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Originally Posted by Jim McDougall
Welcome to the forum!
You came to the right place! most of the entries online often end up bringing the queries here at one point or another.
These two swords (very nice BTW) are indeed Ethiopian.
The one with the lionhead is a stirrup hilt sword of military type and appears to be Italian. These seem to be from the 1890s going by the George V blade, which is extremely nice by Wilkinson, who was of course in London and supplying blades to Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in these times.
The sword itself is termed a shotel, and the distinctive hilt was typically of rhino horn. The enthusiasts here are better at determining what type of horn this is but probably rhino.
These were turbulent times in Abyssinia with the Italian occupation and the Mahdist campaigns going on in adjacent Sudan with British forces.
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Hi Jim,
I believe that the term SHOTEL to which you refer to is not in fact the correct description to the subject sword (with the horn/rhino hilt). The correct term for this particular blade shape is in fact GURADE.
The term SHOTEL refers to the "double" curved blade also found on Ethiopian swords and shown in the pic attached.
As an aside, Wilkinson and various Solingen makers made and shipped many hundreds of sword blades to Ethiopia which would have been locally mounted. A large % of these bore various inscriptions in Amharic language as shown on the Wilkinson blade above.
Also attached is an early advertisment from Wilkinson for Ethiopian blades.
Stu