Nomadic swords

Philip · 25th November 2018, 02:37 AM

The more we see, whether in art or "in the flesh", the more complete our knowledge will be. Why not take these various depictions as "suggestive of the possibility that..." even though the surviving material strongly indicates otherwise. Personally I put more credence in an actual example of something as opposed to a hand-drawn depiction. Especially a work of art produced within specific traditional canons (religious iconography certainly qualifies) and whose primary "big picture" focus is not the miniscule details of weapons or costume.

However, we can't pretend at this time to have seen every archaic sword that has continued to exist down to our time -- discoveries are being made all the time and I'm sure there are plenty more still buried. Let's hope that future uncovering is done within an archaeological context (as opposed to "dig and grab" by amateurs) so that we can be more precise in our attributions and chronology. We can adjust our conclusions about tunkous, or any other point as more physical evidence becomes available for our examination.

25th November 2018, 02:37 AM	#29
Philip Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: California Posts: 1,036	The more we see, whether in art or "in the flesh", the more complete our knowledge will be. Why not take these various depictions as "suggestive of the possibility that..." even though the surviving material strongly indicates otherwise. Personally I put more credence in an actual example of something as opposed to a hand-drawn depiction. Especially a work of art produced within specific traditional canons (religious iconography certainly qualifies) and whose primary "big picture" focus is not the miniscule details of weapons or costume. However, we can't pretend at this time to have seen every archaic sword that has continued to exist down to our time -- discoveries are being made all the time and I'm sure there are plenty more still buried. Let's hope that future uncovering is done within an archaeological context (as opposed to "dig and grab" by amateurs) so that we can be more precise in our attributions and chronology. We can adjust our conclusions about tunkous, or any other point as more physical evidence becomes available for our examination.