A very good so called "Tjakit"sword from South Taiwan.

This highly rare sword from the Paiwan tribe has a very nice carved handle with figures in Chalaabus style where the head is crowned with a motif looking like the headdress made of leopard cat or wild boars teeth. The froglike figures with raised arms are using each others bodies, faces that are sharing eyes is a wider spread feature we also see for example in Dayak- and early Chou art.

(Note for example that the nose on the side of the handle uses one eye of the front and one of the rear face.) 

On the  scabbard the ' Hundred pace snake" or " Vorovoron" the ancestor of the nobility.

The end of the scabbard is ending a stylistic head.

The snake is surrounded with ancestor heads.

The wooden belt stop is gone already for a long time.

The other side of the scabbard is the typical half open model with iron bars that keep the blade on its position.

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Taiwan 19th century

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Paiwan or Rukai tribe.

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ref.  Chen Chi -Lu ~Material culture of the Formosan aborigines, Taiwan Museum Taipeh

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Size total: 68  cm

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€ 3250,- HOLD

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