African swords for ID

[mariusgmioc]

Hello,
Can you please help me identify these African swords?

[Marc M.]

Hello,
Can you please help me identify these African swords?

Hi Marius

Top left: konda , Congo
Top right: yaka , congo
Bottom left: not sure, maybe chokwe, kuba
Bottem right: if the handle ends in a metal spade, maybe tebu , tchad, Central Africa.

Best regards
Marc

[Araña_del_Sol]

To add to Marc's IDs, the bottom left is likely Hausa though I have seen daggers/swords of this type attributed to the Fulani and Tikar as well. The bottom right looks like a mix of Tebu and Sudanese (Ingessana?) styles

- ADS

[mariusgmioc]

Thank you very much! :)

[Duccio]

Hi,
I think Marc is right: the first is definitely Konda and the second is definitely Yaka; I'm pretty sure the bottom left knife is a Kuba, the handle decoration is typical.
You can see a very similar one on the site of "Memoire africaine"
http://www.memoire-africaine.com/armes2.html
The last is more difficult: the scabbard seems to have been made from the tail of a small crocodile, so it could be from Sudanese area, probably the hypothesis that it is Ingessana (or Fur) is correct.
In the archive of Ethan Rider's photographs you can see a knife with a practically identical hilt, the blade instead is a little different.
https://ertribal.com/index.php/tribal-art/archive/short-sword-sheath-fur-ingessana-sudan
Greetings to all.

[mariusgmioc]

Thank you very much!

:)

[Martin Lubojacky]

Dear Duccio,

Thank you for posting the link to the interesting website www.memoire-africaine.com. However, I am afraid there is some missunderstanding here. The knife you describe as "bottom left" is more probably from the northeastern part of Nigeria or from the northern Nigerian borderland. The shape of the handle is in Hausa style, the shape/style of the blade is like from the surroundings of north Cameroonian city of Maroua, the engarved ornaments on the blade are typical for Sahel. You are absolutely right, the handle decoration resembles the style of Kuba.

Best regards,

Martin

[Duccio]

Dear Martin,
I must confess that my experience as a collector is very limited, so I don't pretend to teach others at all, I just throw a few hypotheses there, to discuss them together. In this case, I noticed a strong similarity between the third knife from the left among those presented by Mariusgmioc and this one below, which the memoire africaine site describes as Kuba.
I thought I'd share this impression, to provide ideas to discuss, but it may very well be that I'm wrong.
Thank you very much, many greetings.
Duccio

[Ian]

Martin, Marc and Duccio,

Thanks for the detailed information and sharing of your knowledge on these knives. The level of expertise in African weapons has risen exponentially over the years this forum has been operating. This has been aided by the development of excellent online sites for reference, as noted by others here. Great topic guys.

Ian.

[Pieje]

Hmm I know Allan of memoire-Africaine, and he usually knows his business, but that knife is no Kuba, I guess Allan made a mistake.

I agree it's Haussa dagger..
http://www.africanarms.com/gallery?2-hausa-dagger-35-until-50-5-cm

[Duccio]

I tried to find out more about Hausa knives, and, with the information I found, I must say that Martin and Pieje are actually right: what I thought was a Kuba knife is definitely Hausa (therefore a completely different geographical area, another culture , etc.)
I am very happy, because I have learned a couple of things:
1) not only do Kuba knives have handles decorated with wire fragments (tin?); I was absolutely sure it was a unique feature of the Kuba knives.
2) that even the reference sites can report errors, unfortunately ...
So, since I have learned something, it is evident that the forum works, once again!
Thanks to everyone, let's keep it up!

Greetings to everyone and congratulations again to mariusgmioc for his knives (Hausa included ...)
Duccio