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Originally Posted by Jim McDougall
Interesting suggestion, and well illustrates the 'Rohrshach' circumstance when markings become highly stylized or poorly executed, or both.
As Ariel has noted, this particular 'umbrella' is a bit 'overembellished' as would be the case when an artisan is striving for ultra imbuement.
There are cases of Indian blades where the 'sickle marks' as often seen on blades in Northwest India, are used in linear fashion lining the entire blade along the back (not spine). There are many cases of other markings being imitated in various interpretations.
The case of the 'Passau wolf' is a good one concerning 'stylization' and these representations of the 'wolf' are seen in dramation variation, some virtually just chops in a pattern which barely resembles a wolf or any particular quadruped. Oakeshott once noted that these were seen as a unicorn in some cases, and it seems other interpretations are known as well.
With the numbers on the blade, it does seem these are 'stippled' which would concur with the method of numbering or administrative inventory used by the Bikaner armory iin Rajasthan. These were however in Devanagari or other dialectic Indian script. Whatever the case, this is hardly an aesthetic addition, and further suggests this was probably a combat oriented weapon rather than court intended accoutrement.
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Well put Jim. A similar example to the wolf and umbrella is the Assad Allah Lion. On many Qajar swords you know it's a lion mark because its always a lion mark. For someone not knowing what they are looking for it may as well be a dog, a pig or hippopotamus.
I was doing some more reading in the umbrella thread on the forum.
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...light=umbrella
There is some discussion about the tree of life in connection to the umbrella in south Borneo. So there might be a tree in there after all.
The thread also has the photo below. I am not claiming it to be similar to the mark on my sword. It does however have a half circle+ at the bottom. So there are other umbrellas out there with unorthodox bottoms.