Found a khukhuri I thought I'd lost

[Owd Wullie]

Guess I ought to thank MB. I was digging through the attic archives in search of some totally unrelated stuff and this darlin' showed up.
Had a bunch of these at one time. Thought all had been given away or lost. Pleasantly surprised to find this one. Bought in the '70's for 3 or 4 bucks a piece (if you bought ten as I recall) Don't even remember where I bought 'em from nowadays. Old age creepin up on me I guess. CRS syndrome.

Anyway still in the grease and plastic bag as was shipped.




Don't know if this is a "real" MOD mark or a facsimile thereof.


It's a hand full. As I recall we beat the s... out of several of these after we got 'em. They held up pretty good.

Enjoy,
Willie

[knifemaker3]

Cool old knife Willie! I remember seeing an article years ago in Blade about some dude overseas making them things out of old car leaf springs. Then he used them for everything. That was when the big kurki craze was on and everyone was buying, selling, or making them things. In the hands of someone who knows how to use them they are very effective tools.

Thanks for sharing! Glad to see you finally got some rain down your way.....

[Miller Bro's]

That one looks like it was military issue You stole it Willie

[philco]

I'm curious about the two notches in the blade near the handle. Anyone know what they are there for ?

Wullie, glad you found it. Like getting a new one for free............almost.

Phil

[jerryd6818]

Do you suppose that arrow mark is the British MoD acceptance mark? It kinda looks like it. There was a bunch of crappy Pakistani made khukuris floating around back in the day. This one looks to be very well made.

Excerpt from Wikipedia -
"A popular legend states that a Gurkha "never sheathes his blade without first drawing blood" (this is said to be what the small, sharp notch on the blade near the handle is for: in case you wanted to draw your kukri for a non-militant purpose, and needed to draw blood before sheathing your knife. You could scrape your thumb on the notch, draw blood, and sheathe your knife without breaking tradition)."

Edited to add:
"Kukri blades usually have a notch (kauda, kaudi, kaura, or cho) at the base of the blade. Various reasons are given for this, both practical and ceremonial: that it makes blood and sap drop off the blade rather than running onto the handle; that it delineates the end of the blade whilst sharpening; that it is a symbol representing a cow foot, or Shiva (Brigade of Gurkhas). The notch which also signifies teats of cow have another very strong implication. You may kill, cut or chop any animal by a khukuri but never a cow which is revered and worshipped as goddess by all Nepalese."

[Owd Wullie]

It's supposed to be the MOD mark. I posted a pic of this on another board and one gent said it was a MK III.

I was hoping that S-K or one of the UK guys with more knowledge of the MOD stuff than I have might weigh in.

[jerryd6818]

I have to admit my knowledge is limited to what I have learned from this website - http://www.gotavapen.se/gota/artiklar/fs/fs_knife1.htm

That said, here are a few pictures of MoD acceptance marks I stole from the aforementioned website. Keep in mind, these are all pictures of WWII broad arrows and I don't have a clue if they've changed over the years or how they've been used since WWII. I'm just a babe in the woods when it comes to this stuff. Maybe a trip to British Blades is in order (unless that's where you got the information about the MKIII).

Doesn't it make you wonder if the DD-64 stands for Department of Defense 1964? Of course it's British so it could stand for Dangerous Dolittle the 64th.