Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post - Possible origins of the yataghan hilt form

mariusgmioc · 19th July 2019, 06:50 AM

This topic is very interesting!

Yes, there are undeniable similarities between the "eared" yataghan hilts and the "eared" hilts of the Luristan period, but is there a real connection between them?!

While the common appearance tends to indicate that the yataghan hilt was inspired by the earlier examples, we should also consider the posibility that everything is a simple coincidence.

So, it is possible that the yataghan hilt evolved towards the "eared" shape completely independently from the earlier examples of the bronze age, and solely driven by functionality and aestethics. In other words, it was the function that lead to the appearance of the proeminent "eared" shape.

And I tend to favour this hypotesis since between the bronze examples and the later yataghan ones, is a time gap of a about 2000 years without any continuity of the shape inbetween.

The same can be said about the shape of the blade since between the use of the kopis and the appearance of the recurved yataghan, more than 2000 years have passed without any historical evidence of continuity inbetween.

19th July 2019, 06:50 AM	#7
mariusgmioc Member Join Date: Sep 2014 Location: Austria Posts: 1,870	This topic is very interesting! Yes, there are undeniable similarities between the "eared" yataghan hilts and the "eared" hilts of the Luristan period, but is there a real connection between them?! While the common appearance tends to indicate that the yataghan hilt was inspired by the earlier examples, we should also consider the posibility that everything is a simple coincidence. So, it is possible that the yataghan hilt evolved towards the "eared" shape completely independently from the earlier examples of the bronze age, and solely driven by functionality and aestethics. In other words, it was the function that lead to the appearance of the proeminent "eared" shape. And I tend to favour this hypotesis since between the bronze examples and the later yataghan ones, is a time gap of a about 2000 years without any continuity of the shape inbetween. The same can be said about the shape of the blade since between the use of the kopis and the appearance of the recurved yataghan, more than 2000 years have passed without any historical evidence of continuity inbetween.