Non european blade on Napoleonic saber

[Roland_M]

A napoleonic era "Sabre de cavalerie légère à la Chasseur" with a non european blade from around 1800.
The blade length is 85 cm, the overall length is 98cm and weighs 870g.
The blade is very sure not from Europe. My personal guess is that it was forged in the Ottoman Empire.
It is a pipe back blade with the shape of a turkish kilij and a sharp back edge.

The blade thickness at the beginning of the back edge is only 1.5 mm or 0.059 inch.
Close to the short ricasso the blade thickness is 2 mm. I have read books with rumors about such thin blades, but I could not believe it. Now i have one, still hard to believe, even when I hold it in my hand.
The blade is etched with five moons and a kind of cartouche, picture 3,
I hope this can help to find out more information.
I showed pictures of the blade to a well known german blade smith and he replied (quite euphoric) that it is made from layered steel like japanese katana. Exactly as japanese blades, the saber have a mirror polish, which is almost intact.
The blade was worn over a couple of years (detail in picture 4), probably in the Napoleonic campaigns.
The blade itself have some nicks and it is slightly bended from thrusting (seen from top).

Now the blade rests forever in a carefully made scabbard, which is even in excellent condition.

Together with a real worn mandau (with a hamon like on katana) this is the absolute highlight of my collection.


Thanks for reading and I hope i can read some comments to this blade.


p.s. I'm not sure about the right category, I think the main work of the blade is non european.

Best wishes
Roland M.

[TVV]

This is not an Ottoman blade. Looks very European to me.

Teodor

[A.alnakkas]

Yes, a lovely European blade that was meant to have a good polish :-)

One of my Qatari friends uses a clauberg for Ardha, he was once cleaning it while etching a wootz blade. Some of the etchant dropped on the clauberg and a pattern like this one appeared. He polished it again, as I dont think those were meant to have such patterns exposed.

[Battara]

Could the blade originally be Russian in origin? They did do laminated steel. I am having difficulty seeing if the inscription remnants are Cyrillic or Arabic.

If Arabic, then this could indeed be an old Ottoman shamshir blade reshaped for French(?) use.

[ariel]

Solingen did damaskus.

[estcrh]

I have never sen an Ottoman kilij that looked anything like this blade, either in the shape or the metal type.

[trenchwarfare]

That looks like the Peter Munich "moon". That would put it late 17, early 1800s. Very nice piece.

[Battara]

If this is a special damascus German steel blade, what throws me is the remnant inscription on the top left of the close ups.

[Jim McDougall]

This extremely attractive sabre is truly an anomaly, mostly due to this blade which appears of laminated or Damascus steel, for me in my limited understanding of metallurgy, a most perplexing subject.

The hilt and scabbard do correspond to the Napoleonic sabre form identified, which is indeed French. The piped back blade, with a stepped back of 'yelman' form (a feature which in degree recalls Turkish blade styles) seems to have been present somewhat during these times. These are invariably European, and seen on British and German blades, and this pipeback, raised tip form seems to have prevailed through the 19th century contemporary with other blade styles.

I agree that as far as I have known, the pipeback feature has never been used on Eastern blade forms, though the Central Asian 'T' section has similarity.

What I think is interesting is that after the Napoleonic campaigns a good number of French weapons were captured by the Russians. Many of these, including these type sabres, were copied and produced at the Zlatoust arms factory.

A ceremonial sabre from Zlatoust is seen with blade having remarkably similar profile with the pipeback and stepped tip (Wagner, 1967, p.455, #155) however this sword's blade is etched with military motif etc. and dates 1821.

It is interesting that the Russian's had for some time had the patterned steel known as bulat. In the early 1800s in France Jean Robert Breant had begun experiments with Damascus steel based much on English work by Faraday.
The Russian work with Damascus was with Petrel Petrovich Anosov but not until mid 19th century.

So the question would be, is this a French sabre as properly identified with a blade experimentally produced through Breant? though I believe most of his work was post Napoleonic 1820s

Or, could this have been a post Napoleonic production from Zlatoust, using perhaps bulat, or similar process?



Then there is the question of the curious five crescent faced moons. While Peter Munsten indeed was one German smith whose blades often had these moons on them, these were primarily 'talismanic ' motif which were used in variation by various smiths and the engravers they used. While the French, as the Germans, used these kinds of motif (not as familiar with Russians but they likely did as well) it seems odd on this type of blade with patterned steel. I am uncertain on the other marking.
These moons and other cosmological and symbolic motif were used through the 18th century, but their use seems to have ceased by early 1800s.

So there remain many questions on this sword, but these details I hope might lead to some productive research and ideas.

[fernando]

How about trying to take and post more refined close ups of the marks ?

[Jim McDougall]

I have always said, the depth of text and footnotes in everything written by Robert Elgood is a virtual arms and armour goldmine!

From his 1994, "Arms and Armour of Arabia":
p.25:
"...P.Knecht (of Solingen) appears to be one of the first European makers to experiment in the production of watered steel blades. A German presentation sabre with finely watered, curved single edged blade with clipped back point and yelman".
this was apparently offered in Christies auction Wed, 15 Apr. 1992, lot #194
On the blade is inscribed "
Waffenfabrick von Pr. W.Knecht Sohn in Solingen/Pers Kahora Weich
According to Claude Blair, the term 'weich' means refined.
The blade is dated 1823.

Two other similar type swords without inscriptions , #195 and #196 appear from the same workshop.
#195: no yelman but on forte on each side of blade a star and crescent gilt.
#196: has three stars and crescent on one blade face; on the other
pseudo-Arabic inscriptions and scroll work.
Elgood notes both are early 19th century and in form resemble the Turkish kilij.
It is unclear whether he means the pistol type grip or blade in that comment.
* He also notes that the endymion on the scabbards suggested to him this might align these with the Greek-Ottoman war of that time.

Regarding other perspective on the watered steel blades in European context,
p.25....the blade manufacturer Giacomo Lando from St. Bartolomeo near Brescia in Italy was rewarded by the Viceroy in 1810 for having successfully making Damascus sword blades. Elgood notes further in footnotes that it would be extremely interesting to prove the export of Damascus blades to the Levant in the 19th c. and that though the evidence is lacking it doeseem likely.
*This seems contradictory to the previous reference to Knecht.

Also on p.25, an 'imitation' Damascus blade made by Crivelli in Italy was among captured weapons taken at Seringapatam in 1799, setting us to wonder what Tipu was doing with it.

It would seem the first entries here pertaining to Knecht reveal that he may indeed have been responsible for this blade, and as previously noted, this pipeback feature was in use in Germany (also found on British blades) of the time.
The name Knecht is of course well known primarily for the Solingen family who traded in swords rather than manufacture them c.1770, Johann Peter Knecht who signed P.Knecht (Wallace Coll. Mann, 1962, A520; A641) and the blades with the familiar 'Spanish Motto'.
His son Peter Knecht, was born in 1796, and apparently the innovative smith we are concerned with.


I think this well supports the astute observations of Ariel and Oliver.