Piha or Kaetta = knife
Just wanted to add a note of clarification here. I think I mentioned in a post sometime ago that I'd discussed piha-kaetta with a Sri Lankan I happened to sit with on a plane and after a bit he figured out what I was talking about (putting the two names together confused him).
He told me that "piha" and "kaetta" BOTH translate as "knife" however they are two separate languages one is Tamil and the other Sinhala. Since then and as recent as last month I've confirmed this with two other Sri Lankans.
While we as collectors have used the combination term piha-kaetta to define a certain style ether term used singly or in combination could be accurately used to describe any knife from Ceylon.
Dan
|