It's not much...

Interesting story on the man in the moon mark - It originally was used by sword makers in Solingen Germany as a "maker's mark", and many of these blades were sold to north Africa. When the north Africans realized the steel was much better than their natively produced steel, they assumed the moon guy was some sort of magical mark that made the blade stronger. So they started marking their own blades with the moon guy in the belief it'd make them stronger.

My Takouba is only about 50 years old, but even it still has the moon marks on it. But as you can see the tradition has degenerated over the centuries into just a half circle with a squiggly line for a
face.

 
that is an awesome collection blue, the character of the marks is just gripping, really makes you want to learn more about the blades, I see how you got drawn into this rather unique collecting area, I had never heard of takouba until you!
 
Very good stuff here, Blue Lander, thanks for sharing.
I love the ethnic blades, I too prefer cavalry sabres-especially the wide tip heavy Blucher style. Makers and proof mark are always interesting to me as well.

It sure is fun watching the progression from all the nooks and crannies in the house going from an armory- to babied up- to the later clutter of a mixed museum! I am happy that my gals enjoyed growing up with their baby shoes hanging off of khukuri and spears and hawks and the like. They now have all their own various blades and toys, can sharpen, hunt and wield these fun tools.

:)
Mark
 
its always nice when you can share your interests with the young and see them take up the same ideas, leaves you hope that there is a good place for the collections to go other than an auction house ! very cool mark
 
Thanks for the compliments everyone. Here's another interesting one, a golok from Malaysia.



I love the pamor style patterns on this blade. If you run your fingernail down the side of the blade you can actually feel the laminations.The blade's edge is cracked and disintegrating in some parts, and there are several cracks on the spine as well. It looks like it had a long life judging from how many times it's been sharpened.

I believe this pamor pattern is called "Janur Sinebit", and it's magical power is that it's supposed to ward off "guna guna" whatever that is. It must be working, because I haven't had any guna guna since I bought it.



It looks like there used to be some sort of silver decoration on the bolster that was removed or fell off over the years



There's a pattern on the spine that doesn't really come out well in pictures so I drew it on with MS Paint. I was told these are traditional markings but don't have any specific meaning.

 
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Thats a very nice piece Blue! Imagine the work it took then to get the steel to that point. Guna guna's inside the blade! If you sharpen it guna comes out!
 
Thanks! They must have folded the metal hundreds of times to get that pattern. Google translate says Guna Guna means witchcraft in indonesian, so I guess it's protecting me from the any indonesian witches who have it out for me.
 
Hey you can't have too much protection from them Indonesian Witches, I hear they are sneaky little buggers. Course there's always hope that there are good Indonesian Witches of the West and only Evil Wicked Witches of the East. So maybe ya got a 50/50 chance ya know?
 
Got another Berber dagger to somehow sneak up onto that wall without getting busted...



It looks like the blade came from a cut down sabre or bayonette, no idea how old though.
 
very cool here are all my antique blades



im not sure about the others I have , most are knockoffs and not authentic, these are the ones that I know are antiques, the new dha is just great, i went on a hunt for them after kroncke posted his, they just really got my interest, especially the kachin and naga style.

focus on the kachin dha



pretty sure its early 20th or late 19th , leaning on early 20th, but still a good example, I am going to try and make a sheath for it , since I got a great deal as it did not have one :D
 
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Niiiiice! The Kachin dha is the one with the squared end, right?

I bought a bunch of "tourist" knives too, but most were part of a lot that didn't cost me much. I feel extra stupid about the Talwar, should have known better on that one. Oh well. They'll never hang on my wall of course.


 
hey you never learn to recognize the real stuff unless you make some mistakes, thats learning ! I feel more confident in my ability to recognize authentic antique steel now-- but yeah the kachin dha is the square end, all my tourist ones show weld marks lol, the real things are all hand worked around the blade
 
True, you only learn through making mistakes. Educations are rarely free! I'm going to educate myself more before I go after stuff that's commonly tourist like kerises and koummyas. It's sometimes almost impossible to judge the authenticity of something off a blurry ebay photo. I think if you ever want to build a respectable collection you have to spend the extra money and buy from a reputable seller.

Here's my advice for newbies looking to get a deal off e-bay:

Beware any knife/sword with a two dimensional looking blade. If it looks like a flat piece of metal cut into the shape of a blade, it's probably not made for actual use. Even if the blade is well decorated, you should see some evidence that thought was put into how the blade would cut. Look for things like fullers, ridges or convex edges.

Beware any knife/sword with a blade that still shows a lot of marks from hammer forging. If the hilt and scabbard look nice but the blade looks very roughly finished, it was probably never meant to be seen IE it's a costume piece or a wall hanger. I used to think a rough blade meant it was made for "real use". It really means it was made by someone with no skill out of scrap metal. If it was real, even if it's for a poor person, they would have at least put the effort of polishing the hammer marks out of it. Working with soft metals like brass and copper and wood to make a nice hilt and scabbard. Making a steel blade is difficult, and if it's never going to be used they just skip that part.

If the blade doesn't look right but you find yourself staring at it until you convince yourself it's legit, it probably isn't.

If there are any unusual markings or writing on the blade, type it into google and see what comes up. If you find 10 identical blades it's probably mass produced for tourists.

Don't buy anything from your cell phone before you look at it on a larger screen. Especially if you're at a bar. Especially if it's exactly what you were looking for and the price is too good to be true and nobody's bid on it.

Avoid knives/swords that are commonly made for tourists unless the pictures are really good and you know what you're doing. Moroccan kouymmas are like that, you see 10 tourist ones for every 1 real one. Usually the blades on the tourist ones are terrible looking, though, so they're easy to spot.

If you're looking for a blade from a certain country, don't buy one from somebody in that country. It's probably a tourist piece. Find out who that country's former colonial master was and look to buy it from somebody in that country.

100+ year old steel ages differently than more modern steel's. Learn to tell the difference between the patina of a centuries old piece of steel that's been well cared for versus a 50 year old rusty piece of steel.

Do not believe anything the seller tells you, only believe your eyes.

If the seller says it was brought back during WW 2, then it's probably a tourist piece sold to a GI.
 
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Very nice Gehazi! and Blue! That Dha is really cool! Looks better than 36" more like 40"? Spine thickness about 1/4"? Are you able to weight it? That thing is giving me chicken skin! I gotta have one for a user which means HI will have to make more or....?
 
Nice write-up blue, very helpful. I have been eyeing some antique khuks on ebay but I'm never sure enough that they aren't tourist junk to bid.
 
No prob! That's another good piece of advice - never spend more on something from ebay than you'd be comfortable wasting on a worthless tourist piece. If it's $40 and you think it might be a tourist piece, go for it. If it's fake then you just educated yourself for next time. If it's $200+, don't pull the trigger unless you're 100% sure.
 
More advice:

look for evidence of repeated resharpening. you might notice a change in the edge shape near the hilt where the edge has been ground off over decades of use

look at the grind marks on the edge. Sometimes you can tell if it was ground by a machine or if it was ground with a file by hand.

Look at the other items being sold by that seller. If you think the knife is tourist and he's selling 10 knives that are definitely tourist, don't buy it. If it's the only knife/sword he's selling and the rest is random knick knacks then he's probably reselling stuff he bought at a flea market. If he's selling a bunch of stuff from the same country but he knows nothing about it, he's probably selling stuff from an estate sale.
 
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