Bob, thank you for the thoughtful and well expressed explanation, and now I can see we are pretty much on the same page.
There has always been a degree of confusion on these pages, mostly simple misunderstandings or that often people post without reading what has previously been said. With threads of this size and duration it is understandable as few care to read back through sometimes years of dialogue.
While I have reread this thread I overlooked the jamadhar katari that you mention and your well placed observation on the similar holds of this and the katar. Actually that was what I had I mind when I posted the image of the Kafir man holding one of these.
As I had described earlier, my research on the Kafirs began nearly 20 years ago with a colleague in Germany researching their axes. I became even more intrigued by watching the movie "Man Who Would be King" based on Kipling's writing and focused on Kafiristan.
Later I became connected with a Kalash man here in the US but intent on preserving the culture and language of his people now in Chitral.
The chilanum comparison is a fair one, and these jamadhar katari have some resemblance, but as you note, the chilanum is it seems farther south.
The jamadhar katari, though I regret having to defer to the maddening name game, I think we need to clear up.
These are actually 'katarah' (jamadhar thing is totally Egerton)….and the katar (transverse grips) is a jamadhar. With katar, the term has become too 'died in the wool' to change, so we keep calling them that.
With the KATARAH, these are little known and unlikely to cause great disturbance in the collectors lexicon by using this simpler term instead of the compound.
These have been around for some time, and I have even seen examples with the Afghan state seal etc. As with most traditional weapons, earlier ones were of course more utilitarian, becoming less so and more decorative in recent times.
The Hindu Kush regions of Afghanistan to the east are where the lands of these people historically were termed Kafiristan, but after subjugation by Abdur Rahman in 1890s, were named Nuristan.
The Kalash people primarily in Chitral are deemed loosely aligned with the Kafirs, but more research needed there. Diffusion in these regions is of course complex.
Hopefully what I have noted may help in some degree, and clearly I need to retrace these details myself again..its been too many years.
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