Hi Tim and Vandoo,
I don't take "sailor-made" as an epithet either. I love scrimshaw work and knot-work. I was simply thinking of something that someone made, not for warfare or ritual, but because they had a large sawfish bill and some time on their hands.
Neat as this sawbill is, the thing about it is that almost anyone could have made it, using (for instance) a saw, a knife, a file, and some black paint (or tar, or lacquer, or tree gum). It's so simple that's it's lacking the clues we need for a good provenance. Given a suitable sawfish bill, I could make something like that in an afternoon using my Leatherman, and I'm quite sure that Tim could turn out something much more stylish in the same amount of time.
If you want a fanciful scenario, it could have been made by or for the teenage son of a white missionary, store owner, fisherman, or the like. It's the kind of thing that a boy would love, and that would explain its comparative design simplicity.
The other thing I'm glad we uncovered is that sawfish all appear to be listed under CITES. As with ivory, it's worth knowing that one might run into trouble with customs on these things.
F
|