Derek, can you elaborate on what you find unkaskaroid about the guard? Is it the roundness of the quillons? The finials? I'm not disagreeing; I'd like to be better able to regionalize/ethnically ID these type guards.
Conogre, I'm pretty sure that's not inlay on the blade, but etching with a lowered "ground" and raised letters. It appears to have rusted and pitted at some time, been polished (with a flat stone or sandpaper, etc?) across the tops of the raised letters, leaving the ground pitted, then rusted a bit again.
I wasn't thinking of the Tebu daggers, actually; there is another type, and I'm not sure if it's an arm dagger or not, though it certainly resembles one; it has a pommel this exact shape, integral to the usually wooden handle, and a similar shape at the tip of the usually nonleathered wooden sheath. I've seen two sold on ebay lately, at least one as Oceanic/Pacific, but I'm pretty sure they're African. I don't know if I still have one on my "watching" page, but I'll check later.
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