Collectors of Indian and Burmese weapons

Jens Nordlunde · 29th May 2006, 04:42 PM

A few days ago I got a book from Canada. I had forgotten all about it, as it is five or six weeks ago I ordered it, but now it came.

Temple, Richard Carnac (ed.): The Itinerary of Ludovico di Varthema of Bologna, 1510. Reprint 1970, Da Capo Press.

Di Vathema travelled in north and east Africa, Arabia, Persia, Syria, the west and east coast of India, Siam, Sumatra, Java and some of these islands. The travel to India and the islands he did with a Persian friend who was a merchant. The book consists of about 200 hundred pages, and about half is comments. The author tells about how the people lived, how they dressed, what they grew in the fields, mining gems and so on, not in great details, but I find it interesting to read. Only in a very few places he tells about weapons.

On page 47 he writes about Sind – ‘some of them carry a stick with a ring of iron at the base. Others carry certain iron dishes which cut all round like razors, and they throw these with a sling when they wish to injure any person; and, therefore, when these people arrive at any city in India, everyone tries to please them; for should they even kill the first nobleman of the land, they would not suffer any punishment be course they say that they are saints.’

Page 75 about Burma. ‘Their arms consists of small swords and some sort of shields, some of which are made of tortoise-shell, and some like those of Calicut; and they have a great quantity of bows, and lances of cane, and some also of wood. When they go to war they wear a dress stuffed with cotton…….. There is also here another kind of bird, one of prey, much larger than an eagle, of the beak of which, that is, of the upper part, they make sword-hilts, which beak is yellow and red, a thing very beautiful to behold.’

In most places he describes the dresses they wear when going to war as being quilted, but in one place he writes about mail shirts, and especially that an elephant was dressed in mail for protection of the trunk.

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.

29th May 2006, 04:42 PM	#1
Jens Nordlunde Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Europe Posts: 2,713	Collectors of Indian and Burmese weapons A few days ago I got a book from Canada. I had forgotten all about it, as it is five or six weeks ago I ordered it, but now it came. Temple, Richard Carnac (ed.): The Itinerary of Ludovico di Varthema of Bologna, 1510. Reprint 1970, Da Capo Press. Di Vathema travelled in north and east Africa, Arabia, Persia, Syria, the west and east coast of India, Siam, Sumatra, Java and some of these islands. The travel to India and the islands he did with a Persian friend who was a merchant. The book consists of about 200 hundred pages, and about half is comments. The author tells about how the people lived, how they dressed, what they grew in the fields, mining gems and so on, not in great details, but I find it interesting to read. Only in a very few places he tells about weapons. On page 47 he writes about Sind – ‘some of them carry a stick with a ring of iron at the base. Others carry certain iron dishes which cut all round like razors, and they throw these with a sling when they wish to injure any person; and, therefore, when these people arrive at any city in India, everyone tries to please them; for should they even kill the first nobleman of the land, they would not suffer any punishment be course they say that they are saints.’ Page 75 about Burma. ‘Their arms consists of small swords and some sort of shields, some of which are made of tortoise-shell, and some like those of Calicut; and they have a great quantity of bows, and lances of cane, and some also of wood. When they go to war they wear a dress stuffed with cotton…….. There is also here another kind of bird, one of prey, much larger than an eagle, of the beak of which, that is, of the upper part, they make sword-hilts, which beak is yellow and red, a thing very beautiful to behold.’ In most places he describes the dresses they wear when going to war as being quilted, but in one place he writes about mail shirts, and especially that an elephant was dressed in mail for protection of the trunk.

30th May 2006, 03:55 PM	#2
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	#3
Jens Nordlunde Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Europe Posts: 2,713	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.