Thanks very much guys! I must say you are all doing great at getting this discussion aligned, and above all, keeping it a friendly discussion...decidely NOT a debate. At this point most of what I am doing is fact finding as stated in various literature, as presented and of course subject to consideration.
I think we have all agreed that Solingen was well equipped and situated for prolific production well before the Industrial Revolution and did in fact supplant many long standing suppliers of blades, particularly Toledo and in many cases the Italian centers for the volume of trade blades. In looking at the various examples linked by Iain of these kattara of the 'new' form, which I consider more aligned with Muscat, in the coastal regions, it still seems to me that most of these are 'trade' blades. Actually, the examples seen in these various sale situations seem to be mounted with blades of the type, and perhaps even traded from Red Sea ports, as they correspond with those found in North Africa in kaskara. The fullering seen is of two types I have seen in these, and in particular the running wolf mark along with the cross and orb are characteristically seen in these Sudanese swords.
Case in point, in one of the kattara with single central fuller, a blade like this is shown in "Kaskara from Northern Darfur, Sudan" Graham Reed, (JAAS, Vol.XII, #3, March 1987, LII, p.168). Mr. Reed was in Darfur just before 1987 and was speaking with the chief who owned this kaskara. He told Reed that he thought the 'running wolf' was a hippopotamus and the cross and orb a tree. He then explained that the blade was from 'before the time of Kasalla, which loosely translates to say, before the increased local production of kaskaras in Kasalla in the 1960s....in other words, a very old blade. This suggests that perhaps these markings were placed on these blades by armourers in the Sudan, or they may well be early to mid 17th century. There is a very real possibility of course, which needs more research, that Solingen makers in the 19th century may have been producing trade blades specifically to these markets. These may well have been copies of much earlier style blades.
With the examples Iain linked:
One of these seems the exact same style blade (Reed, LII), and the markings seen. It seems that among the other examples shown, and as often is the case, the 16th,17th century dates are optimistically and it seems somewhat arbitrarily added, though the European attribution is often acceptable but with some caveat. The use of the running wolf had largely subsided in Solingen by the latter 17th century, in fact was not widely used except in the Caucusus where it was used by Chechen makers in the 19th century and in the 18th century only by Samuel Harvey in England with his initials.
In the one example shown first, the hilt is entirely different than most examples and as was rebutted in the listing, actually is a Manding sabre, not Omani. The leatherwork is correspondent to the scabbard styles of the Manding of Mali, and the grip is graduated though without the knob usually on top.
It does seem possible that some of these blades (except the running wolf examples)could be from the 18th century, as such blades were entering British India in the latter years. I have seen pata with Solingen blades with familiar markings of 18th century and the also familiar kaskara type triple fuller blades. Haider and Tipu's armies in Mysore used German and French mercenaries and there were significant numbers of these swords extant there and certainly in Malabar to the west. There were significant commercial ties between Muscat and India in the latter 18th century which continued into the 19th. The favor of German blades was well explained by J.H. Grose ("Voyage to the East Indies",1772) ; "...though there is no doubt that the English blades were bought by the Marathas, the factory correspondence shows that they were highly unsatisfactory and were progressively in less demand. Angrey, the famous Maratha admiral used to say that the English blades were 'only fit to cut butter with'". ("Indian Arms & Armour" G.Pant, p.42-43).
Clearly the desire and demand for German blades was well established by the Marathas as well as the Mysoris, and with the trade in Malabar which served Muscat. There was considerable trade between Gujerat and Muscat as well, and Gujeratis lived in Muscat and Omanis lived in Surat, ("Trade and Empire in Muscat and Zanzibar" , Mohamed Reda Bhacker, 1992, p.31).
The other points of entry into Muscat would have been via the Red Sea ports as well as other Arabian ports en route to Zanzibar, where these blades would have likely been among other commodities.
With regard to the desired properties of the German blades, Jan Ostrowski ("The Polish Sabre", 1979, p.226) notes, "...the greater elasticity of European steel permitted thinner blades than did Damascene steel, which was more brittle and usually required thicker blades".
The famed Turkish traveller Euliya Celebi in "Seyahatname" praises the quality of 'Tuetonic steel' calling it 'German iron'. ("Islamic Swords and Swordsmiths", Istanbil, 2001, p.10).
With regard to Umayyad and Abbasid swords, I must correct an earlier comment of mine in which I said examples of these no longer existed. Actually I misremembered what Yucel had said, which was that while we cannot be certain (empirically) of the hilts or mounts on the examples in Istanbul in the collection known as the Sacred Swords, there is far more certainty as to the blades, which seem to be of those periods in provenance. (op.cit. p.54). Apparantly one of the telling features are the one to seven gold filled holes in the blades, and the rounded point is noted as well.
The degree in which these are represented in the old battle swords is unclear, as are the hilts as noted. In Elgood, it is noted as mentioned before that the blades on these are often German and thought to be 17th century (examples 2.14 and 2.15) but others also have Persian blades.
Guess thats all I have for now, there'll be a quiz tomorrow
just kidding !
All the best,
Jim