[Tim Simmons]

I was so brief in the last post I feel I should add a little more about the script and origins of the sword in the photograph. There are notions of Medieval origins which hinder us today. A look through any of Oakeshott's publications should put an end to that. The sword is not Medieval. It is thought that the script is too inaccurate to have origins in an Egyptian workshop also it is held to predate the armoury at Omdurman. The origin is thought to be somewhere in Nilotic Sudan.
I am not a qualified historian or researcher so I could be talking from a hole in my backside. However I do think it is not unreasonable to face convention full on. You only have to think of the sack of Benin city 1897? and the refusal in believing that the art works there were locally made and of indigenous thought. The sword mentioned and other works may well be slowly emerging from this type of learned discrimination and we as collectors are often all too eager to accept this condition. One of the problems with this material, which affects opinion so much is that it is simple, not shiny, silvery and covered in glittering baubles. So untill quite recently its market value held back any further thought and care of investigation. I know I use strong words but it is fun. I simply cannot accept that cities like Kano in such an expansive land did not make weapons.