Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Ibrahiim al Balooshi
Salaams kahnjar1 ~ I once went to an interview in which the interviewer would only answer questions with two words... either "yes" or "no".
In "Ethnographics" I doubt the same technique can be applied.
The first point is that not all blades danced with in Oman are straight flexible ones... with nothing else to hand dancers use pretty well anything similar including rifles, camel sticks and any variety of sword avialable...I can show the mimic fighting taking place with a curved sword and a sandal for a shield. So it would be quite wrong to be so specific.
Your question (though by no means a closed or completed querry) asks; Do ALL the Straight bladed Omani Sayfs have a "90 degree" flex or not?
Technically I think so. All the ones I have seen and handled are flexible but... and the BUT is big ... There appear to be swords from probably the Red Sea region that are not flexible ... that look like Omani Dancing Swords but which are not flexible..and no-one knows why. Logically they could be rehilts of otherwise previous fighting blades (foreign) on Omani Hilts. We know for example that Muscat since the 70s has been active in the business of rehilting all manner of foreign blades onto Omani Long Hilts. We know that these blades were provided from Sanaa and several have Ethiopian blades originally German. The Red Sea link is therefor highly likely. Your blade may be related to the blade at Kattara for comments #1. The apparent blade cross section from what I can see... makes that blade and yours similar ... not a flat springy dancing blade but stiff..with a wing shaped cross section.
Naturally there is a very big difference in the application between wholly flexible and wholly stiff blades, though, try as I might, I still haven't unearthed the reason why these odd stiff variants turn up now and again mounted on Omani long hilts, however, since I'm in the Muscat Museums next week I will be giving that one a lot of time.
As to the yes or no answer technique I repeat that ethnographic detective work can never be so limited..The Forum would only be about two pages long based on that structure...yes or no ?
Regards,
Ibrahiim Al Balooshi.
|
OK Let me rephrase the question......Do ALL the straight bladed Omani swords which you have in your workshop, and describe as Omani, have "90 degree" flexible blades?
What I am trying to establish here, is that there was POSSIBLY a "combat" version of this sword in it's own right.