For me, most if not all Sub-Saharan African swords is a victory of form over function. I just cannot imagine how they could be used effectively, with all those curlicues, outrageous curves, clumsy blades, crude handles and absent points, edges and balance. That's why many of them hang in the museums as forerunners of "abstract" art.
Not that I do not understand people who collect them, but nobody in his right mind would choose one of them as a real weapon....
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