Peace Corps bring back: Modern Cameroon utility/ bush knife/ machete

[Nathaniel]

Additional photos

[Nathaniel]

Here is a photo I found online from Cameroon. Note the original wider tip of the blade. My neighbors was well used so after multiple sharpening a the original blade profile was changed.

[Nathaniel]

Additional photos I could find

[Nathaniel]

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[Sajen]

Very interesting, thank you for sharing! Like the scabbard with the nice basketry.

Detlef

[KuKulzA28]

Good stuff! Looks like what machete aficionados call a tapanga.

I think companies like Ralph Martindale from the UK and Chinese companies make a lot of the machetes for Africa. I have also noticed machetes being popular in Papua New Guinea, and of course in Latin America where they replaced palmwood and hardwood machetes of the Pre-Columbian natives. SE Asia, India, and China seem to stick to their traditional bush knives such as aruval, e-nep, dha, parang, golok, chai dao, etc.

I have noticed that certain machete designs have greater popularity in different areas. What is typically called an El Colin in Puerto Rico or pata de cuche in some places, the stereotypical slim bush machete, is ubiquitous. The panga and tapanga styles seem pretty popular in parts of the Caribbean, Guyana, and Africa. The costeno and colima designs originated and were popular in part of Mexico. There are also various saber-like machetes, and the cutacha which I think was made as a sword for Cubans. I believe the so-called "bolo style" may have come about after the Spanish conquest of the Philippines, though it doesn't look like many of the Filipino bolos - still a useful design however, fulfills the same role as the panga. The history of machetes is a very interesting field (to me). In Trinidad and Guyana, they're called cutlasses in the local creole, which sort of betrays the origins of the machete as descended from Spanish cutlasses and shortswords adapted to fulfill the role of the Amerindian bushwhacking sticks.

[fearn]

I should note that you can get a pretty good sampling of commercially available machetes is at http://www.machetespecialists.com/

Those three grind lines make me think it was ground down from a Wortools Tapanga style machete (http://www.machetespecialists.com/wo...apanga-18.html).

F

[Nathaniel]

Originally Posted by KuKulzA28

Good stuff! Looks like what machete aficionados call a tapanga.

I think companies like Ralph Martindale from the UK and Chinese companies make a lot of the machetes for Africa. I have also noticed machetes being popular in Papua New Guinea, and of course in Latin America where they replaced palmwood and hardwood machetes of the Pre-Columbian natives. SE Asia, India, and China seem to stick to their traditional bush knives such as aruval, e-nep, dha, parang, golok, chai dao, etc.

I have noticed that certain machete designs have greater popularity in different areas. What is typically called an El Colin in Puerto Rico or pata de cuche in some places, the stereotypical slim bush machete, is ubiquitous. The panga and tapanga styles seem pretty popular in parts of the Caribbean, Guyana, and Africa. The costeno and colima designs originated and were popular in part of Mexico. There are also various saber-like machetes, and the cutacha which I think was made as a sword for Cubans. I believe the so-called "bolo style" may have come about after the Spanish conquest of the Philippines, though it doesn't look like many of the Filipino bolos - still a useful design however, fulfills the same role as the panga. The history of machetes is a very interesting field (to me). In Trinidad and Guyana, they're called cutlasses in the local creole, which sort of betrays the origins of the machete as descended from Spanish cutlasses and shortswords adapted to fulfill the role of the Amerindian bushwhacking sticks.

Fantastic! Great to have a name for this type of blade. Good information KuKulzA28! That is indeed very interesting. Thank you for sharing. This is one of the things I most enjoy about the forum...you post something and you learn so much from others.

[Nathaniel]

Originally Posted by Sajen

Very interesting, thank you for sharing! Like the scabbard with the nice basketry.

Detlef

Happy to share. The scabbard to me was very interesting...the diamond type pattern is one you see among many cultures...here we see it in West Africa and I have also seen this in South East Asia as well.