Turkish Ribbon yataghan
 

Hello folks,

I had the good fortune to pick up this yataghan a short while ago. The seller's pics suggested the blade might have a Turkish ribbon construction and it turned out to be the case. Blade is about 29", with 4-5 twisted bars.
It is dated 1271 - 1855. Can someone translate the small cartouche?

The handle scales are missing but it won't be too hard to replace them. The yataghan of this type I have seen had simple horn slabs, nothing fancy. At first look I thought the simple ferrule was a solder replacement. A very similar example on Oriental-Arms indicated that this is a pewter-silver alloy. It looks like it's meant to imitate the full silver/copper ferrules in appearance only. The blade has an integral bolster.

Also interesting is the blade's profile and thickness. It has a T-section and is about 1cm thick at the spine, over twice as thick as the Balkan yataghan I have (see pics below).

Comments, thoughts would be most welcome.
Emanuel

New pics
 

New pics

Comparison to Balkan yataghan
 

Comparison to Balkan yataghan

Awesome piece, i very much like it!

I cant read the cartouche perfectly but it could be Mala'eka (angels) or Mulla "something". I cannot write in arabic at the moment due to pc lacking arabic script.

Would love to see it restored :)

Excellent catch Emanuel!
It would have taken a tremendous amount of work to produce a blade like that!!
Well worth the effort of restoring. I look forward to seeing it finsihed.
I'd hope one day to find a pattern welded Ottoman Yat and Kilıç to sit with my 'starry night' Kindjal.
Congrats
Gene

This is the same one that's in the swap forum?

It is written "Selanik" (Salonica,Thessaloniki whichever you like) in the cartouche.

Thanks folks.
Interesting, that would make this a Greek yataghan not Anatolian as I thought.

Fearn, as I replied in the swap thread, I had initially posted in the wrong forum. The yataghan is certainly not for sale/swap :D