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A Cased Pair Of Scottish 50-Bore Percussion Duelling Or Target Pistols By Alex.r Martin, Glasgow, Mid-19th Century
The medals and associate ephemera and uniforms of Arthur Watts, 6th Inniskilling Dragoons
A Pair Of Highland All-Metal Percussion Belt Pistols Signed Paton & Walsh Perth, Mid 19th century
A Silver-Mounted Left-Hand Dagger, probably German, Italian or English Late 16th Century Or Later
FOUR REPRODUCTION CARVED POWDER HORNS/FLASKS.late 20th century.
THREE CARVED COCONUT ITEMS.18th/19th century.
A COLLECTION OF ANTIQUE AND REPRODUCTION POWDER FLASKS AND RELATED SPORTING ITEMS.
THREE VICTORIAN ARMS AND ARMOUR DECORATIVE ITEMS.
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Lot 105

A Rare Lowland Scots Left-Hand Dagger
Dated 1621, Perhaps Edinburgh

Antique Arms & Armour
22 April 2009, 13:00 BST
London, Knightsbridge

Sold for £1,920 inc. premium

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A Rare Lowland Scots Left-Hand Dagger
Dated 1621, Perhaps Edinburgh

With sharply tapering hollow ground blade of stiff diamond section inlaid with a copper mark on one side at the forte, the forte and slightly recessed ricasso each retaining traces of etched and gilt decoration on both sides, iron hilt dated on one side of the quillon-block and comprising recurved quillons widening towards the tips, large side-ring, faceted barrel-shaped pommel with button, and original tapering writhen grip bound with twisted brass wire (heavily rust corroded overall)
27.7 cm. blade

Footnotes

The blade of this dagger is of the distinctive type best known from a group of early 17th Century ballock-knives, which it has been suggested were what were then called dudgeon daggers. An account of them by Claude Blair and John Wallace, published in 1963, records that a number of the forty-one examples then known - represented both by complete daggers and detached or remounted blades - bear Scots inscriptions and/or coats-of-arms, and concludes that the whole group was almost certainly produced in Scotland. Confirmation of this would seem to be provided by a ballock-knife sold at Christie's in London on 18 May 1994 (lot 55), which is dated 1614 and bears on its scabbard the mark of the sheath-maker Charles Strudgeon or Sturgeon (recorded 1584-1626) of both Edinburgh and Edinburgh, Canongate

The present dagger provides a rare example of a blade of this type mounted in a hilt with quillons of more-or-less standard international form. Two other examples are illustrated by Blair and Wallace, who point out that daggers depicted in Scottish portraits of the 16th and 17th centuries - which are all of Lowlanders - are invariably of the quillon variety

See Claude Blair & John Wallace, 'Scots - or still English?', the Scottish Art Review, 9 (1), 1963, pp. 11-15, 34-37

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A Cased Pair Of Scottish 50-Bore Percussion Duelling Or Target Pistols By Alex.r Martin, Glasgow, Mid-19th Century
The medals and associate ephemera and uniforms of Arthur Watts, 6th Inniskilling Dragoons
A Pair Of Highland All-Metal Percussion Belt Pistols Signed Paton & Walsh Perth, Mid 19th century
A Silver-Mounted Left-Hand Dagger, probably German, Italian or English Late 16th Century Or Later
FOUR REPRODUCTION CARVED POWDER HORNS/FLASKS.late 20th century.
THREE CARVED COCONUT ITEMS.18th/19th century.
A COLLECTION OF ANTIQUE AND REPRODUCTION POWDER FLASKS AND RELATED SPORTING ITEMS.
THREE VICTORIAN ARMS AND ARMOUR DECORATIVE ITEMS.