Naga Daggers

[Timo Nieminen]

Originally Posted by SwordsAntiqueWeapons

#3 Looks like it might have come out of Assam tea plantations or similar...EU made I suspect

I have a knife very much like this (maybe a little smaller, but close to the size of this #3). English made, just before 1900 if the number on the blade is a date of manufacture, came from India.

Wonderful tool for clearing vines. Before secateurs, it would have been one of the best light pruning tools.

[Ian]

Rawson, in his book The Indian Sword, makes the point that the Nagas were an iron-poor people who would "appropriate" iron and steel from the tea plantations and railroads to manufacture their implements and weapons. He presents some examples of Naga axes made from British hoes that presumably were obtained from tea plantations.

[Ian]

This knife is attributed to the Abor people but is also found among the Mishmi. The sheath is again open-faced, wooden and with metal bands. There is again a wooden lip on the side of the sheath that corresponds to the spine of the blade.

[Gavin Nugent]

Here is one of this type in native context 1922, Mishmi, Assam.

Ian, your bolo type is on the hip of the chap in the background.

[Ian]

Very nice photograph Robert. I have taken the liberty of enlarging the two knives in your picture, the one on the guy in front and the one in back. The bands across the scabbard appear to be solid metal strips in each case (rather than several wraps of wire).

[Gavin Nugent]

Originally Posted by Ian

Very nice photograph Robert.

[Ian]

Originally Posted by SwordsAntiqueWeapons

Sorry Gavin--my bad!