Enrica Medugno
Senior Sale Coordinator
Property from the Mohammed Khalil Collection
Lot 42*
A fine Ottoman gold-inlaid watered-steel sword (kilij) Turkey, the blade 16th Century, the hilt 17th Century
22 May 2025, 11:00 BST
London, New Bond Street£50,000 - £70,000
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Oliver White
Head of Department
A fine Ottoman gold-inlaid watered-steel sword (kilij)
Turkey, the blade 16th Century, the hilt 17th Century
Turkey, the blade 16th Century, the hilt 17th Century
the single-edged watered steel blade of slightly curved form with flattened spine and double-edged section towards point, decorated in gold inlay with a cartouche filled with arabesques surmounted by an inscription-filled palmette to the forte to one side, an inscription-filled cartouche to the other, two long cartouches containing fine inscriptions in thuluth running down the blade to each side, terminating in a partial palmette towards the point, the gilt-silver hilt with openwork lobed panels, the wood scabbard with silver mounts
82.1 cm. long
82.1 cm. long
Footnotes
Provenance
The Mohammed Khalil Collection.
Published
M. K. Ibrahim, Islamic Arms and Armour, Vol. I, United Arab Emirates, 2022, p. 276-7, cat. no. 59.
Inscriptions: to one side, Sura 2 (al-Baqara), vs. 255 (Ayat al-Kursi), followed by the phrase sadaqa allah al-karim ('God the Generous spoke the truth'); in the small palmette, al-'izz al-da'im, 'Perpetual glory'; to the other side, Sura 48 (al-Fath), vs. 1-3, in the cartouche next to the grip, al-khass bi-niyyat al-ghuzat, 'Reserved for the intention of the holy warriors'.
The blade of the present lot is a finely watered-steel example with elegantly engraved calligraphy in thuluth script. It is related in form to an example in the Furusiyya Collection, dated to the second half of the 16th Century, which also has a line of Arabic inscription to each side (see Bashir Mohamed, The Arts of the Muslim Knight, the Furusiyya Art Foundation Collection, 2007, p. 62, no. 26). The silver hilt is typical of the mid 17th Century and relates to that of another sword in the same collection (ibid, p. 70, no. 34). Hilts of this type are first seen during the reign of Sultan Bayezid II (reg. 1481-1512), though it was not until the 17th Century that they became curved to a perpendicular pommel as on the present lot.