North African dagger for identification

[gp]

Originally Posted by kronckew

I suspect the Moroccans are lazy and only sharpen as little as possible rather than the more normal fully sharpened both edges. It's certainly not because they get there fingers down there. I dislike Khoumiyya in general. Moroccan saifs are OK tho, I especially like the ones we call 'nimcha' even tho they aren't really. I have a 'cavalry nimcha' with a really long blade (Camel corps?) as an oxymoron; and a more piratey nimcha (short) one or two. One of those is guardless but has the std grip profile for one... Weird.

well to inflict maximum damage in battle, one doesn't sharpen a blade...those wounds don't heal as easy as a sharp cut one and tend to be more deadly.
That's a lesson I learned from my late father from his WWII experience...

But also many swords in the American Civel War were not sharpened; to avoid the horses getting hurt....
Hence one finds small pieces broken out at the blade...

Comming back to my friends in the Magreb, the Khoumiyya was a very effective weapon in the Riff Wars as the Spanish found out or the French before them through the hands of Emir Abdelkader and his troops.
Excellent side weapons to the riffles and the combination of the high temperature with a hole isn't exactly nice and allowing a combatant to return to active service soon...

A sharp knife/dagger comes in handy as a "nice & sleazy" assassin's or revange act compared to a battlefield one