Period Photos of People with Ethnographic Arms

[gp]

Most people know Goya from his work "The Disasters of War (Spanish: Los desastres de la guerra) " being a series of 82 prints created between 1810 and 1820 : https://artfacts.net/exhibition/goya-dali:-monsters-awake-when-the-mind-sleeps/895569

but also most interesting is a painting called The Second of May 1808, also known as The Charge of the Mamelukes (Spanish: El 2 de mayo de 1808 en Madrid, La lucha con los mamelucos or La carga de los mamelucos)
Created: 1814. Medium: oil on canvas . Dimensions: 8'9" x 11'4" in Museo Nacional del Prado (Prado Museum); Madrid, Spain.

Having been on an exhibition of Dali - Goya , Dali loved and was inspired by Goya, specially his war topics. As a result you can see some influances on Dali's 'The Battle of Tetuan', 1961 .

Enclosed both paintings , some details and 2 studies of Dali

[gp]

sword handling and dances, just like collecting them.... is mostly male dominated,
but women do also are present...
as these dancing ladies from Asia, through the Arab world to the Balkans clearly show...

[Pertinax]

Bride

[gp]

another lady but except for the Husar-like uniform, have I no clue from which country and which regiment....

Anybody any idea?

[David R]

Austro-Hungarian Empire.

[gp]

some more Husars, King William III of Holland, some German and French and one of Luzern.
What I like is the difference in swords

[gp]

.

[gp]

with regards to Tasa's contribution "The Ottoman Art of Bladesmithing" a few pictures of the lads...

[gp]

some pics of the Morlachs; a Slavic people in the areo around Herzegovina, Lika and the Dalmatia, often in service of Venice

[francantolin]

Here a picture of the wife of a famous south italian bandit
named Ninco Nanco from Basilicate-Lucania .
The band , chief and wife fight against the Savoy soldiers that wanted with lot of violence to conqueer south Italy during the italian '' unification''.
Maria fighted as a man and Ninco was considerated in the region as some kind of Robin Hood,
stealing ( and killing ) lot of soldiers and rich insiders and then helping poor people and priests.

[francantolin]

Authentic pics more than this kind of ''warrior'' pictures where men seems just dressed like that for a souvenir picture mardi gras ...
( I did the same at the Alhambra in Granada , for few buckets, dressed with arabo-andalous clothes and holding a large khanjar.. maybe one time I'll post it 😁

Armenian warrior from Zeytun

[francantolin]

Other briganti / bandits from Bisaccia /Irpinia

Around same period: 1862

[Pertinax]

Bedouin warrior, Saudi Arabia, 1906

[roanoa]

From an old Italian book on world costumes

[roanoa]

some more pictures

[gp]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3i7K8Ep7Lw

that Caucasian ladies knowing how to use the shaska as in the above video,
is not something new....
as one can see from these pics, some dating back to around 1910...

[Maurice]

Achenese warrior

[gp]

1877 Kurd & Karakulak

[Sajen]

A Tanimbar warrior with a keris! :eek:

[Sajen]

And here is a picture from the Ngada people of Flores with shields, guns and a stick sword.

[gp]

3 pics from the Balkans;

a militia ( Serdars) with Austrian K.u.K. army officersin Hercegovina 1905
police in the town of Trebinje 1907
a Royal Guard from Gorazde around the 20ies or perhaps a little later

[Pertinax]

Mongolian warrior in battle dress, Mongolia, circa 1900.

[Rick]

Americans.

[David R]

Usually family members in this sort of photo, and I would guess Confederate recruits, 1860.

[AvtoGaz]

Authentic pics more than this kind of ''warrior'' pictures where men seems just dressed like that for a souvenir picture mardi gras ...


Its not a souvenir picture, they really were just that heavily armed in everyday life. It was really not uncommon at all for many of the peoples of Anatolia and the Balkans.

"In front of and behind the mules or at their sides, walked robust young men; they had light and narrow clogs at their feet; woolen breeches wrapped around their legs; a reddish belt tightened their waist, contained first pistols and carried the leather powder magazines; from the belt hung the half-meter long sabers, next to small powder boxes and bags which contained bullets: their busts were covered with jackets of variegated wool, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows; and the very long sleeves of their shirts, tied at their ends, passed behind their necks; at their backs, on the right side, stood the rifles, having barrels a meter long, and flat triangular stocks; they wore the Tunisian fez, wrapped in large red silk kefié, rolled up several times, giving a terrible appearance to their faces; They were all tall with blond moustaches curled up on their alert and young faces : they were the brave men of Zeïtoun." -Zeïtoun: Depuis les origines jusqu'à l'insurrection de 1895

[David]

Its not a souvenir picture, they really were just that heavily armed in everyday life. It was really not uncommon at all for many of the peoples of Anatolia and the Balkans.

"In front of and behind the mules or at their sides, walked robust young men; they had light and narrow clogs at their feet; woolen breeches wrapped around their legs; a reddish belt tightened their waist, contained first pistols and carried the leather powder magazines; from the belt hung the half-meter long sabers, next to small powder boxes and bags which contained bullets: their busts were covered with jackets of variegated wool, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows; and the very long sleeves of their shirts, tied at their ends, passed behind their necks; at their backs, on the right side, stood the rifles, having barrels a meter long, and flat triangular stocks; they wore the Tunisian fez, wrapped in large red silk kefié, rolled up several times, giving a terrible appearance to their faces; They were all tall with blond moustaches curled up on their alert and young faces : they were the brave men of Zeïtoun." -Zeïtoun: Depuis les origines jusqu'à l'insurrection de 1895
Your original photo that you posted was so far back in the thread that i am reposting it so that your response here can make more sense. ;)

[gp]

Its not a souvenir picture, they really were just that heavily armed in everyday life. It was really not uncommon at all for many of the peoples of Anatolia and the Balkans "

Indeed, hereby a few more pics from several peoples on the Balkans.
Don’t forget, those times where dangerous with bandits, brigands, local militia, unpaid soldiers from armies wandering around at the border of great empires…it was not that safe and one had to protect oneself….

I never forget the first time I arrived in Sarajevo and Kotor on motorbike in 1985, I was asked where I came from. On my reply “ Maastricht”, they asked where that was. When I said “Limburg” a big long laughter followed.
Asking what was so funny, they told me that Limburg was synonym for BS, nonsense, nothing….
Root cause was simple :
since Medieval times when all were part of the Holy Roman Empire ( Emperor Sygismund) and also later when the Ottoman and Habsburg successors took over, if a guy would travel from Sarajevo to Cologne , Maastricht (Limburg)or Brussels, chances he arrived or worse returned were a minimum . Also found in Crnojanski’ semi historical book “ the Pandurs” AKA “ migration”. Hence Limburg became quite understandable a “ funny ” laughable name, implying either a suicidal mission or one of no return caused by danger on the road….so not to be compaied with Jack Kerouac’s “ on the road”….
Just a simple indication or justification one had to arm himself very well. A matter which continued through the Balkan wars of the 1912ies to the tragic events in the former Yu during the 1990ies

Made sense to me and if you look which borders one had to cross from the Balkans and which dangers to face, one had to be carefully and good armed as there was no 2nd amendment on the Bill of Rights in the Balkans…:-)

[Maurice]

I never forget the first time I arrived in Sarajevo and Kotor on motorbike in 1985, I was asked where I came from. On my reply “ Maastricht”, they asked where that was. When I said “Limburg” a big long laughter followed.

Hi GP,

Thank you for posting the nice photos.
Greetings from another resident of (south) Limburg

[Pertinax]

Nubians. Sudan, second half of the 19th century

[AvtoGaz]

Armenian from Moks region

Bit hard to see, but he has a Khanjar dagger and a curved saber. From what I have been able to tell the swords used in the very easternmost part of the Ottoman Empire by Armenians and Kurds were more similar to Persian Shamshirs or Transcaucasian/Georgian Khmali sabers than to the classic Turkish Kilic. The Yatagan was also not widely used there.

[gp]

as in a yataghan topic, the Balkan Wars was mentioned, enclosed a few pics from the men involved...

Albanian, Greek, Montenegrin, Bulgarian, Serbian

[gp]

Albanian, Greek and Bulgarian gents

[gp]

some pics of men in the Middle East around 1890 -1910;
Kurds and Druzes amongst them

[gp]

.

[AvtoGaz]

Armenian warriors from Karabakh. In the Caucasus, it is customary to depict the dead and their weapons on their headstone.

First two from circa 1840s, last is from the end of the 19th century.

[gp]

some guys with a kaskara from East Africa

[gp]

a blade and dagger vendor on the market of Skoplje in Macedonia

[cyten]

Bashi Bazouk with Shishane, Yataghan, and Kubur.
Colorized by me.