Damascene/Koftgiri Metal Inlay on Arms and Armour in Rajasthan

Crafts, Handlooms, Art

Damascene/Koftgiri Metal Inlay on Arms and Armour in Rajasthan

Bhasin, Sonali

Armies of the Rajputs, Mughals and Tipu Sultan were renowned for their weapons. Every state had its own forging unit and the metals were locally procured and crafted. Not only where they the sharpest and strongest but each was a work of art, carved and bejeweled. The range and magnificence of the arms found in India was astounding as can be seen from the extensive visual documentation available. Any miniature painting of any tradition which has a male as its subject shows him in full armored finery. It was an art form held in the highest esteem, a honed science which, with the right combination of heat, metal and forging created arms to suit the physiognomy of the soldier.
Today, with the multiple innovations and developments in warfare, traditional weapons: swords, daggers, shields, scabbards have been made redundant. The once proud traditional armourers, the Gadi Lohars, are turning their metal working skill to create objects such as cooking utensils and picture frames in order to survive. Though there is a tiny demand for swords as decoration, arms and armory making is a dying art. Damascening, the inlay of gold and silver wire on iron objects, was traditionally practiced by the Siklikar community in Rajasthan for the Rajput warriors. . These weapons of destruction were exquisitely ornamented by a complicated process the first step of which was of etching the design, then heated on a stove until red hot and then cooled. The object is clamped in a vice and the process of embeddin...
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