaken-my mother was not always so keen on this practise! My partner in collecting karina has been a keen lover of Indian weapons for several years and has it must be said caught the weapons bug-she's a younger 40 years old.

We buy and sell antique to help pay for our interest, it solves the money problem and allows us to own if only for a short time a wide variety of weapons and artifacts.

This is a wondeful thread, very cool to put ages to names...perhaps character profiles next............. !!

What is funny is the misconceptions we had regarding peoples ages, perceived youngsters are older, whilst the ageing wise ones are mere youths! It just shows never buy unseen!

Cheers to all. A & K

[Freddy]

I'm 53 years old and I've been collecting since the early 90's.

Although I must say that I've always been interested in knives and this from my early childhood. When we went on schooltrips (e.g. to the Zoo), I always came back with a small tourist penknife. Now, I wished I kept these.

[A.alnakkas]

Well, I am not sure about people losing interest in either history or historical items. Certainly there are plenty who are interested, but life is getting harder and other hobbies fill the vacuum easily and far cheaper.

I always liked swords since my childhood. But I was never able to collect so early so was satisfied with just drawing or designing swords. With time I forgot how much I liked swords, but I still would watch documentaries or read any information about them, just never thought of collecting them (there were some tries, where I would save and buy some Chinese made katana or a Syrian made ardha saif. But I knew these arent real and never gave it much attention) but only when I travelled to Greece in 2009 and visiting the military museum there did I get the bug back once again. When I went home, I bought my first 'real' sword and ever since I started collecting AND studying the field more seriously.

When it comes to jambiyas, my first real one was actually given to me as a gift from my uncle, he got it from his wife's family who live in Yemen. Its nothing fancy but an authentic dress piece non the less. Its one of the reasons why I developed an interest into Yemeni (and Arabian) daggers as a whole.

Sometimes I feel alone here when it comes to our hobby. There are people interested but not many willing to spend the cash on it. almost 4 years have passed and I have only met one Kuwaiti collector who is just a mere beginner, I rarely even hear from him. Saqir is another, he used to be in the forum but he no longer is interested in collecting swords though.

I reckon that we collectors are perhaps a part of why the hobby is not so wide spread, ofcourse that can be good and bad at the same time, but wouldnt the fact that we as 'private' collectors are a reason of holding historical items from the public? museums from what I read here seem to have an effect on alot of us which drove us to collect but as time passes and the more we collect, the more of history goes private for decades with only a selected (or overly interested) minority gets to view it.

Some people I know who tried to pick up the hobby felt crushed by the amount of fakes around. They never recovered from their mistakes and simply gave up on the hobby all together. Its their mistake though :-)

[Iain]

Originally Posted by A.alnakkas

I reckon that we collectors are perhaps a part of why the hobby is not so wide spread, ofcourse that can be good and bad at the same time, but wouldnt the fact that we as 'private' collectors are a reason of holding historical items from the public? museums from what I read here seem to have an effect on alot of us which drove us to collect but as time passes and the more we collect, the more of history goes private for decades with only a selected (or overly interested) minority gets to view it.

Some people I know who tried to pick up the hobby felt crushed by the amount of fakes around. They never recovered from their mistakes and simply gave up on the hobby all together. Its their mistake though :-)

Museums are a double edged sword in this regard - yes some exhibit ethnographic arms and do it very well. Unfortunately most museums do not have the space to exhibit all their collections and a great many objects are never available for the public to view.

On subject of fakes - I think it very much depends on the area one collects in. Personally my area of interest doesn't have fakes per say - just things that are less old.

While there are many expensive cultures and types to collect there remain quite a few areas where things are still pretty cheap. To be totally honest that's one of the main reasons I got into takouba in the first place - it didn't require a huge investment to acquire a few examples.