Katar

Origins

The katar appears to have originated in South India, where the name kattari is found in Tamil and Kannada, and it was well established by the time of the Vijayanagara Empire in the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, whose temple carvings show warriors holding the characteristic crosswise grip. From the south it spread across the whole subcontinent. By the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was the dagger of Rajput princes and of the Mughal court, where nobles are shown in miniature paintings with a katar thrust through the sash — often a jeweled one, since it was as much a badge of rank as a weapon. In northern India it was also called the jamadhar, "death's tooth."

Design & Construction

The katar's grip is unlike any European dagger's. Two parallel side bars run back from the base of the blade, and between them are one or two crossbars that form the handle; the fighter closes his fist around the crossbars so that the blade projects forward from his knuckles in line with the forearm. The blade is usually short and broad at the base, tapering to a point that is often reinforced — thickened into a diamond or square section for the last inch or two — so that it will not bend when driven against mail. Many blades are fullered or ribbed, and some are forked or wavy. Variants include katars with a hand guard, katars whose blade opens into three when the grip bars are squeezed (the "scissors katar"), and katars fitted with imported European blades. The finest are chiselled, gilded or inlaid with gold koftgari work.

Combat Use

The katar was designed for close combat against armored opponents: because the thrust comes straight from the arm and shoulder, a fighter can put his full body weight behind the point and burst the rings of a mail shirt. It was often carried alongside a sword such as the Indian Talwar, as a weapon for grappling range, and some Rajput warriors fought with a katar in each hand. Contemporary accounts and paintings also show katars used by nobles in tiger hunts, a test of courage in which the hunter faced the animal on foot, though how often this was actually done rather than depicted is unclear. The side bars protected the wrist against a parrying blade and could trap an opponent's weapon.

Legacy

The katar is the best-known Indian weapon after the talwar and the Kukri, and it became a symbol of Rajput martial identity. It stayed in use and in ceremonial dress into the nineteenth century, and many were made purely as court jewelry. See Indian Arms & Weapons and Mughal Empire Arms & Weapons for the wider tradition. Collectors look for early South Indian katars, fine koftgari decoration and the rare mechanical scissors type; reproductions made for the tourist trade are common, and the thin blades and crude grips of these give them away.