Tulwar - Faux Wootz, Koftgari

[Emanuel]

Hi everyone,

Recently I saw a number of tulwar come up on ebay that shared some similar features: false imitation wootz, and a peculiar silver koftgari ensemble on the handle.

The faux wootz is a pattern etched using a wax resist method. It's been discussed before. The handle's koftgari theme consists of simple and rather crude circular motifs and lines, but it looks pretty good.

My understanding is that these are mid-late 19th century punjabi work. Any thoughts on these and why I saw four similar swords come on the market this summer?

Cheers,
Emanuel


Tulwar 1 - doesn't have the false wootz blade, but rather one with very crude shikargar type hunting scenes

[Emanuel]

Tulwar 2

[Emanuel]

Tulwar 3 - I believe one sold by RSword recently.

[Emanuel]

Tulwar 4 - A nice one from Oriental-Arms

[Emanuel]

All in all, different blade types, although two of them with faux wootz, and near identical handles, suggesting the same handle/koftgari shop.

They all look like nice pieces, although I'm no fan of the crudely scratched shikargar hunting tulwar, but I'm very curious why they seem to have popped up recently (possible exception the Oriental Arms one, no idea when it was sold).

Thanks
Emanuel

[Emanuel]

Another example owned by Lew that he got some years ago, so maybe not a very new phenomenon.