Afghan Knives: Choora and Pesh Kabz
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- čas přidán 15. 03. 2020
- These two terms get used interchangeably in some sources, but in my reading of 19th century texts the term 'choora', 'charah', or similar, is usually applied to the larger chopping weapon (often known as a 'Khyber knife'). The term Pesh Kabz is Persian and seems usually to be applied to the smaller daggers. However, just like with many historical and ethnographic words, they have been used for different things at different times.
- Zábava
I love how you're making some people who maybe were only interested in medieval European weapons aware of the well-developed military technology of other people designed to be effective in other contexts.
🤝🏻 exactly
Remembering all the different terms is such a choora
Ugh... Lol
"Yukka yukka", quipped Fozzy Bear.
Thanks, Matt. Afghan blades are definitely my favorite aesthetically. No nonsense weapons with a functional beauty
I have a hard time selecting my favorite blade. Too many choices and they're all lethal!
I particularly like the aesthetics of South East Asian and African blades. They often have such fantasy like designs, just really unique shapes though still practical. Some look so foreign they could be a prop from Star Wars.
From 35 to 38 years ago, Atlanta Cutlery out of Georgia USA sold items very similar to what you have displayed, they called the longer on "Khyber knife" and the shorter one "choora". The owner of that company, Hank Rheihard, was a member of the SCA and pretty knowledgeable and this time period was the heart of US fascination with Afghanistan because of the Soviet occupation there
'One short and stabby, the other long and choppy' might be peak British description
That Pesh Kabz really looks like it could be the stabmaster, awesome aesthetics!
I dunno, reminds me a lot of my grandma's kitchen knife. She so stingy she wont buy new knife for like 20 years now and constant sharpening gave it same distinctive shape. Don't get me wrong i admit both weapons have cool and exotic aestetics to it just not my kind of aestetics i guess.
Hi 👋
In Pashto, the long sword looking weapon is actually called 'Toora' meanings sword and you are right about the smaller weapon which is called Pishkabza.
Chorra/Chala/ چاړه is primarily use in the kitchen for cutting and chopping. Cheers
I would really like to get a good choora. I imagine that given the design is so similar to an oversized chef's knife, and I spent years as a chef, that it would feel very natural in my hand.
That was the first thing I thought when I saw the thumbnail. The other one would likely do well as a boning knife, maybe not flexible enough though.
You can carry a chopping board as a shield and wear a mixing bowl on your head.
It seems more similar to my French chef's knife than German style ones. I also have an older chefs knife that's even closer to the chura in shape.
The pesh kabs looks like an old chura cut down and sharpened so much most of the blade has gone.
@@MatthewDoye close to 30 years ago grandparents picked up a really old Henckels chef knife for me at an auction. It was probably made in the late 19th or very early 20th century and was basically a short choora, it even had a T-back to the blade. It had probably been about a 14 inch blade when new, but was down to just under 13 inches after decades of sharpening. Of course it wasn't stainless steel so I couldn't use it in restaurants I worked in thanks to health department regulations, but it was great for home use. It really made short work of cutting up large pieces of meat to go in the grinder for sausage. It was also super easy to sharpen, but didn't hold it's edge nearly as well as the Shun knives I use now. I really miss that knife, some a-hole stole it at a historic reenactment event years ago. I just hope they've treated that knife with the respect it deserves.
I think you're only looking at the side profile. What makes these blades distinctive is their cross-section. If you take a look at that you'll see how they differ from each other in function, and how both would be the last thing you'd ever want to use as a chef's knife.
According to Wikipedia, George Cameron Stone knew a "chura" as the name of a short type of pesh-kabz among the Mahsuds in the Khyber. It's entirely plausible that the word came there from elsewhere with a changed meaning. The French word "soupe" (beloved of Napoleon's troops: fill kettle with water, throw everything in, heat and stir), has come into English twice: firstly as "sop", meat which has been boiled; secondly and separately as "soup", a liquor in which something has been boiled.
Another good example of what may different words mean: pallasch. In Poland pałasz(pallasch) is one or double edged straight sword with sabre hilt- curved handle(word and weapon came through Hungary from Turkey, i think)... While French would call it "infantry sabre"... But for some reason it is common to use word "pałasz" in context of baskethilted swords as well, while we all know, that baskethilted swords are basically, in some great simplification, basically medieval arming swords with more hand protection... So no curved handle... Languages are wierd...
In Austria, we called it Pallasch.
The Turkish term pala (I'm guessing the source for Polish pałasz) as far as I know refers very specifically in Turkish to those small, short but stout sabres. When it came into Serbo-Croatian though its use was expanded and came to refer to any short or side sword, such that even things like yatağan's were sometimes called 'pala'. Perhaps that broader usage was carried up into Poland and might go some way to explaining how a baskethilted sword could fall under that name.
@@d0r1an06 It is possible. People of old times made mistakes namig stuff, just like we do today... and there is also question of common usage. For example in Poland today Adidas is what we call all sport shoes- probably because they were first to introduce this type of shoes here. Just like word Nagan is synonymous with revolver in Russia
I would suspect that there was crossover with Schiavona (Slavonian basket-hilt sword) that wound up migrating northweast; maybe they were used by the heavy cavalry as an alternative to the palaz and they became synonimized. They would be used the same way despite their different construction as a heavy general cut and thrust sword
@@d0r1an06 also the word KELESH in some parts of Balcans means short but sturdy fit strong man , actually it comes from a short but very heavy sword something like a cleaver.
It doesn’t matter how bad my day has gone, or how sour my mood. Watching one of your videos always makes me feel good. I enjoyed this one especially.
My son came back from Afghanistan over ten years ago and had numerous stories about the knives that he saw there. He even designed one himself that took on much of their tradition.
Thanks for the uplift.
😎👍🏻👍🏻
I'm curious about a sword that seems similar to the khyber knife called the flyssa. Is there a relation between the two?
They are both related to the yataghan, so they are related indirectly.
scholagladiatoria how are they related tot he yatagan? U said in another video that they weren’t
I just looked up flyssa and it looks eerily like the Thrandui sword from LOTR. Must be one of the historical influence for that sword.
@@phoeben9764 Funnily enough, the yataghan also looks like it could be an elvish weapon.
xllab1 yatagan handle looks like a copy of of khyber knife handle. The Ottoman Empire was multicultural
That shield looks udder-ly practical.
Matt was the Shamshir used in the same way across Persia, Afghanistan and India ?
I don't know and I don't know if we have enough source material to even answer the question. However, from a European perspective the answer is kind of yes - European sources describe similar movement and fighting styles from the Ottoman Empire, through the Persian and into India.
@@scholagladiatoria a qualified yes?
In India one of the word for a knife is Choori ( notice the feminine i ) for smaller knives and choora for bigger knives (not sword size , mainly cleaver sized knives ) and in my native tongue Kutchi, which is from a region called kutch on the border of Pakistan and a mixture of sindhi, marwadi , minute traces of punjabi ...we call knives as chari and even in gujarati language which borders these same regions, one of the word for knives is chari . Choori , chari , choora are essentially the same thing...pronounced as Chu not cho , chu as in when we imitate the sound of a sneeze aschu ...the chu .
Interesting. I wonder if there are any indian weapons/large choppy knives that would look kinda like the big khyber knife. I just really like indian weapons, but i have not really looked everything from there. I just like indian weapons, and big choppy knives haha. From curved saber like swords the indian tulwar is one of my favorites, and i think afghans have their own version, but the afghan one is not quite as pleasing to the eye for me.
Oh Matt mentioned towards the end Indians started making their own versions of these. I have to look them up
All are Pashto words because Indians used to be ruled by Afghans.
I am from Afghanistan and i can confirm we call this a sword.
I learned english watching this channel. Thank you Matt.
I was wondering where exactly Khyber knives fit in and what they were. Thank you for teaching me.
Nice! a closer look at these unboxed pieces.
I have heard that the fashion for brightly coloured silks sewn in slashes in sleeves that was popular among the nobility of Europe originally began with the lower class soldiery known as Landesknechte.
Hey Matt, love your videos. Just wanted to ask whether you could do a video on the infamous 1796 heavy cavalry trooper's sword and maybe the 1864 pattern light cavalry trooper's sword. IMO, they're pretty interesting swords, but are often forgotten or neglected, especially compared to the 1796 light cavalry sabre. Cheers!
Cool to see these sorts of weapons more!
Came for my daily dose of historical weapons facts and myths. Thanks Matt!
Interesting to see how similar weapons evolved to fill similar needs thousands of miles apart from one another.
Have you given any study to the Lohar Axe?
Thx. I have bought a Choora many years ago for cheap, without sheath. It is a formidable shortsword - in my hands (viking size man) it is a hacking AND stabbing arm.
Khyber-Knife and khyber talwar were the terms i knew for it.
Churra or choora pronounced "Ch-h-u-rr-a" just means a big knife in Urdu/Hindu/Punjabi and some dialects of Pushto (Pushto being the language of the Pathans or Pushtoons, People who mainly live on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan).
For a small knife the word is Churi pronounced as "Ch-u-rr-ee".
Pashkabz or khanjar basically mean dagger style knives or knives used as daggers... also khanjar may mean an arming knife.
That Choora is so beautifully brutal looking...vaguely reminds me of the Kopis, at least the hilt does.
AFAIK, the Kopis had a very different hilt, except that both of these blades and the Yatagan became thicker towards the end in both dimensions. I´ve seen a Kora (spelt like that) which was more like Kukri and thus closer to the Kopis. It was constructed like the Khyber knife, but became broader to the tip and was far more curved forward.
Looks nothing like a kopis. The yatagan is more similar in that regard
@@ChromeMan04 hence why I said *vaguely*
Demetrios Levi the hilt doesn’t look similar either, Kopis handles were not curved
Looking forward to see a video on the'' sayf'' you unboxed with Lucy in the last videos :)
Wonderful. This is exactly the discussion that I hoped would follow on from the unboxing video...only missing Lucy 😍👍
Could you do a video on blades with the tbacks and pie backed blades??
Didn't read comments beforehand, but what an ingenious way to make an "all purpose" sword. Adds rigidity and a blocking mechanism that saves the blade if possible when parrying and counter slashing/ stabbing. Added benefits are not needing to repair the bladed edge when no such provision is available. Hmmmmm
If anyone's interested. There is an alternative history novel called The Peshwar Lancers, I believe. Takes place in that part of the world and includes this weapon combo quite a lot. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Thank you again Matt for sharing these with us. Always enjoy your insight on these things. Cheers!
Fantastic book by S M Stirling!
Fantastic book by S M Stirling!
@@graelgraan2428 it is. I have read and re-read it numerous times over the years. One of my top 5 authors for sure.
In most modern languages of India "Chhūrā" means, (large) "knife". The word comes from the Sanskrit word "kshura", which meant "knife" or "razor". "kshaura-karma" means the act of "shaving" (beard or head) . Apparently, the word for a razor or small tool knife turned into the word for a large stabbing knife.
I like the geometry of these blades. Interesting shape, seems good for thrusting and cutting.
The choora reminds me of a very large kitchen knife
Matt did British officers ever carry daggers or PeshKabz in action ?
How well does that cut/chop with that T-shaped cross-section? Can you show us some test cutting?
Hey Matt, I was thinking, could you maybe sometime talk about butted mail? From what I've seen in various tests (usually those low-quality fake tests, where they call it real medieval armour), butted mail seems almost useless. It almost looks like it isn't worth not only the expense, but also the added weight, so I wonder why some cultures used it (they obviously had a reason).
He talks about the subject in comment reply to Austin Howard, which I'll quote here:
"Butted mail is quicker and easier to make, but also you can more easily make smaller rings. Some of the Indo-Persian mail has really tiny rings that it would be almost impossible to rivet. Having such small rings brings extra strength which balances out the butted construction."
I enjoyed the Video Matt!
I’d love to see you cover a nation or region in general, or follow the development of non-western weapons. I love your use of technical terms like ‘choppy-choppy’ and ‘stably-stabby.’ 😉
Hi Matt i wanna thank you for your interest in Afghan weapons, most people on CZcams don't really talk about our swords or knives. I believe the Khyber Knife could be a descendant of the Scythian long knife; www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/ancient-viking-scythian-battle-knife-1928713284
They look strinkgly similar, what do you think? BTW, Afridis are Pashtuns or "Pathans" like you said and are hence Afghan. All the same people.
Is that T-cross section acting like a brake when cutting? Blade is going into flesh and than it stops, because it suddenly becomes much wider?
Always interesting. Thank you.
How useful it is, in my daily life, well, it is very interesting anyhow.
Hey Matt, really love your videos. In India/Pakistan/Afghanistan...
1. Chura/Choora = long dagger (for domestic or military use).
2. Chaqoo = small dagger.
3. Churi/Choori = smaller kitchen knives (kind of feminine version of Choora).
4. Khhan-ger = military grade dagger (but this term is archaic)
Interestingly a Wikipedia search for "Khyber Knife" directs you to the page for "Pesh-kabz" and goes on to state the "chura" is a slightly smaller version of the Pesh-kabz. Seems there is a lot of confusion and conflicting information around this.
Same confusion goes with a lot of weapons like rapier for example.
Hey Matt I was doing some research on feudalism and land grants in England and I came across the primary unit being the Hide. Which was mostly defined as the area of land that could support a single family unit or produce £1 in income annually. Now from what I read it said that every five hides was required to produce a single fully equipped fighting person. However it also said that a Knight would have about 50 hides so my question is what was this soldier and what would have been the kit he would’ve been expected to have had?
A spearman or, later a billman. Of my memory is good.
This is the content I like
I always wondered if you ever ran across any antique tuna swords.
The US special forces name for the Choora was 'BFK'.
I'll let you guess what that means.
Big fucking knife?
Black feathered kumbaya
Nuserame BBQ Filled K(C)hicken
i love the choora, it's my preferred weapon for a no rule of law situation. i don't have one yet, i was super tempted to buy the ultra-crappy, bud k catalog, no name brand "khyber bowie", but i came to my senses. i'd love to have an antique one.
Could you hold short and stabby behind the not-a-buckler offhand and long and choppy strong hand, as a dirk and targe kind of combination with a sword?
Asking for a friend.
Most targes I've seen had loops for the forearm, allowing for the gripping of a dirk. Matt's buckler appears to be center gripped, so you'd have to try and hold the shield and knife in the same hand together.
I’d love to see a video about Cumans and their weapons on your channel.
I hope you make a video on the yataghans you got
Greetings sir. Excellent video. I always knew the pesh kabz was curved and choora was straight. The big knife they only call it a khyber knife. Is that correct! Regards!
Interesting to see many examples of curved Pesh kabz outthere. An image search shows overwhelmingly pesh kabz when most of the museum examples I know have straight blades
A point on the mail: In Persia and India, there actually was a great deal of riveted mail, but what they did was similar to the early Romans and Celts and have alternating bands of butts and rivets to compromise between time spend forging and having decent mail. It's a real myth that Eastern mail is uniformly weaker than European mail, and really only true if you far east to the Philippines and Japan.
Do you have any info (origin, etc.) on the saber hanging behind you, between the rapier and the black buckler? I have one just like it, and would love to get a pointer to where I can search up some more info on it.
It's a French M1822 light cavalry sabre.
@@scholagladiatoria Thank you!
I saw that sword, as a competition on "Forged in fire" on the History Channel. It was not (as I recall) called what you're calling it, but it was the same weapon.
They called it 'charay' bizarrely.
@@scholagladiatoria cool. Thanks for correcting me. I love your channel.
@@scholagladiatoria now that I think about it, i think that wss what it was called.
One point of contention I would like to give from the account of that doctor is that he may be victim to survivor bias. Perhaps the reason he wasn’t seeing stab wounds in his care was that all the guys who were getting stabbed had already died before they ever got to him, thus preventing him from seeing them.
Pls do on how its weilded
Is choora the same as qama?
I would have loved to get a closer look at their grips from the side. It seems that both become gradually thicker to the bottom like the Yatagan (minus the extensions at the very end). This makes for a very secure grip for a chopping weapon, but it makes me wonder about the Pesh Kabz, because it would cause you to slip up to the blade, where the finger would bump into the protrusion similar to a kitchen knife. This can hurt a lot when stabbing bone, or even armour. A rondel dagger or katar would be much better regarding a secure grip and impact distribution.
If I would design a Khyber knife, I would make it closer to the Yatagan with a stronger S-curve in the blade and a more canted grip. That should improve the cutting even further and takes into account the T-crosssection. Moreover, you could still thrust with it.
Is there a chance that both weapons evolve out of the yataghan but used differently by different martial art schools? Like, maybe the Khyber knife's ancestor was designed for thrusting but when it was adopted by Afghans the locals favour mostly chopping motions.
I am Afghan i think i can answer this, the answer is no. The Khyber Knife is most likely ancient and derives from some form of knives or swords used in the region, most likely stemming from an Ancient Scythian long knife. Yatagan on the other hand related to Greek Kopis's and the only similarites they share is the eared handles which in turn originate from Central Asia.
this dagger looks like it can hunt wild boar 💯 I like British commando dagger but this particular one looks unique and awesome for self defense
We use the word "Choora" or "Choori" even today in India & Pakistan for a big knife like a butcher's knife.
doesnt pesh kabz have an unusually thick tip and just like pointy and not sharpened at the end?
Another Schola video watched en garde. Sound historical and martial information (to the best of my knowledge), as always
How big are they in inches
Great video as always! I was curious why the afghan's and perhaps others too, preferred butted mail to riveted. I've heard butted mail is kind of crap, and even that it's ahistorical, though those claims could simply be uninformed about people who had used it, or talking about a group of people who didn't ever use it in the referenced time period, so it's ahistorical in the sense that a native american didn't use a musket in 1490, but there were forces that did in that same time period.
Butted mail is quicker and easier to make, but also you can more easily make smaller rings. Some of the Indo-Persian mail has really tiny rings that it would be almost impossible to rivet. Having such small rings brings extra strength which balances out the butted construction.
@@scholagladiatoria thanks for that insight.
@@scholagladiatoria Pathan from India here, I have an ancestral Pesh Khab as you call it dating from the 17th century. We have always referred to it as Churra (dagger) feminine Churri(kitchen knife), is different. BTW pesh khabs were dipped in poison before engaging in combat.
You can still see people wearing and using pesh kabz. A friend of mine won a pesh kabz in a game of chess. Chess is a really popular game among the Pashtuns. They really like beating russians at chess and letting them know that you crushed a Russian master is a good way to get a smile :D
Do you knnow that a Pesh kabz is just an overly sharpened and wear down Chorra? You can see a similar blade pattern from old butcher knives, like a cook knive and a filleting knive.
Nihang Sikhs in india, punjab , I was in jalender district , called those daggers Choora also. I bought two at the time, specifically calling then Chooras . As this was what i believed they are called,he brought the shorter daggers out ? Interesting stuff thank you for the info.
On the subject of the 19th Century Afghans propensity for using chopping weapons as opposed to stabbing weapons, is it plausible that it wasn't so much that the wounds from pulwars and chooras were less lethal but that the quality and standards of trauma medicine in the region at the time was such that chopping wounds were in fact as lethal as stabbing weapons were in Europe?
There was a certain curse among old people in my country (Balcans) mainly addressed to an animals , it sounded like : O , MAY CHARA or choora STABS YOU!!! Or when something or someone was kind of injured or not visually hurt or ill but resulted with death they would say "it or he was choored or charred", so now I know where did it came from , actually I thought it was some kind of sickness, thanks .
Handsome looking weapons , like to have both these.
Love the dagger
Did Afganistan at this time have a prominent dueling culture? the choora and that buckler might make sense in duels as it wounds fairly brutally in a chop but isn't as lethal as stabbing.
Thanks.
What language does he speak?
I know I'm a bit late to the party but another term to be aware of is "karud", which I'm fairly sure is a modern collectorism rather than a historical term. You'll often see it applied to the type of straight Pesh-Kabz addressed in this video but I (and Peter Dekker of the Mandarin Mansion) believe this is most likely a corruption of the word "Kard", which of course denotes both a specific type of straight Indo-Persian knife and a Persian word meaning knife in the more general sense, and although it may have been used in Persian speaking communities in Afghanistan (Qizilbash, Hazara or Tajik among others) in the sense of generic knife, is more likely to be a modern term used by Western Collectors for what would historically in period be termed a Pesh-Kabz, the short stabby knife of the Afghans and related groups.
both of them are churra, the big one is called "ghata churra" and the dagger is called as " warra charra" Pushkar is more like a curve dagger without the T-Bone use only for draw cuts. both of them are great in stabbing as it wounds cannot be healed easily
But did they have khyber crystals?
Pakistan still produces really good muzzle loader rifles. All hand made from memory. Quite a fascinating video if You can find it.
Matt, could you do a review of the movie "The Man Who Would Be King" and take a look at what was done well or totally wrong? Afghan military history is quite rich from Alexander the Great to the British Empire and even to modern times.
Ok, showing my stoner side here but hashish (made from the living plant) is called Charas in that part of the world (and has been since before Hastings) . It was also a cash-crop in British India - being sold in gov't pharmacists.. Anyway, any chance it's like a machete equivalent? Be a good blade for harvesting tough hemp!?
Nope it’s strictly a sword, machetes are shorter and don’t have t spine edges
British troops operating in cold areas of India and its frontiers were issued poshteen, an example being the Tibet Expidition of 1903-1904 where the Royal Fusiliers who were sent wore them.
These are reminiscent of the early iron age sword they found at Hjortspring
Nice fam
I just did a Google image search for "choora sword" and approx 90% of the images shown were knives (or daggers) like the Push Kabz. Even if one doesn't know the difference between a choora and a Pesh kabz one might have the expectation that people would know a 12" blade or less is nor a sword.
Ive read of the clubbing of the musket being somewhat common till up to the american civil war as it was common to not attach the bayonet as it slowed down loading so if you were pushed into melee without time to put the bayonet on this was a common o shit tactic
In India we also call knives chura sometimes and the word shamshir is also used in Indian languages and poetry. More so in punjabi etc.
Looks very similar to a Saxon Seax that i own :O
I don't know, Matt. It looks to me like the Pesh Kabz is basically a Choora that has been sharpened nearly to death... ;-)
like Grandma's favorite paring knife
It still gets 🥶 in the 21st century 😳
I’ve always known it as a Kar !
In common languages of the nearby Punjab region , Choora = Knife (literal translation)
Chara is Pashto, it means Knife.
Matt, how sure are you that they are called "Choora"? Because I have red in a Book that they are called "Salawar Yataghan"
That is the Turkish name for them. Yataghan is Turkish. Choora is the word for knife in Afghanistan and a lot of India.
@@scholagladiatoria Ah OK, thanks for the answer!
Afghanistan: where empires go to die
If they just didn`t die in such high numbers, while they bury those empires... Sounds badass, but it is grim as Hell
British Empire didn't die in Afghan
I'd like to hear Janet street porter say the name used in Afghanistan and greater India.
I really think you need an Afghan input here.
The weapon you call a "Khyber Knife" is what we call "tura" in Pashto meaning sword. While the "choora" is what the Pashtuns have historically called the small Pesh-Kabz dagger. In fact, the word "choora" is an Indian corruption of the Pashto word "Chara" which simply means knife which was probably borrowed into North Indian languages from Afghan influence in the sub-continent. In Hindi, they say "Chaqo" for knife. I have also seen some rare 16th-17th century Khyber swords with guards and generally finished products while Victorian era Khyber's lack guards due to being mainly being unfinished products, during this time, Afghans preferred functionality over looks since it was the time of war and many were being made in a hurry. Oh and i don't see any relation to the Yataghan, i just don't see it, the Yataghan from my understanding was the knife of the Zeibeks who were incorporated into the Ottoman army after their Islamization and this weapon (which would later became a side arm for the janissaries) was adopted by the Ottomans as well. Other than hilt similarites, there is no relation at all.
Choora or Choori basically translates to any type of knife.