Tunisian or Libyan berber sword with scabbard

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by werecow

Thanks for your thoughts Jim!

Of course, my knowledge of this area of the world is quite limited, and I'm entirely going by geographical proximity and superficial similarity (and even then, when squinting). Some of these pommels resemble the Jineta shape much more than others, but all of them also admittedly have significant differences in shape (being flat, much more triangular, lobed, and frankly looking a bit penile in shape ), so there is also plenty of cause for skepticism and caution. Still, what similarity there is seemed interesting enough to warrant mentioning.

This may be a long shot given that so little is known about these, but are there any books or papers that deal with pre-19th century swords associated with the Berber tribes of north west Africa that I could check out to see if I might find any more robust connections to other hilt types?

Im sure there is notable anthropological literature on the tribes of the Berber confederation, but I rather doubt any specific attention to peculiarities of weaponry would be likely. While a great deal of attention is given to the social and cultural characteristics, seldom is attention applied to weapons, so all we can do is speculate much as you have done, quite effectively I must say.
Offhand I can recall some works by Carleton Coons (if memory serves) on Berber tribes of the Rif; and Nicolsen wrote extensively on the Tuaregs in which there were actually general notes on weapons.

While the Zeneta tribes removed to the Maghrabi areas during the 16th c. it seems of course that there would be residual contact with Tunisia etc. The cross diffusion with Saharan trade routes that existed from Tunisian areas from these early times into the 19th century of course confounds any sort of finite classification. It does seem as noted, the general consensus seems to hold to the Tunisian assessment.

The French blades moved broadly across the Sahara, and seem to occur often in the distinct sabers of the Manding in Mali as well as in many 'aljinaur' (=curved) tuareg style hilt takoubas.

I'll have to look further, consider my curiosity totally piqued!