Collectors of Indian and Burmese weapons

Mark · 30th May 2006, 03:55 PM

I finally found a fascimile copy of Varthema this year. It is so tantalizing in its references to weapons and warfare, as are all of these early travel accounts. Others are Marco Polo, Nicolo de Conti, Hieronimo de Santo Stefano, Ralf Fitch, de Marini, de la Louberemore, and more recently Sangermano, Albert Fytche (decendant of Ralf Fitch) and Symes. Here are two links were I found a lot of this stuff: http://web.soas.ac.uk/burma/pdf/ (text-only, often extracts with just the parts about Burma); http://dlxs.library.cornell.edu/s/sea/index.php (this one has full facsmile versions).

There are some Portuguese writings that I can't get ahold of, as well. What I find so curious is exactly what Jens pointed out - the way they will go into some detail about things as mundane as fish traps, but never describe what the darned swords looked like! Even more surprising with those whose missions were as much military as political/cultural (like Fytche and Symes). The firearms always seemed to overshadow everything.

Jens Nordlunde · 30th May 2006, 04:53 PM

Hi Mark,

Thank you for the links. True it can be frustrating to turn page after page reading about a lot of things other than what you are looking for. There are however also funny things, like when the king in a place where they mined rubies rented out pieces of land to people who wanted to mine themselves. If the found rubies over ten carat they belonged to the king, other rubies they could keep if they paid a tax – rather sly I would say. Another funny thing is, that the author – in 1510 – got ten years copyright by the Pope.

30th May 2006, 03:55 PM	#1
Mark Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 987	I finally found a fascimile copy of Varthema this year. It is so tantalizing in its references to weapons and warfare, as are all of these early travel accounts. Others are Marco Polo, Nicolo de Conti, Hieronimo de Santo Stefano, Ralf Fitch, de Marini, de la Louberemore, and more recently Sangermano, Albert Fytche (decendant of Ralf Fitch) and Symes. Here are two links were I found a lot of this stuff: http://web.soas.ac.uk/burma/pdf/ (text-only, often extracts with just the parts about Burma); http://dlxs.library.cornell.edu/s/sea/index.php (this one has full facsmile versions). There are some Portuguese writings that I can't get ahold of, as well. What I find so curious is exactly what Jens pointed out - the way they will go into some detail about things as mundane as fish traps, but never describe what the darned swords looked like! Even more surprising with those whose missions were as much military as political/cultural (like Fytche and Symes). The firearms always seemed to overshadow everything.

30th May 2006, 04:53 PM	#2
Jens Nordlunde Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Europe Posts: 2,718	Hi Mark, Thank you for the links. True it can be frustrating to turn page after page reading about a lot of things other than what you are looking for. There are however also funny things, like when the king in a place where they mined rubies rented out pieces of land to people who wanted to mine themselves. If the found rubies over ten carat they belonged to the king, other rubies they could keep if they paid a tax – rather sly I would say. Another funny thing is, that the author – in 1510 – got ten years copyright by the Pope.