Shabria Dagger

[tom hyle]

Actually, a great many old cannon and even handguns (particularly bluderbusses) were made of brass/bronze/coppery stuff, and in fact the term "gun metal", so commonly referring to blued steel in modern N America, originally (and thus arguably properly) refers to a certain copper alloy commonly so used in Europe. Cortes even got Maya copper casters to make him cannon. Believe it or not, a lot of early cannon (bombards, I think they were called) were even wooden (with metal bands). I like these shabrias, and though I didn't think it appropriate to argue concerning mine after I'd asked opinions on it, I will tell you that I consider this an excellent example of the misuse of the term "tourist" dagger. These are modern shabrias, in the current (post wwII?) style; plain and simple. Mine is nicely made with a sharp forged diamond section blade, and is no rougher in its construction or finish than expected on "tribal" level pieces; I'd venture to say the same of yours. I haven't handled mine in a while, but I think the blade's surface was filed to finish. Typically they bear a nice native cutler's mark, which it seems is typically a name and date(?) Light and strong, they are designed and constructed in such a way as to be useful for violence and for work, and the metal clad construction seems to me to have come from more Southern Arab influence, the earlier ones having horn "scale" handles with somewhat of a khinzalish look, as I recall.

[Aurangzeb]

Hi Tom!

Thanks for your help.My dagger to is filed finish now that I know what those lins on it are,when I first got it I thought it was the maker went scratch happy on the lower part of the blade! So my piece is not a tourist pice in the way I think of it?(made for the visitors like some koummya's in Morroco.)So my dagger is recent(1946 to present),but is not made for visiters.But instead is made by a arab for his own use.Do you think it is pre formation of Isreal or post?

Thanks again for the help!

[tom hyle]

Probably post- Certainly no real comparison is to be made to the decorator khoumiyas with the flat "tin" blades snipped out of sheet metal. This sort of dagger is sold initially by a cutler, and though numbers of them certainly are bought by foreigners either from the cutlers or on the secondary market, I am unable to comprehend the viewing of this process in a different light than with a German or Itallian knife; the whole concept of the "tourist knife" is overplayed, and perhaps rather ethnocentric, IMHO, with modern using and decorator pieces for native consumption often improperly painted with the brush. I usually consider "decorator" or similar terms more accurate for the useless wallhanging type items, but I certainly consider these shabrias as using daggers. Certainly in modern times they see less use than their ancestors, much as with the stacked-handle Spanish colonial/Mediterranean dirks we recently discussed, but this does not imply an entirely vestigial weapon/tool. Many rural N Americans carry "hunting knives" as they often term them; bowie knives usually; I'm not sure why people think the knife is a "dead" or obsolete artifact; it's something to do with industrial city culture that predisposes toward this ideation, which isn't even valid or fully accepted within that culture.

[Aurangzeb]

Hi Tom!

Thanks for all the help with my dagger! I have one of those useless decorator koummyas it is as sharp as a butter knife(if not duller). Your certinaly right about the "hunting knife" out here in rural PA just about everybody has at least one dagger/knife for hunting,work,etc. My work knife is a Iraqi AK-47 bayonet! But how do you think the english writing on the throt of my dagger came about in a country of people who speak arabic and hebrew?My idea is it was a old can just made into a dagger in modern times.So is a Islamic not Hebrew weapon.I am suprised th st use silver not tin or other metal and real horn to hold the blade in place not plastic like my other two.

Thanks again for the help with my dagger!!