Lao Blades (Parang?)

[Okiegunner]

A little history on these blades...

My wife's brother is married to a Laotian lady. Her father brought these blades to the U.S. in the early 1970s.

They were forged and made by a local blacksmith near the village where he lived. Appears to me that they were probably made from leaf spring steel. They are fairly heavy blades and pretty darn sharp still, even in their current condition.

Based on some old photos it appears that they once had roundish handles about a foot long, either made from bamboo or wood.

I was thinking about doing a para-cord wrap on the handles and using them like a machete.

Are these parangs? My sister in law does not know and her father is now deceased.

Anyhow, I thought these were kind of cool. I have been soaking them overnight in Ballistol.

Hso, JShirley or Sam...You guys probably have a lot more experience with something like this. Can you identify these blades?

Thanks much

[Sam1911]

Those are very cool, but that's way outside my area of expertise. John and HSO will know for sure, though!

Certainly they seem that they'd work like, and fill the same role as, a parang, even if that shape denotes a slightly different form.

[JShirley]

Parangs can come in various forms. Like kukuris, they all have blade-forward balance.

Spring steel is perhaps the very best steel available for large blades in primitive places. It's not bad steel even for those of us who have a variety of good steels available.

John

[Sam Cade]

Aranyik sells a very similarly constructed chopper they call an e-toh.

Aranyik is Thai, not Lao but it is as close as I can get since I don't know much about SE Asian chopper typology




http://www.current.aranyik.com/2012/...ze-1-size.html

[Sam1911]

Wow, those are pretty cool! I wonder what the story is with the large vertical grooves on two of those. They look like artifacts of a previous purpose, i.e.: reclaimed material. Kind of like making a blade out of a W2 file, but on elephant scale!

[Sam Cade]

Originally Posted by Sam1911

Wow, those are pretty cool!

I know! So many blades! So little time!

Originally Posted by Sam1911

I wonder what the story is with the large vertical grooves on two of those. They look like artifacts of a previous purpose, i.e.: reclaimed material.

I've been wondering that myself.
They have an (image rich) Facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Arany...65373413480945

[Okiegunner]

Sam Cade...

Wow!! Very cool. Thanks for the info and pictures. E-toh, I'll research that.

Once again...thanks

[hso]

Ethnic chopper from Luang Prabang area of Laos from what I can dig up.

Posted in a motorcycle forum chronicling a ride through Laos.

[Okiegunner]

HSO...

Great pic!!

Thanks

[Sam Cade]

Originally Posted by hso

Ethnic chopper from Luan Prabang Laos

Dig the brass on the handles on the left side of the pile.

Those look are particularly handsome tools.

[hso]

One of our briefly posting members is a writer for one of the knife magazines and I vaguely remember him either posting a pic here or in the magazine of something much like that and that's what allowed me to run it down on the net (that and the Laotian connection).

I had thought golok, but goloks tend to be sharpened on the curved side and, as John pointed out, there are a lot of different parangs depending upon the application (as we can see from the displayed local products).