Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim McDougall
As always, the best thing about being confronted with a conundrum like this, is is exciting to research to learn about areas one is not familiar with. The 'ivory' material used here, from my cursory research, I think is very likely to be narwhal, which seems to have the bright white color and different from elephant, mammoth or other tusk material.
With regard to this blade, while it does have the feel of one of the Russian regulation sabers such as the M1881, as I mentioned, I see no evidence of the block ricasso which is consistent on these patterns.
It seems that there was a predominance of European blade imports into the Caucusus, up to the 1850s. While the Chechens were actively producing blades, after the 1850s the Daghestanis began producing their own if I have understood correctly.
The markings on the imported European blades became prevalently copied on the blades produced in the Caucusus; with blades out of Styria using the well known dentated arcs known as 'sickle' marks (in thier parlance the Chechens called these 'gurda' =good blade).
The running wolf, which came from Solingen blades, was copied, but in more realistic form, though the stick figure choppy ones seem to have been copied as well....these termed 'ters maymal' =screaming monkey (?).
In the attached illustrations it does seem the two letters on either side of the running wolf do appear on examples of Solingen blades FROM Solingen (one by W. Clauberg) but I would point out that almost invariably, the running wolf is upside down within surrounding letters or words on German blades.
Note on your blade, the letters AND wolf are upright. This tells us that this is NOT a European blade, and I would suspect a Daghestani product which in which the wolf and letters are duplicated.
Those crosses in the inscription I noted were called 'bees'. These are copies of strange number system used in Styria termed 'antler numbers' with dots and connecting lines, so these are likely copied from Styrian blades.
So rather than a heirloom blade, I would suggest this is possibly a Dahestan made blade in the manner of the Russian regulation form, but made without ricasso as in Caucasian manner. The markings added for 'quality' impression.
The styling of the mounts are as noted 'Circassian' using the Russian skan method of metal work. It is likely these mounts are indeed vintage and silver (84) and used in remounting the shashka in composite.
While this MAY have been done in Georgia as Russian military was indeed present there, I still believe this is likely something fashioned using older components and for a ranking Russian officer.
This is in my opinion FAR from being a commercial fake, and probably a dress shashka for a Russian officer, who was quite likely with notable service in Georgia or Caucasian regions. With the leather of scabbard relatively new its hard to say whether the assembly was done early and scabbard redone or other.
Naturally I am far from having expertise in this field, but from the past several days of research these are opinions I have formed.
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I have a friend who's a long-time antique dealer and expert who I've been conversing with at length about this shashka, I've provided every picture I could possibly summon to him and he is certain it's ivory. He believes its mammoth simply due to the availability of the material during the time this was potentially made. If it is narwhal that would lend to the theory it was refitted potentially in Russia itself as narwal marine ivory would've been rarer and more expensive. I've never handled any other ivory before, but it sure does feel buttery smooth in the hand. I think I can close the door on that theory.
Using a 20x lense I've taken a look at the carvings of the fittings, there is zero evidence of any dremmel or power tool being used here. That of course does not guarantee it is not of modern make, but it continues to add the extreme care that someone put into making this sword whether it is modern or not.
The blade stamp looks exactly the same as the one produced in that Russian PDF, while I studied Russian in college its been more than ten years and I could never read at a technical level anyway, I translated the pages surrounding the diagram but found nothing to indicate where the FB group owner was generating his analysis that the stamp was common in Western Georgia. The blade is still period sharp, probably the sharpest of any of my antiques. Someone took a significant piece out of it at some point swinging it against something hard.
The 84 stamps I'm not entirely sure about, if the work were done in Russia it would have a stamp next to the 84 indicated who the silversmith was, given 84 is .875 pure silver on the Russian zolotniki scale, I think I should be able to determine whether or not it is genuine silver after some time. I have a number of other pieces with solid silver fittings and they patina rather quickly, especially when touched. I've owned this sword for 6 months now, and I've seen no signs of aging after handling so I'm highly skeptical about the purity of the silver.
I appreciate the well-thought-out response and research, this has surely been the most interesting blade that I've owned. I've been pressed to do a write-up on my findings for this blade for quite some time now, and as I am currently on paternity leave I have a goal of finishing the write-up next week of my findings for this beautiful sword.
I'm of like mind that I believe this sword is likely a composite assembled probably late 19th century, with an older blade. The leather has likely been redone in the 20th possibly 21st century. I found it amusing that one of the shashka "experts" in the FB group immediately went to "fake!" then later admitted the Georgians did fashion a small number of swords like this one in that time period but there was "No way" that this was one of those swords, more likely that I was able to attain it. I will add again, I grabbed it at auction in the presence of another 20 legitimate high-quality niello shashka's and other trooper shashka's. I had the chance to nab one of those but this one seemed so out of the ordinary I went for it.
Cheers