As far as books about African cold weapons are concerned, there are many authors already -e.g. I have books by Manfred Zirngibl - but he is mostly concentrated on Africa south of Sahara. I would say there are some books on north African blades (French authors ? - I would also appreciate if some of colleagues could intrioduce them here). I also like Christopher Spring. His African Armes and Armour is relativelly "thin", but sententious...
The similarity of those "three knives" you identified on the picture from the book is purely accidental. In fact it is going on one short Fang sword and two types of sheath. The profile of the handle is similar only due to high reduction of the drawing.
Concerning the enamel parts in North Africa: As everybody knows, big part of North Africa/south coast of Mediterraneann Sea was under Turkey for centuries. I think one could find interesting parts of various items in old bazaars till now. And Coucasus was under Turkey too...... This is just construction, but the true is, that I found a very nice large kinjal in Tripolis years ago - typical Caucasus item from 19th century. As I was told that time - this was remainder of Turkish garrison in Misurata. The personnel was purely from Caucasus and used to be renewed every few years. And I think items could penetrate south - to Sahara
"....AND THEY NO DOUBT HAVE A STORY TO TELL IF THEY COULD ONLY SPEAK...." - I think Vandoo is 100 % right. This is also what attract me to collect old african weapons....
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