Boys,
I gave a very mild cleaning to the Dha and I may owe deep apologies to its Master. I think it is not a primitive village work but a lot of age! The quality appears to be much higher than I thought.
First, similar to the Japanese swords, it has "domed" spine. Second, it has no warping at all! You know that virtually all long "Oriental" blades are warped to a degree. This is seen on almost all Persian, Tturkish, Indian and, certainly, all SE Asian blades I have seen. Only Japanese smiths managed to control it using vises. Well, this one is straight as an arrow! The areas of pitting, I think, are not due to imperfect manufacture but to aging. If I saw a Caucasian/Turkish blade in such a shape, I would have guessed its age well beyond the 200-300 years mark. With SEA blades, I need help.The base of the blade is 1 cm thick: it was meant for business.
The tsuba has an inner core of reddish patinated metal with a bit of verdigris and is clad with copper ( now, when it is cleaner, I can see the color).
Any new assessments?
