Indian Antiquary Vol 07

SR No.: 032499
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Jas Burgess
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 386
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 17 MB

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194
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
to favourite swords has been; there was the Prophet's sword Zualfakir, the Cid's Durindana, King Arthur's "brand Excalibur," the Dwarf-sword Tirfing of Scandinavian Sagas, and many another celebrated in the annals of chivalry. The Tanjor armoury strongly confirmed the statements of the great importation of European blades; it contained hundreds, whole or in pieces. Two phirangis in my possession have double-channelled blades, one set in a beautiful hilt of copper inlaid all over with ornamentation in gold, including four figures of griffins and ten of gods, the blade bearing on one side this inscription, repeated in each groove, X CKNEO SOE NVS X and on the other side the letters
OEN BCг
also twice repeated. The blade of the other phirangi, set in a hilt covered with tasteful gold foliage-work, spread also over hold-fasts prolonged four inches up the blade, bears these symbols and letters in one line on each side
*** NOVA E * * * These, as well as scores of others, were evidently European blades, and the signification of the letters may probably be obvious to antiquaries conversant with old weapons. And besides these there were multitudes of uttars with handles of very exquisite pierced steel-work, in which were set blades evidently formed of pieces of European swords bearing various inscriptions. I have seen no medieval or modern steel-work surpassing these Hindu hilts in excellence of workmanship, artistic ingenuity, and tastefulness of design and ornament. The fancy shown is endless, and the execution minute and admirable. The sides of the handles, the crossbars between for grasping, the tops of the handles, and the hold-fasts running from them up the blades, are all wrought in steel, generally pierced, and hardly any two designs the same. All the mass of weapons when taken from the armoury were thickly caked over with rust, and too many lamentably corroded and destroyed. It was only after great and persevering labour that the incrustations, perhaps of centuries, were more or less successfully removed, and the designs and inscriptions disclosed. One kuttar of fantastic design now by me has the grasp covered by a shield-shaped guard of pierced steel, bearing a griffin on each outer
[AUGUST, 1878.
rim, from whose backs small blades project on each side at right angles to the central blade, which bears this inscription on both sides :xx INTI xx DOMINI XX (See Fig. 6 in the first of the accompanying plates.) Another fantastic dagger has three long narrow blades parallel to one another, the middle one longest, and on it are the letters EDRO. A kuttur (Figs. 3, 3) with a handle throughout of beautiful workmanship, the openwork sides an arrangement of griffins, phoenixes, and clustered fishes, and the hold-fasts of the blade each four fancifully grouped parrots, bears on one side the blade, which is broad and three-channelled, the letters S. M. V. N., and on the other C. V. M., with a human face in a crescent further up. A second kuttar (Fig. 5) has the handle of fine pierced steelwork covered with a guard representing a cobra with expanded hood between two rampant griffins; the long narrow blade exhibits a single deep groove, in which on one side are the letters 10 HANIS VLL, and on the other four or five indistinct letters and then ALIV N. A third, with a handsome well-wrought steel hilt, after the thick layer
of rust that coated it had been removed, dis-.
closed, to my surprise, in two deep channels on
each side the blade, the well-known name ANDREA FERARA (sic).
It seemed strange to meet the famous Italian swordsmith of three centuries ago in such an association, but Sir Walter Elliot has informed me that when a notorious freebooter was captured in the Southern Maratha Country many years since, his sword was found to be an "Audrea Ferrara." So widely have these old European blades been spread over India; whether frequently found in Bengal and the North-West I do not know; but in the extensive collections of Eastern weapons in the India, South Kensington, and Bethnal Green Museums there are very few-less than a dozen-blades that appear unmistakably European, whereas in the Tanjor armoury they were numbered by scores; perhaps they had been collected there for a long period. One noticeable feature was the immense number and variety of arrows and arrowheads: the former, as usual, of reeds, with bone or ivory nocks and spike-heads of all possible 2, 2, and 4, 4, on the plate represent two others.
11, 1, are the side aud front of one handle; and