Sabre with scabbard

The word yatagan designates a sabre with an extremely sharp blade curved at the tip, which is used in Turkey. It takes the form of a steel blade with a wooden handle and a silver-plated wooden scabbard. Part of the blade is decorated with five-petal flowers, palm trees and half-palms.

A rich Baroque-style decorations runs down the length of the scabbard. It features, in succession, embossed fluting alternating with dots, a row of tulips separated by volutes, a sailboat known as a galleon, and coats of arms displaying swords, a club and a hatchet. A tulip framed by two fluted columns is surmounted by a bow, a bouquet of flowers and two cornucopias. These are followed by depictions of aedicules and a mosque with a ribbed dome surmounted by a crescent and minarets. The tip of the scabbard is shaped like a dragon’s head inlaid with coral.

On the other side the same decorations are embellished with an inscription in popular Arabic, the production date of the item and the depiction of a mosque with a ribbed dome and two side minarets.

Most of these motifs – e.g., boats and tulips – are very common in the decorative repertoire of the ceramics of Iznik and Kütahya (Turkey). Tulips (lāle) are sacred because the letters that make up the word are the same as the letters of the name of god, Allāh. Tulips come from the Turkish repertoire and are found on brass-ware and woodwork in Algiers[1]. The crescent is derived from the moon[2] : it appears together with a star as an emblem on Umayyad coins. The oldest example of the image of a crescent standing alone is found on a fragment of Fatimid pottery[3]. During the Mamluk period the crescent constituted heraldic arms. Only when the Ottoman Empire reached its apogee did it become the symbol of Islam.

Various aedicules were common in Iranian ceramics and almost systematic under the Qajars[4]. Cup-holders imported from Istanbul and used in Algiers, copper trays from Algeria and ceramic panels from Tunisia also bear depictions of mosques.

The cornucopia is an ancient motif that appears on the El-Hofra Punic stelae in Constantine (eastern Algeria). It is surmounted by a disc and placed to the left of a sign of the Phoenician patron goddess Tanit dominated by an inverted crescent[5].

Lastly, the dragon is one of the ornamental motifs most widely used in Asia, Anatolia and Iran; often represented in the form of a scaly snake twisted into contortions that sometimes resemble Chinese clouds (tchi), it is common in Eastern decorative arts from the fourteenth century on.

In the light of the motifs used on this yatagan, it may be assumed to have been made in Turkey and exported to Algeria. Therein it is representative of a trend that intensified in the nineteenth century; the Ottoman Empire exported a great number of objects to the West, where Turkish-style works became so popular that local markets carried on a thriving trade in forgeries and imitations.

[1] Petite table conservée au Musée des Antiquités et des Arts islamiques d’Alger, balustrades des palais d’Alger.

[2] Le croissant antique (punique ou romain) se distingue du croissant islamique par sa position (cornes dirigées vers le haut ou le bas, jamais latéralement).

[3] Fragment, Syrie ou Égypte, XI^e- XII^e siècle, Paris, musée du Louvre, inv.7872.

[4] Dynastie iranienne (1721-1924).

[5]La mythologie grecque raconte que Zeus cassa une des cornes de sa nourrice la chèvre Amalthée. Pour se faire pardonner, il donna à cette corne le pouvoir d’abonder de fleurs et de fruits. Elle représente la richesse et la fécondité et compte parmi les symboles les plus fréquents du pouvoir universel exercé par les Romains.