Tulwar handles on e-bay

kahnjar1 · 16th January 2017, 07:10 PM

One other possibility, which has not been mentioned above if I read correctly, is that these (or at least some) are modern made and aged copies. I have an Indian friend who has said to me that I should NOT buy anything from India described as "old" or "antique" unless I have watertight provenance. His comment was that India is the new China in terms of copies. This of course is not necessarily an all encompassing statement, but simply that extreme care should be taken when buying "old" items.
It should also perhaps be noted that there are, from time to time, many "old" and "antique" powder flasks being advertised from India, "made by" such well known makers as Hawksley etc.

Stu

ariel · 16th January 2017, 07:54 PM

OK, guys, additional information.
I contacted Fernando and he was unbelievably helpful.
He sent me an English translation of p.189 from Rainer Daehnhardts book "Men, Swords and Tomatos" ( the latter is a Portugese slang for "Balls") as well as his old post here about his conversation with RD post book reading.
Here they are:

Daehnhardt's book:
''' The main charateristic of this arm is little known, but rather interesting. Apart from individual arms that were manufactured for high rank personalities, more simple tulwars were also produced, in large quantities, for the Sovereigns arsenals. Invasions, popular insubordinations and palatial revolutions were very frequent. Few were the Sovereigns that dyed of natural causes. The state of war between ones and others was a frequente situation. In this atmosphere it became obvious that the possession and access to the arsenals were a preocupation of the greatest priority. A system was invented that impeached the possibility of using an Indian arsenal from one moment to the other. The handles of tulwars were built in metal ( usually iron ), joining guard, grip and pommel in one only piece, which doesn't happen in the majority of white weapons of other origins, where all these components were separated one from eachother. As tulwars handles were one only part, it became easy to join all these in one arsenal ( we are talking, in round numbers, in the order of the one hundred thousand handles ), and build a tower where these could be well kept with "seven keys" ( my commas , for a Portuguese figure of speech ). In another tower, distant from the first one, the respective blades were kept. When a sovereign decided to invade a neighbour country or prepare himself to defend his own, such event would be known within months of antecipation, which allowed for the mounting of the blades in their handles. Such blades had a short tang, which was neither peened, screwed, or stuck by a pin. To couple the blade with the grip, the late was turned upsidown, pouring in into his hollow part heated pitch, therefore liquid, as the blade was inserted. Once the pith cooled down, the blade would be fixed enough for battle, during years. In case it started to oscilate, the fixing system could allways be repeated. A strategic Sovereign would know how much time he needed to mount his army weapons and, taking precaution, had his arsenals ready in due time for the distribution of tulwars. In case of a mutiny or a palatial revolution, there was no time to mount the tulwars, in a manner that the arsenals were relatively protected from improper utilization.'''

Fernando's follow-up message:
Hi Ariel,

I was precisely answering your first email...my email server got stuck.

Yes, this was a two part story.
First, and as you already spotted, the text copied from page 189 of the said book Men Swords and Tomatos (read 'balls').
And as this has generated some skepticism, namely from the side of one such 'Spiral', i have visited Daehnhardt and raised the problem. His answered is contained in a post i submitted in a later thread, as follows:

... I have visited Rainer Daehnhardt shops in Lisbon, and i had in mind to ask him to coment on some parts of his book that have been considered discusseable.
Concerning the tulwars being stored in separate places, he stil assumes what he has written in the book. But i have learnt that he was referring to a specific case, and not to generality. In one of his (three?) visits to India, around 1970, he met a certain Maharaja in the north whom, at time of visiting his arsenal, asked him whether he wanted to see the blades first, or the hilts. For the case, they were kept in two towers, located about one kilometer away from each other.
The reason explained for such attitude was the one we already know.
He said ( i didn't ask him ) that the Maharaja's name was complex and dificult to memorize ... "Bija" something or the like...

Best wishes
Fernando

Thanks a lot, Fernando!!!!!

fernando · 16th January 2017, 08:02 PM

Jens Nordlunde · 17th January 2017, 04:43 PM

Fernando/Ariel, very well done, and thank you very much for the translation.
It seems to me, that keeping the hilts and the blades apart, was a question, which Rainer Daehnhardt should have been digging a bit more into - a pity he didn't.
This 'habit' of keeping hilts and blade seperat, could be due to, how much the Maharaja trusted his employees, and the people he was ruling over.
I feel sure, that had it been general, people like Egerton, Hendley, Kipling and others, living there and commenting on armouries would have mentioned it, as the habit, as far as I know, is very far form the European way to do it - and so, such a habit, must have been very strange to them.

ariel · 18th January 2017, 12:40 AM

I am with you .

These missives were not intended to be a final, unassailable "truth".

The issue was raised as to the origin of this information, and here it is. Nothing more.
Each one here is free to accept the idea or to reject it. If additional sources become available, they should be presented here.

Going back, we may find potential explanations for the plethora of handles and the paucity of blades.
The absence of dish pommels is still a mystery.

Travis Canaday · 18th January 2017, 08:14 AM

Hello to all,

This is my first post and I would like to introduce myself and throw my hat into this conversation. Although my current knowledge is quite limited in regards to South Asian arms, my favorite swords are tulwars. I can thank Matt Easton for planting this seed and ebay for letting me get my hands on some of these swords with my rather meager budget.

As far as why are all these hilts without blades on ebay, I just assumed it is because of the old tradition in India of hilts and blades being easily interchangeable. While an old sword blade could be made into something useful quickly, an old hilt would just get tossed aside. In regards to this "epidemic" of tulwar hilts on ebay as Ariel refers to it; I think folks just realized rather than just let these old things rust away in the shed, some westerner will pay thirty bucks for it. I am referring to all these real antique, but junky (often broken) tulwar hilts on ebay. They don't seem to be doing the fake old stuff racket the way the Chinese do so often on ebay. These cheap hilts often have a missing disk and/or a broken langet.

In regards to all the missing disks on many of the hilts, it is simply because they are worn out old junk. I just bought a tulwar from an American seller with the disk missing from the hilt because I like the stout old blade that came with it. It definitely had a disk at one point (long ago), but these parts do seem to be the first part that breaks. I plan on replacing the hilt with a different one purchased on ebay from India. A really nice one which I will attach using a traditional Laksha based cutler's resin. Another tulwar I have is completely solid except for a wiggle in the disk. I think this is just a common problem with these mass produced "munitions" level hilts.

In the future I plan to post pictures of my tulwars and the re-hilting process to share and request knowledge and opinions.

Cheers!

fernando · 18th January 2017, 11:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ariel

...These missives were not intended to be a final, unassailable "truth".
The issue was raised as to the origin of this information, and here it is. Nothing more.
Each one here is free to accept the idea or to reject it...

Exactly.
In fact, when i pasted my post reflecting Mr. Daehnhardt's narration on this subject, i saw no need to transcribe in the text a paragraph with my own comment on it, which was:
Naturaly this is a facultative situation, nobody has to beleive in it.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showpo...5&postcount=19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jens Nordlunde

...It seems to me, that keeping the hilts and the blades apart, was a question, which Rainer Daehnhardt should have been digging a bit more into - a pity he didn't.
This 'habit' of keeping hilts and blade seperat, could be due to, how much the Maharaja trusted his employees, and the people he was ruling over...

Apparently there was nothing further to dig, at least as far as he was concerned, which i think he has put it in detail and very clear.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jens Nordlunde

I feel sure, that had it been general, people like Egerton, Hendley, Kipling and others, living there and commenting on armouries would have mentioned it, as the habit, as far as I know, is very far form the European way to do it - and so, such a habit, must have been very strange to them...

Also we may read that, in my checking with him about such particularity, he admitted that, the way he has put things in his book, might be seen as a general habit but, having to be precise, he assumed that, as far as he could assure, this occurred with a particular Raja, for the quoted reasons. If there were more sovereings acting with the same behaviour, who knows ? India is as large as a sub continent; perhaps too large for one to say he has seen it all.
But again ... we are all free to digest it or not

.

Mercenary · 21st January 2017, 05:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jens Nordlunde

I feel sure, that had it been general, people like Egerton, Hendley, Kipling and others, living there and commenting on armouries would have mentioned it, as the habit, as far as I know, is very far form the European way to do it - and so, such a habit, must have been very strange to them.

Are you sure that Lord Egerton ever been in India?

Jim McDougall · 21st January 2017, 05:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mercenary

Are you sure that Lord Egerton ever been in India?

HUH????

"...while in India Lord Egerton collected, studied and observed with the inspired interest of a student collector. The odd arms of India were fast becoming obsolete and he seized the opportunity to record all be could.."
from the foreward in his 1880 book.

Are you suggesting he was not?

Mercenary · 21st January 2017, 07:20 PM

"there was none available, nor any information about Indian weapons and their manufacture, except that which was to be found in books of travel, or in the noticed scattered through Oriental magazines" - in India in 1855?
Where was Lord Egerton? How long? Was he doing any research except through "books of travel" and "Oriental magazines"? I can not find anything about his life in India. I will try more...

16th January 2017, 07:10 PM	#1
kahnjar1 Member Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: CHRISTCHURCH NEW ZEALAND Posts: 2,786	One other possibility, which has not been mentioned above if I read correctly, is that these (or at least some) are modern made and aged copies. I have an Indian friend who has said to me that I should NOT buy anything from India described as "old" or "antique" unless I have watertight provenance. His comment was that India is the new China in terms of copies. This of course is not necessarily an all encompassing statement, but simply that extreme care should be taken when buying "old" items. It should also perhaps be noted that there are, from time to time, many "old" and "antique" powder flasks being advertised from India, "made by" such well known makers as Hawksley etc. Stu

16th January 2017, 07:54 PM	#2
ariel Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Ann Arbor, MI Posts: 5,503	OK, guys, additional information. I contacted Fernando and he was unbelievably helpful. He sent me an English translation of p.189 from Rainer Daehnhardts book "Men, Swords and Tomatos" ( the latter is a Portugese slang for "Balls") as well as his old post here about his conversation with RD post book reading. Here they are: Daehnhardt's book: ''' The main charateristic of this arm is little known, but rather interesting. Apart from individual arms that were manufactured for high rank personalities, more simple tulwars were also produced, in large quantities, for the Sovereigns arsenals. Invasions, popular insubordinations and palatial revolutions were very frequent. Few were the Sovereigns that dyed of natural causes. The state of war between ones and others was a frequente situation. In this atmosphere it became obvious that the possession and access to the arsenals were a preocupation of the greatest priority. A system was invented that impeached the possibility of using an Indian arsenal from one moment to the other. The handles of tulwars were built in metal ( usually iron ), joining guard, grip and pommel in one only piece, which doesn't happen in the majority of white weapons of other origins, where all these components were separated one from eachother. As tulwars handles were one only part, it became easy to join all these in one arsenal ( we are talking, in round numbers, in the order of the one hundred thousand handles ), and build a tower where these could be well kept with "seven keys" ( my commas , for a Portuguese figure of speech ). In another tower, distant from the first one, the respective blades were kept. When a sovereign decided to invade a neighbour country or prepare himself to defend his own, such event would be known within months of antecipation, which allowed for the mounting of the blades in their handles. Such blades had a short tang, which was neither peened, screwed, or stuck by a pin. To couple the blade with the grip, the late was turned upsidown, pouring in into his hollow part heated pitch, therefore liquid, as the blade was inserted. Once the pith cooled down, the blade would be fixed enough for battle, during years. In case it started to oscilate, the fixing system could allways be repeated. A strategic Sovereign would know how much time he needed to mount his army weapons and, taking precaution, had his arsenals ready in due time for the distribution of tulwars. In case of a mutiny or a palatial revolution, there was no time to mount the tulwars, in a manner that the arsenals were relatively protected from improper utilization.''' Fernando's follow-up message: Hi Ariel, I was precisely answering your first email...my email server got stuck. Yes, this was a two part story. First, and as you already spotted, the text copied from page 189 of the said book Men Swords and Tomatos (read 'balls'). And as this has generated some skepticism, namely from the side of one such 'Spiral', i have visited Daehnhardt and raised the problem. His answered is contained in a post i submitted in a later thread, as follows: ... I have visited Rainer Daehnhardt shops in Lisbon, and i had in mind to ask him to coment on some parts of his book that have been considered discusseable. Concerning the tulwars being stored in separate places, he stil assumes what he has written in the book. But i have learnt that he was referring to a specific case, and not to generality. In one of his (three?) visits to India, around 1970, he met a certain Maharaja in the north whom, at time of visiting his arsenal, asked him whether he wanted to see the blades first, or the hilts. For the case, they were kept in two towers, located about one kilometer away from each other. The reason explained for such attitude was the one we already know. He said ( i didn't ask him ) that the Maharaja's name was complex and dificult to memorize ... "Bija" something or the like... Best wishes Fernando Thanks a lot, Fernando!!!!!

16th January 2017, 08:02 PM	#3
fernando (deceased) Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Portugal Posts: 9,694

17th January 2017, 04:43 PM	#4
Jens Nordlunde Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Europe Posts: 2,718	Fernando/Ariel, very well done, and thank you very much for the translation. It seems to me, that keeping the hilts and the blades apart, was a question, which Rainer Daehnhardt should have been digging a bit more into - a pity he didn't. This 'habit' of keeping hilts and blade seperat, could be due to, how much the Maharaja trusted his employees, and the people he was ruling over. I feel sure, that had it been general, people like Egerton, Hendley, Kipling and others, living there and commenting on armouries would have mentioned it, as the habit, as far as I know, is very far form the European way to do it - and so, such a habit, must have been very strange to them.

18th January 2017, 12:40 AM	#5
ariel Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Ann Arbor, MI Posts: 5,503	I am with you . These missives were not intended to be a final, unassailable "truth". The issue was raised as to the origin of this information, and here it is. Nothing more. Each one here is free to accept the idea or to reject it. If additional sources become available, they should be presented here. Going back, we may find potential explanations for the plethora of handles and the paucity of blades. The absence of dish pommels is still a mystery.

18th January 2017, 08:14 AM	#6
Travis Canaday Member Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: Kansas City, USA Posts: 1	Hello to all, This is my first post and I would like to introduce myself and throw my hat into this conversation. Although my current knowledge is quite limited in regards to South Asian arms, my favorite swords are tulwars. I can thank Matt Easton for planting this seed and ebay for letting me get my hands on some of these swords with my rather meager budget. As far as why are all these hilts without blades on ebay, I just assumed it is because of the old tradition in India of hilts and blades being easily interchangeable. While an old sword blade could be made into something useful quickly, an old hilt would just get tossed aside. In regards to this "epidemic" of tulwar hilts on ebay as Ariel refers to it; I think folks just realized rather than just let these old things rust away in the shed, some westerner will pay thirty bucks for it. I am referring to all these real antique, but junky (often broken) tulwar hilts on ebay. They don't seem to be doing the fake old stuff racket the way the Chinese do so often on ebay. These cheap hilts often have a missing disk and/or a broken langet. In regards to all the missing disks on many of the hilts, it is simply because they are worn out old junk. I just bought a tulwar from an American seller with the disk missing from the hilt because I like the stout old blade that came with it. It definitely had a disk at one point (long ago), but these parts do seem to be the first part that breaks. I plan on replacing the hilt with a different one purchased on ebay from India. A really nice one which I will attach using a traditional Laksha based cutler's resin. Another tulwar I have is completely solid except for a wiggle in the disk. I think this is just a common problem with these mass produced "munitions" level hilts. In the future I plan to post pictures of my tulwars and the re-hilting process to share and request knowledge and opinions. Cheers!

21st January 2017, 07:20 PM	#10
Mercenary Member Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Moscow, Russia Posts: 426	"there was none available, nor any information about Indian weapons and their manufacture, except that which was to be found in books of travel, or in the noticed scattered through Oriental magazines" - in India in 1855? Where was Lord Egerton? How long? Was he doing any research except through "books of travel" and "Oriental magazines"? I can not find anything about his life in India. I will try more...