Is this a Firangi ?

[Nihl]

I’m a bit late to this thread, so maybe this will work as a “soft revive” and get discussion going again. The main info I want to contribute here I’ve actually already spoken about in a previous thread, but I’ll quote it here for convenience:

In my opinion, while "firangi" is a legitimate term, it's a bit too vague to use these days when talking about indian swords. Sure, there are plenty of swords with "firangi blades" out there, but since we now know that copies of European blades were paired with hilts just as often as authentic ones, it makes no sense to rely on "firangi" as a sword type when the swords described, from a glance, have a 50/50 chance of actually being accurate to the term. Meanwhile, the term "dhop" makes no such distinction, and instead is defined (from what I can tell) as just a basket-hilted sword with some kind of long and often - but not always - fullered blade. The term "asa shamshir" indeed is more northern in origin, but I would say it's an accurate term to describe any straight-bladed, basket-hilted "firangi". In my mind, firangi is a good way of marking an indian sword as having a trade blade (i.e. saying "this is a firangi-bladed pata, tulwar, etc"), when used as a descriptor/shorthand that would indeed signify that that sword has a blade of european origin, but I think it is too vague of a term to use as a standalone type of sword.

The term “dhop” that I reference was discussed in the thread linked above as well, but in short Dhop is basically the marathi term for a basket-hilted cavalry sword. I regard it to be the most authentic and accurate term for describing these swords (including the one posted at the beginning of this thread by drac), as, like I stated in my quote, it does not make any prescriptive judgements about the actual origin of the blade, which experts (or “experts”) can argue over for days without coming to an actual conclusion.

In regards to using “Firangi” as the standalone term for a sword - It’s worth noting that, historically, most Indian people cared more about the blade of their swords than the hilt. This makes sense from a utilitarian perspective as of course having a good, strong blade, will always be more useful than a super fancy hilt in a life-or-death scenario on the battlefield. As such, it would make sense historically that, when asked, Indian people would pretty much exclusively describe their swords by the blade - that the blade is firangi, sukhela, sirohi, etc.. I could be mistaken, but I believe most of these accounts never mention any natives taking time to describe the hilts of their weapons, and I think this is the reason why.

The reason why I’d consider this “hilt blindness” to be problematic for collecting is because it only tells half the story. Contrary to what was the norm in the 19th century, hilts in precolonial India often had explicit regional variations and styles. Artisans in one state/empire would largely only make a single type of hilt, and there were no real "generic" styles of tulwar or basket hilts being made. Of course, commoners most often only had access to undecorated, utilitarian versions of these hilts, but even then most styles have enough physical changes from one another that it's still possible to tell them apart (namely in terms of the styles of pommel, langet, and quillon terminals). As such, while it’s hard work, discerning what type of hilt a pre-19th century indian sword has can greatly reduce the geographical range it can be attributed to.

Of course there is always the issue of trade, but imo this is a whataboutism, and is neither helpful nor meaningfully contributes much to the research of these matters. Is it possible a sikh nihang at one point in time wielded a 17th century, thanjavur-style pata in battle? Sure! In fact, I know I’ve even seen them in pictures of Sikh arms collections on sites like Instagram, but this is all due to trade and is NOT related to where an item was made or “came from” (which matters when trying to figure out what its original name was).

So, back to hilt blindness and the term firangi. What is a firangi sword? A sword with a foreign blade, sure, but with what type of hilt? The term does not specify. What about a dhop? The term Dhop specifies a few things: that the blade is long, fullered, can be straight or curved, and is mounted to a basket hilt. IMO “firangi” is just a descriptor, something to be added on to a name to help further describe an item. Dhop, for reasons that are hopefully clear by now, is imo a proper name and a superior standalone term than firangi when used to describe a style of sword.

Put perhaps more concisely: Firangi only describes the form that a sword's blade might have, meanwhile Dhop is both more generic and more encompassing. It specifies the style of blade and hilt that the sword should have, without constricting either to an exact point of origin.

[Jim McDougall]

As noted, it makes sense that the emphasis on blades would be taken.
The type of blade is of course of great consequence with a sword, and the hilt is simply designed to carry out the function of the blade. The reason hilts are often referred to in describing certain ethnographic sword types is that they are commonly regarded as of local preference.

Clearly with Indian swords, in many cases the blade character determines the term used for the sword, such as kirach, tegha for example. G.N.Pant (1980) placed his focus on hilts and tried to establish regional classification for tulwars which of course had only marginal success. Tulwar hilts of a traditional form over several hundred years were often produced in one location and went to others where they were decorated in motif favored there in many cases. In many cases, as noted, the same basic traditional hilt form was produced but with variation on its elements such as most notably the pommel dish, quillons and the langet/chowk combination. The grip can also have certain variation.


Many of the terms for swords such as 'sirohi' refer to blades made in that city in Rajasthan. Many tulwar hilts are considered from Rajasthan, but many called by the name of a city in Rajasthan they are somehow associated with (as per Pant, 1980) such as Marawari; Udaipuri;

The 'khanda' which of course is initially regarded as Marathi from Deccan, and west India origins was diffused northward into Rajput regions where these were used by them as well as Sikhs. Post contact these were altered into what became known as the 'Hindu basket hilt', and as well known, often fitted with European blades, which seems the prime case with the use of the firangi term.

I once asked a Sikh if there was a way to distinguish a Sikh weapon...he wryly smiled and said, 'if a Sikh used it, then its a Sikh weapon".

We often see various weapon forms classified as Sikh, Rajput, Mughal, Hindu so here we have the cultural/religious denominator.

The bottom line is that usually, the native population seldom, if ever, refers to a weapon specifying any such classification by blade, hilt, religion, regional or otherwise.
They simply use the dialectic term for 'sword' at hand locally, or within the context of the group they are in.
In India, in northern regions the tulwar means sword, any type.
In Persia, shamshir has similar use, but typically means curved.

In "Armies of the Caliphs" (Kennedy), it is noted swords were often called by the place they were made by Muslims.

In studying the 'kaskara' of Sudan, I spent years trying to discover where the term came from. Apparently there, not a single native person had any idea of the term, let alone where it might have come from. When shown photos of a kaskara, people I spoke with immediately called it sa'if. One man, said they called it a 'cross'. Eventually, as usual, it turned out this was a loan word used by writers, later collectors to describe these broadswords.
Natives interviewed by Reed (1987) found that these broadswords were called 'Kasallawi' due to this was now where they were made (post 1950s).

I really dont think there is a universal way to classify ethnographic swords, and for the sake of discussion feasibility it makes most sense to use the term most commonly held rather than any attempt to correct or debate terms.
Surely a footnote or cross reference is most helpful.

[Nihl]

Jim, I hope my writing here doesn’t come off as overly aggressive, however to be quite honest your reply has made me rather irate.

I once asked a Sikh if there was a way to distinguish a Sikh weapon...he wryly smiled and said, 'if a Sikh used it, then its a Sikh weapon".

This is exactly why I wrote the following in my previous post:

Is it possible a sikh nihang at one point in time wielded a 17th century, thanjavur-style pata in battle? Sure! …but this is all due to trade and is NOT related to where an item was made or “came from”

The idea that the person who wields an item somehow contributes to how it should be classified is patently ridiculous. Are any of the swords in my collection, new or modern, “american swords” just because I, an american, own and wield them from time to time? Of course not! Of course ownership can contribute to the provenance of an item, but provenance alone should not be mistaken with place of creation, which IMO is a more valuable descriptor.

They simply use the dialectic term for 'sword' at hand locally, or within the context of the group they are in.
In India, in northern regions the tulwar means sword, any type.
In Persia, shamshir has similar use, but typically means curved.

This is a fundamentally unhelpful, ineffectual notion that I can’t help but notice is only ever brought up, without exception, when someone on this forum is unwilling to change the terminology that they use regarding weapons. It has not and will never be a valid argument, nor will it ever contribute anything to the study of arms. Saying “who cares, words are silly, let's just get drunk!” is a statement that is equally meaningless and silly yet functionally interchangeable with the previous one. Yes, basic “sword words” exist, but believe it or not there are not only more specific words that exist to differentiate items, but also things such as adjectives, prefixes, and suffixes that can be attached to words to additionally specify their meanings.

No progress will ever be made in our field if people keep holding on to this idea, and I really wish people would stop saying it. Even linguistically it’s rather daft, as plenty of languages have numerous words distinguishing knives from daggers, different types of swords and other arms from one another, etc. etc. (including both Indo-Aryan and Dravidian languages as relevant to this thread here). Words have meaning, and that meaning can change or even be outright replaced over time. It is only natural that in a field that at least attempts to be scientific some of our words will change over time too. Again, I only ever see this hand-waving of semantics whenever someone brings up the “revolutionary” concept of definitions changing, and as far as I can see it comes from fear and ignorance, and the complete opposite of willingness to learn.

Looking at a sword with a stereotypical tulwar-style hilt but a long, straight, fullered blade? Either describe it in full like I just did, or say it’s a tulwar with a firangi-style blade! However just calling it a “firangi” not only exclusively describes the blade, but also might be describing the blade wrongly if it turns out the blade isn’t from europe. Theoretically, in the future, if hilt origins are ever finally discerned, you could make the naming even more accurate by, for example, saying the sword has a “udaipuri-style hilt and a firangi-style blade”! Sure, it’s easier to just use the generic “sword word” and call it a tulwar, but I’d like to think that the longer, previously given description functions as the “scientific name” of sorts for the item.

At the end of the day, sure, to the average collector or dealer that just wants to put a name on their items, there will always be generic terms that exist to describe them. However for anyone that is actually curious and interested in the study of these things, I think more mileage will be had trying to be as descriptive as possible.

Once again, this isn’t intended as a direct attack at Jim, despite what it may or may not seem like, but rather an open letter of sorts that happened to be spurred by Jim’s response.

[Jim McDougall]

Wow Nihl! I'm glad your rancorous attack was not directed AT me (still tender from the gut punch though)....but glad I provided you a platform for your rant, which ironically is very much the same convention I have tried to advance for most of the 25 years I have written here.

What I wrote, I thought was being supportive of your interesting and well thought out perspective, including my Sikh anecdote mindful of exactly what you had said.
I will say that after over fifty years of studying arms and armor, I cannot say how many examples of mostly Victorian 'collectors terms' I have sought to place in proper detail, and working with many of the venerable authors now mostly gone, who also sought to 'correct' misnomers and curious colloquial terms for certain weapon forms.

On the European forum, we have been engaged in finding the origins of the 17th century campaign swords called 'walloon'; there have been debates on 'basket hilt' vs. 'claymore' and a book full of such 'classifications' .

In a current project, I found that the Spanish colonial hanger known popularly as the espada ancha, was actually termed in Alta California in that period, 'machete', and that the espada ancha (=Sp.broadsword) term actually referred to the full size swords used by the military at the time.
As most of the literature published to date on these hangers calls them espada anchas, it is hopeless to try to change this to 'machete' which in discussions brings forth an entirely different connotation.

Pant (1980) went through a number of notices of errors in previous works by Rawson and in the most notable case, Egerton (1885) who somehow transposed the term 'katar' to the transverse grip dagger actually termed 'jamadhar' ...and from then on, these familiar daggers became KATARS.
The was carried forth in virtually every published work including Indian arms since......and NOBODY has been able to change it. In most cases, this is noted in various writings, but mostly it is a matter of semantics in knowing which weapon was being discussed.

In many years of research with various authorities on Indian arms, we had great difficulty in tracing the chronological development of the katar, as when reading early period accounts, if the term katar was used, was it the earlier known version with regular hilt, or the jamadhar etc.

We have the curious 'Khyber knife' which somehow became termed the Salawar Yataghan in some sort of Hobson-Jobson .....it is not a knife, but a heavy short sword, and CERTAINLY not a yataghan.....yet in every circle today, these remain a Khyber knife. (actually 'sillawar' appears to be the local Afghan term, but who knows if universal in all tribal dialects there).

I could take the anecdotes and examples of all these, and probably compile them into a book, encyclopedia, perhaps even a movie (which would parallel Ben-Hur or such epic)...but the point is....
This particular dilemma/debate/conundrum has been an ongoing casus belli here for over the decades I have been here, and the contentious warfare has been brutal (just look at our situation here from what I intended as a helpful entry).
We have called this 'the name game' admittedly with spite, as it seems seldom to have achieved much.

As long as I can recall, I have advocated, do not be afraid to use as many words as it takes to describe a weapon, and its components. Collectors often want simple general terms for labels on displays, students of arms prefer qualified and detailed descriptions (in my opinion of course).

As I believe I have told you, I personally applaud your passion and serious approach to the study of arms, but as someone who has also followed your course for most of a lifetime, I can tell you, it is not an easy road. I can assure you the attitude you depict in your post of 'who cares' is hardly a description of my work, but despite your tone, I can appreciate what you are saying as a condition I have encountered for more years than you can imagine.

My best hope is that those of us who wish to seriously learn on and from the weapons we collect work together on reasonable solutions to better describing them, and a way to collectively cross reference terms as required.
In many cases the etymology and linguistic aspects provide colorful history to be added to these, and all the better in understanding them.

Best regards
Jim

[Jim McDougall]

In rereading your response Nihl, I think you deserve a bit more detail. I must say that fear, ignorance and unwillingness to learn are terms I have never in my life had directed at me, regardless that you claim they are meant openly you obviously include me in your 'comments'. I have written here for 25 years in order to learn, and to study WITH others. The idea behind research is to NOT be ignorant, always open to ideas, willing to listen, and to advance the core of knowledge on topics by comparing and evaluating evidence. I have always believed that we learn together, and insults are what is not helpful.

In view of your editorial, I thought perhaps you might like to look in on the concurrent thread, "back to Laz Bicagi' which you might find compelling.
Here, if you are not familiar, is a weapon which first appeared in the collecting community back in the 90s, when I first acquired one. These were pretty much unknown and a few sundry catalogs called them SE Asian; North African and other completely wrong identifications.

I first began to find information on these in a quite obscure paper on "the Origins of the Shashka" (Jacobsen & Triikman, Copenhagen, 1941). It took some time to get this translated but when I did (through the Danish Arms Society) these curious 'yataghans' were included. I found that the 1941 article (1897 article by J. Vichy Budapest) was Hungarian and these were called kardok, among other similar examples.

I then found one in a German reference "Schwert Degen Sabel" (Gerhard Seifert, 1962) which he termed a Kurdish-Armenian yataghan.When asked he said this was what his mentor, Mr. Jacobsen told him in 1941.

I found other references calling these transcaucasian yataghans. As I researched the examples in various museums, I found they had been collected in various locations such as Trebizond, Erzerum. I also found a contact in Tblisi who indicated these were well known in Georgia, but that they were indeed from transcaucasian areas.

There were discussions here over years where they became known as
Black Sea yataghans. Over the past 15-20 years that is what they have been called. Then we found that these were primarily a weapon of the Laz and the term bichag =knife.

Now it seems it is suggested to call them by another term.



When it comes to trying to learn on a weapon form, research and investigation constantly to find facts is hardly unwillingness to learn, and the number of guys here who were also busily seeking facts also sought to learn.
If you look at the archived material here, I would tread carefully using the word ignorance. I will not even dignify the vapid use of 'fear'.

When I noted, people in certain regions do not use consistent or specific terms for weapons in use when conversing. That was the purpose of the anecdote on the 'kaskara' broadsword of the Sudan. Nobody in Sudan or Ethiopia for that matter has any idea what a 'kaskara' is. I spent several years researching that. I had added these anecdotes and analogies in hopes that you would be willing to consider them. Perhaps many of these are in areas of study you are not familiar with, but I hoped they were explained well enough to illustrate the connection.

[Nihl]

Jim, thank you so much for your response. I am well aware that you are indeed very passionate and experienced with these things, and again I must state that my previous post wasn’t intended to be a direct personal attack, but an open letter inspired by much of what you had said. Some of your remarks are things I’ve heard not only numerous times on this forum (said by many more people than just you), but also innumerable times elsewhere on the internet, in other forums, in the comments of youtube videos, etc. Your reply just tipped the iceberg for me, so to speak, so it only felt appropriate for me to finally say something, especially in a thread that has specifically become name-game related.

I’ll be honest with you that most of what you’ve written in your replies to me are things I either agree with or think work as examples of what I’ve been talking about, and as such I don’t have much to say about them here. I think they illustrate well how humans will sometimes completely change or damage things (depending on your viewpoint) without realizing what they’re doing, for better or worse. Ignorance is bliss, as the platitude goes. This goes both ways too, as I can’t comment on the linguistics disputes for sword types I am unfamiliar with (i.e. ignorant of ).

In regards to the katar/jamdhar example though, so far as I’m aware katar actually is the appropriate endonym to use. To the best of my knowledge, Jamdhar is of persian origin, or derived from persian root words, while katar comes from the Tamil kattari, which was then carried into sanskrit, before ending up as katar in modern day hindi. I am of course just parroting what I’ve read online though, without having done my own research, so I would be totally open to anything that proves the opposite.

I would contend with your khyber knife point, as indeed I think the colloquial term is quite silly, and would prefer using salawar/siliwar yatagan (a lot of the larger examples actually do have a forward-and-back curving tip fyi - it’s hard to see but it’s definitely there), however I am unfamiliar with the nuances of that discussion so I’ll stay out of it.

Like I said in my last reply, I consider all of these (generally) long winded terms to function as the “scientific names” for these items. I have nothing against anyone that uses the collector-held colloquialisms for them in casual conversation, however I only think it’s appropriate to use the scientific names when we are discussing these things seriously, which I’d like to think is at least part of what this forum allows us to do - seriously analyze and discuss arms and armor without having to exclusively use layman's terms.

I believe the “true” names for any sword type should be a mixture of those used natively and originally (i.e. as close to the days when they were actually used as possible), mixed with a healthy amount of brevity so as to not make any particular term too jargon-centric and alienate those less invested in the field.

Firangi is a perfectly fine term, however its definition I find to be too imprecise, and as such the native Marathi term, dhop, seems like a perfectly adequate and necessary replacement.

While I’m aware Laz bichaq was perhaps the closest, most precise term to use for this previously enigmatic sword type, it (the term) is of a turkish origin, and does not respect the native users of these swords, who were predominantly laz (although I’m aware these swords indeed spread across transcaucasia and were allegedly used by kurds and armenians). As such, in accordance with my own research, I prefer the native term Lazuri Didi Xami, which I think when shortened to just Didi Xami (keeping in mind the principle of brevity), is a completely acceptable name that does justice to the ethnic minority group(s) that wielded it.

Anyways back to directly responding: the “fear and ignorance, and the complete opposite of willingness to learn”-part was, I assure you, not at all intended at you, Jim. Again, like I wrote at the beginning of my reply here, I am well aware of your credentials. My intent was never to insult you with this statement, rather it was my attempt to psychoanalyze (perhaps poorly) the exact reason as to why it would seem to me so many people stubbornly hold on to terms that are otherwise antiquated or outdated.

I repeat myself - I do not believe you to be fearful, ignorant, or unwilling to learn about new terms Jim. My comment was intended at those stubborn forum members that insist on never updating their vocabulary because they’ve grown fond of some poorly transliterated terms written nearly a century ago by one orientalist or another. I feel as though, if and when we can do so, discerning the native, non-loan-word terms for sword, knife, or "edged implement" in general should always be prioritized over the "traditional" terms we use in the ethnographic A&A field. My issue here is with those that insist on clinging to the latter, rather than engaging in the adventure that is finding the former.

[Jim McDougall]

Nihl, in kind, I thank you for this well written explanation which I think we can agree has clearly come from a misunderstanding. As noted, I think we are actually in accord on most of the points discussed.
I will say that I do understand your frustration, as I cannot tell you how many times over these many years I have felt the same when my efforts in possible situations involving certain aspects involving particular weapons or elements were met with that 'what difference does it make' attitude.
I suppose that eventually I simply 'put that to work' and pushed harder to find the answers.

With the 'name game' (as we have come to call it over the years) in looking back at old threads, and ironically some which are again concurrent, despite the carnage, some surprisingly useful facts and material have come up and added a great deal to understanding these terms.

I feel that much in the manner of a dictionary, showing alternate terms and definitions, it is important to associate the number of terms to describe the weapon in discussion. Quite honestly these collective terms can often add intriguing dimension to the history of the weapon form. Again, the list of examples and analogies would be remarkably lengthy.

While many of us continue using long established terms in discussion for the sake of semantics and understanding, we often acknowledge the proper term alongside. For example the Maghrebi saber known commonly as nim'cha, which is a misnomer in itself, is locally known in Morocco as the sa'if, thus often we term it Moroccan sa'if.

Again, this becomes a long and complex discussion. However, I think that if we can continue the use of long established terms (though technically incorrect) in colloquial discussions, while making note of proper or alternate terms we can safely maintain the integrity of same to achieve good result.

Again, thank you for putting all this in perspective. This topic has come a long, hard way, and we have a long way to go. Not necessarily to change the existing history and terminology, but to enhance it with necessary revisions without disrupting the flow of the collective material extant.