Search found 13 matches
- Sat Jan 29, 2011 6:45 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Tibetan sword terminology
- Replies: 17
- Views: 50940
Re: Tibetan sword terminology
Very nice sword, Scott. Kham is, of course, a very large region, containing many smaller states, kingdoms or chiefdoms, including Derge, Nyarong, Batang, the Horpa states, etc. Most of Kham was never brought under the direct control of the Lhasa government in modern times, and a large part was under...
- Fri Mar 27, 2009 8:58 am
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Village blacksmith jian (and a few dao)
- Replies: 6
- Views: 10816
Village blacksmith jian (and a few dao)
Folks, our friend Josh Stout has a nice collection of what you might call vernacular jian, made by village smiths. It made for a nice display at the Timonium ethnographic arms seminar last week, and there are some photos in this thread on the EEWRS site: http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?...
- Fri Mar 27, 2009 8:54 am
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Regulation Qing Dao
- Replies: 2
- Views: 6970
Re: Regulation Qing Dao
I have no knowledge of the regs or any other Chinese texts that would shed light on the question, but my guess would be that it was mainly a rust preventative. Secondarily, it may have been used to eliminate the glint of bare metal.
- Sun Nov 09, 2008 6:02 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Tibetan sword terminology
- Replies: 17
- Views: 50940
I went back to the handful of books I have that contain photos from the 1904 invasion. Several are reprints, so the photos aren't as good as originally printed, but the weaponry of the Tibetans was not the focus---except for Waddell's interest in old armor. One officer, said to be a general from Lha...
- Sun Nov 09, 2008 11:02 am
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Tibetan sword terminology
- Replies: 17
- Views: 50940
That's a good point, Phil. There are numerous references to the use of swords when chopping steps into icy slopes when traveling, for instance. Peter, I think you are absolutely correct about the sabers. I think that particularly among general officers, they were probably likely to have Chinese or p...
- Sun Nov 09, 2008 10:14 am
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Tibetan sword terminology
- Replies: 17
- Views: 50940
Good "point." Although I've read Waddell's book and Candler's and a hundred others, the typical fleeting mentions of weaponry provide less conclusive evidence than one might like. Despite his apparent interst in the subject, Waddell is perhaps not the most reliable observer on matters of armament (s...
- Sat Nov 08, 2008 7:02 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Tibetan sword terminology
- Replies: 17
- Views: 50940
Always happy to see discussion of Tibetan weapons. I had always taken the terminology for curved sabers to refer to imported weapons, as I have only seen, and very rarely, foreign sabers remounted in typical Tibetan hilts and, of course, Indian talwars brought in through war, pilgrimage or trade (as...
- Wed Apr 18, 2007 2:57 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: the dating game: do all tangs age the same?
- Replies: 6
- Views: 11483
An excellent question, Josh. I would have to guess that there would be different factors affecting oxidation in addition to merely time, including the blade composition, but more importantly, the amount of exposure to moisture. The degree of direct exposure to air would of course affect the speed of...
- Thu Mar 29, 2007 11:39 am
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: paper on Bhutanese sabers
- Replies: 4
- Views: 9917
Josh, I agree with you on the X mark on the back of the blade--a very interesting detail. (When I read it, I immediately went to my Bhutanese swords to make sure I had not missed anything there before!) I would interested to see how many examples of such marks show up among collectors' swords today....
- Wed Mar 28, 2007 6:12 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: paper on Bhutanese sabers
- Replies: 4
- Views: 9917
Phil, that's really interesting. I guess I am going to have to look at some Tang hilts! Naturally, I have wondered why the morphological differences between Bhutanese and Tibetan swords developed and persisted. While both retained the same zhibeidao blade forms, the distinction is largely in the hil...
- Tue Mar 20, 2007 7:54 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Some more trans-cultural fusion
- Replies: 17
- Views: 25550
No, I have never seen other tangs exposed, frankly. But those examples I photogrpahed appeared to be fairly old and with an apparent provenance. I have three swords whose pommels are loose enough to sort of twist a bit opposite the blade (i.e., I have one hand on the blade or scabbard, rotating slig...
- Tue Mar 20, 2007 1:17 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Some more trans-cultural fusion
- Replies: 17
- Views: 25550
Sorry for not posting a link in my last. It is an interesting avenue of inquiry. LaRocca's book doesn't really get into it for the same reason it is still a bit mysterious--all of us are naturally reluctant to take apart nice swords! I suspect, basis on this little bit of evidence, that at least som...
- Mon Mar 19, 2007 8:53 pm
- Forum: Chinese Historical Arms
- Topic: Some more trans-cultural fusion
- Replies: 17
- Views: 25550
I have found that Tibetan blade tangs are not necessarily peened. Not that I have ever felt an overwhelming urge to take apart any of my swords, but I have seen a couple of old blades in a Tibetan monastery with relatively short, triangular tangs, rounded at the end, rather like those of Burmese dha...