Afridi Dagger ?

ariel · 21st October 2009, 12:48 AM

Lou, don't be a party pooper :-)
I think it is rather interesting.
I think the distinction is not in construction per se, but in purpose: daggers always have some military tinge. Knives, on the other hand, can be anything, including, importantly, perfectly peaceful purposes: kitchen, cheese, butter, paring etc.
It so happened that English has two separate words for a short weapon: dagger and knife.
Russian, on the other hand, has only one: nozh=knife. Therefore, anything shorter than saber or sword was a "nozh". They realized that it was insufficient and utilized a (Caucasian) Kindjal as a matrix word. Thus, you see definition like " Jambiya, an Arabian kindjal", "Kris, an Indonesian kindjal", " Nazi SS kindjal", etc, etc. for any short weapon with military purpose. Exceptions are naval dagger "kortik" (probably modified "kortelas", a short naval sword), and sapper's "tessack" ( likely, from German "dussak" or a derivative of Russian verb "tesat'", " to chop).

Words get different meanings. I was told, for example, that in the Balkans, yataghans are knives/daggers, but a full size one is called handjar.
Jim's favorite example is kaskara that is known as such everywhere, except in ...Sudan. The Sudanese call it Sayf.

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21st October 2009, 12:48 AM	#12
ariel Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Ann Arbor, MI Posts: 5,503	Lou, don't be a party pooper :-) I think it is rather interesting. I think the distinction is not in construction per se, but in purpose: daggers always have some military tinge. Knives, on the other hand, can be anything, including, importantly, perfectly peaceful purposes: kitchen, cheese, butter, paring etc. It so happened that English has two separate words for a short weapon: dagger and knife. Russian, on the other hand, has only one: nozh=knife. Therefore, anything shorter than saber or sword was a "nozh". They realized that it was insufficient and utilized a (Caucasian) Kindjal as a matrix word. Thus, you see definition like " Jambiya, an Arabian kindjal", "Kris, an Indonesian kindjal", " Nazi SS kindjal", etc, etc. for any short weapon with military purpose. Exceptions are naval dagger "kortik" (probably modified "kortelas", a short naval sword), and sapper's "tessack" ( likely, from German "dussak" or a derivative of Russian verb "tesat'", " to chop). Words get different meanings. I was told, for example, that in the Balkans, yataghans are knives/daggers, but a full size one is called handjar. Jim's favorite example is kaskara that is known as such everywhere, except in ...Sudan. The Sudanese call it Sayf.