Sudan Mahdist daggers

[colin henshaw]

Thanks to Iain and Edster for their comments about these daggers. Unfortunately, no documentation came with them to completely verify their provenance.

Regarding the second dagger shown with the dog-leg shaped blade; I agree it appears very unlikely this form was invented in 1916. In addition to the example cited by Edster, there is also a dagger very similar to mine, illustrated in one of W O Oldman's early sale catalogues, which he published in the years 1902 - 1914.

Regards.

[Iain]

Hi Colin and Ed,

Good to hear the 1916 can be disregarded. I always thought it a bit odd that such an iconic design was from that late a date.

[Edster]

Continuing research often closes some doors and opens others. That's the fun of our field. The blade soat'al form has lasted a considerable period. But the grip/handle has evolved and perhaps the back-to-back "C" configuration was a modern innovation, perhaps at the time of the Eastern Camel Corps participation in the 1916 Ali Dinar Campaign, perhaps even later. It would be interesting to see soat'als from various periods.

The C grip is held by the first and second fingers which allows better range of slashing motions than a conventional "fist" grip. See the post and period photographs below. Note that most of the Beja wear the old J shaped blade knife with its characteristic fist grip.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=9991

Ed

[CharlesS]

Geeeees this thread is missing Lew.

[Iain]

Originally Posted by Edster

Continuing research often closes some doors and opens others. That's the fun of our field. The blade soat'al form has lasted a considerable period. But the grip/handle has evolved and perhaps the back-to-back "C" configuration was a modern innovation, perhaps at the time of the Eastern Camel Corps participation in the 1916 Ali Dinar Campaign, perhaps even later. It would be interesting to see soat'als from various periods.

The C grip is held by the first and second fingers which allows better range of slashing motions than a conventional "fist" grip. See the post and period photographs below. Note that most of the Beja wear the old J shaped blade knife with its characteristic fist grip.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=9991

Ed

Hi Ed,

Completely agree - I still find it interesting that someone in kassala was apparently trying to take credit for the design!

To get back to the two daggers of Colin's... The inscriptions and dates seem perfectly in line with the items and I see no reason to suspect they don't date to the period.

It's always fantastic I think to see properly dated examples and gives a very valuable benchmark.