My apologies, my notes on the photo I referred to were incorrect.
What I meant was the photo by John Burke at the signing if the Treaty of Gandamak, 26 May, 1879.
King Mohammed Yaqub Khan seated at center, on his left is Daoud Shah, his commander in chief......and my notation was to the distinct style of his hilt with the open parallel bar knuckleguard, recurved terminal at top.
It is thought that this hilt was possibly a prototype for the military style hilts which were to be produced at the Mashin Khana at Kabul in the early 1890s.
As seen in other photos, this style hilt is also to be found on the traditional Khyber blades, often with the 'Mazir I Sharif' stamp of Mashin Khana.
The heavily channeled European style blade (also pictured) became the more regularly produced model into turn of the century. Later many of the hilts were in brass, but with this distinctive 'bayonet style' hilt.
It seems that these Khyber bladed examples with military style hilts as pictured, may have been for some of the tribal levy's using traditional blades but with these Anglo-Afghan hilts.
The styling of the slotted knuckle guard seems to correspond to some styling on a number of paluoars as well as tulwars from these regions in the Northwest Frontier into Afghanistan.
The theme of the paper discussed the integration of the traditional blades and military style hilts as well as seeking the origins of the design, with the example of similar style in the sword of Daoud Shah in 1879 representing earliest known placement of its form. As I understood the title noting 'regulation Khyber' referred to the development of these military Afghan swords as well as their use with traditional Khyber blades in the tribal contingents .
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