John's Dha / Darb

Dha are southeast asian swords from the golden triangle area. While most are commonly attributed to Burma they can be found many other places. In Thailand they are called Darb. There is little written about them as until recently Chinese and Japanese swords have gotten more attention. Many of these are well made. You can find examples with folded blades with active patterns. Some are differentially hardened. And a few are even sanmai (three plate) construction. Recently a typology system has began developing called informally the “Greaves-Winston system”. This landmark work will hopefully in the future allow us to classify these swords much the way Japanese swords are now. This system can be found here. Mark Bowditch's "Dha Index can be found here I would like to give special thanks to Ian Greaves, Andrew Winston and Mark Bowditch for all the information they have given me directly and indirectly through forum posting on Dha over the years.

Small Dha




this first small dha has been sold











My Sword page is here

My second sword page is here