How old is the kampilan as a form?

[Timo Nieminen]

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

Other accounts I have seen described the weapon used by the warriors as 'cutlasses', again a broadly applied term for any heavy blade and in any degree curved for cutting strokes. Since this term was not really known until late 17th into 18th c. it is again clearly later addition to the text of accounts.

The original Italian is:
uno con un gran terciado (che è como una scimitarra, ma più grosso)

The whole original text is available at https://it.wikisource.org/wiki/Relaz...torno_al_mondo

For "terciado".
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Terciado.jpg
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showpost.php?p=165771

Since it's explicitly scimitar-like, it doesn't sound like a kampilan to me. If it's similar to modern Philippine weapons, a big pira or a panabas? But long curved swords were not unusual in the area - a classic weapon of "Japanese" pirates. A long dao/dha/katana-like sword could be described as "like a scimitar, but larger".

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Timo Nieminen

The original Italian is:
uno con un gran terciado (che è como una scimitarra, ma più grosso)

The whole original text is available at https://it.wikisource.org/wiki/Relaz...torno_al_mondo

For "terciado".
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Terciado.jpg
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showpost.php?p=165771

Since it's explicitly scimitar-like, it doesn't sound like a kampilan to me. If it's similar to modern Philippine weapons, a big pira or a panabas? But long curved swords were not unusual in the area - a classic weapon of "Japanese" pirates. A long dao/dha/katana-like sword could be described as "like a scimitar, but larger".

Timo, we cross posted and I just saw your outstanding links and superb assessment, which describe what I was trying to say perfectly! Thank you!
The term 'scimitar' is a classic example of this kind of dilemma......rather than being an exact weapon form, it is a 'description' and most commonly found in literary parlance. Excellent!

[kai]

Hello Timo,

The original Italian is:
uno con un gran terciado (che è como una scimitarra, ma più grosso)
<snip>
Since it's explicitly scimitar-like, it doesn't sound like a kampilan to me. If it's similar to modern Philippine weapons, a big pira or a panabas?

I've also been wondering wether it might not have been a tabas/panabas - it's function as a mop-up weapon would be perfectly suitable for finishing off an fallen/wounded opponent with compromised fighting abilities.

I believe we can exclude pira since antique examples are relatively small as compared to European swords and wouldn't warrant a description as being "più grosso" IMHO.

Even considering that the oldest kampilan tend to have somewhat shorter blades, I'm not sure we can exclude them from this cursory account. It seems possible that the descriptions "gran terciado" and "una scimitarra, ma più grosso" were not meant as an exact description of the actual form but rather just used to emphasise a really broad and very long blade (by comparing it to swords known to the European reader). This was not meant for a hoplological society meeting but to the interested public in general.

I doubt that katana, dha or typical examples of the klewang family would provoke such a description by an European though.

Regards,
Kai