# Communities > Antique Arms & Armour Community > Middle-East, India & Africa (MEIA) >  how is koftgari done

## David Lewis Smith

how does one do it?

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## Emanuel Nicolescu

Hello David,

There are different types of inlay methods known as koftgari. One is deep inlay where a pattern is incised into the blade and thick wire is hammered into the undercut grooves. The other, traditional koftgari, consists of crosshatching the pattern into the surface and drawing patterns over it with a sharp implement, and hammering thin wire into it. The last is golf/silver foil hammered onto a crosshatched surface. I think this is what is most often seen, as it was the most affordable method. 
In some cases the pattern can be punched in and the gold applied to the dotted pattern.

Cheers!
Emanuel

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## Sandeep Singh

Hi,
Koftgari is not an inlay art its an overlay art because the gold/silver wire is pressed on crosshatching by a tool
Its really a long process to do that art and it cannot be explained verbaly.
In India, three types of koftgari art done which are......

*Te-hen-shah work*- its an inlaid art in which gold/silver is hammered on the deep chisseled design, you cant feel the gold/silver on the iron as we can see in teh-tula work

*Koftgari work* - its an overlay art which is done by pressing gold/silver wire by special tool on crosshatching and then its heated and pressed by a polish hakik stone ( not normal stone is use). In this also you can feel gold/silver

*Teh-tula work* - its also a kind of overlay art in which we can feel gold/silver work on the objects, they just seems embosed work, its really hard to find this work.

In India Koftgari art still exists but no idea about the other two art it may be lost

I hope my little knowledge would help this forum and i m sorry if i make any mistake, please coperate with me as i am new to this forum

Sandeep

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## David Lewis Smith

First let me welcome you to Sword Forum Sandeep.  We have many artist here and it is always great news that another artist has joined us.

Second thank you very much for the clarification of types.   I have been collecting swords from north Africa, the Arab Peninsula, Iran, Afghanistan and parts of India for years now and really love the work.  

The reason I asked is I am considering a project of making a 'modern' Saif, shamshir or tulwar.  I have not decided yet on what type of sword hilt I am going to do but there is a company that sells Tulwar hilts that are fairly inexpensive as well.  It would be more interesting to learn and then build the hilt guard my self though.  Anything you wish to post here would be fine, and we Love photos of peoples work

Regards
David

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## Manouchehr M.

Thanks for your input and welcome to SFI.

Regards
Manouchehr

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## Sandeep Singh

Thanks to members for allowing me to post my photos.
Few times back i have prepared one yellow and green colour gold koftgari handle in floral and creeper design and butterflies too on both sides
I hope you all will enjoy the handle's pictures
Sandeep

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## David Lewis Smith

beautiful work, 

exactly the type of work that i need to finish a project I have in mind

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## Sandeep Singh

Hello Moderators,

Can i take pictures from this forum to give an example for Teh Thula work???

I have found the pictures in this forum
 and link is 

http://forums.swordforum.com/showthr...light=inlaying

i hope this link will work out here

Thanks

Sandeep

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## David Lewis Smith

> Hello Moderators,
> 
> Can i take pictures from this forum to give an example for Teh Thula work???
> 
> I have found the pictures in this forum
>  and link is 
> 
> http://forums.swordforum.com/showthr...light=inlaying
> 
> ...


of course you can
That is really remarkable work

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## Sandeep Singh

Thanks David,

The Hilt i am showing is very good example of Te-hen-shah work or inlay art.
In this process deep (not much deep) chisseled carving is done in floral and creeper design or any design by a special pointed chisseld tool then gold is hammered on that deep chisseled designs, the gold is fixes deeply in that design and then its might be heated and rubbed by stone to fixes the gold/silver completely as i do in koftgari.
I might be wrong in the ending process because i have not seen anyone doing this art at present in India but what i am concluding is might be right as i m artist too, so i can feel that they would have done this ending process through this process only.


Here the example of Teh-Thula, its a persian Pesh Kabz.
You can clearly see the embossed gold overlay on its blade, in this case very thick gold wire is used and the gold wire is hammered on the surface of crosshatching. I dont no how this process ends in fixing the the gold on crosshatches.
I will try to put some more pics of this art

The similiar (not same) type of Teh Thula was done in mewar region, in this case not much thick gold is used.
I also have attached the pic of dagger with mewar style koftgari work.
This mewar style koftgari is as same as new koftgari, only difference is that they use thick wire and we use thin wire.

I hope through this description, we are now able to differentiate between inlaid and overlay art.

I would be more happy, if somebody come across with the ending process of these arts or have any experiences with these lost techniques

Whatever i have described is what i know.

I am sorry, if i makes any mistake. I am always scared to make any mistakes while expressing my art knowledge. So, please once again coperate with me

Thanks

Sandeep :Smilie:

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## David Lewis Smith

you were very clear and we appreciate you sharing your knowledge and art with us. 

Could you post photos of your tools, or photos of your work in progress, ?

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## jeff Pringle

Awesome work there, Sandeep!  :Cool: 

David - 
It is kinda hard to find much info on the specific techniques used in koftgari, by searching that name; however the basic process of overlaying silver or gold wire & sheet onto a cross-hatched ground of harder metal is almost universal, and there are some good descriptions of the method. 
Theophilus, in "On Divers Arts" (German, 1120AD) describes a machine for cutting the ground as well as the technique of applying the metal. It is also described in Oppi Untrachts tome Jewelry - Concepts and Technology, and there are some websites with info on the Japanese and Korean variants of the technique, with movies of the process in the two Japanese pages- 
Higo/ numone zogan
http://www.kougei.or.jp/english/crafts/0813/f0813.html
Another - 
http://www2.edu.ipa.go.jp/gz/y-kwm/y-gkg/y-ghn/IPA-tac490.htm
Movie of pressing the metal into the crosshatching:
http://www2.edu.ipa.go.jp/gz/y-kwm/y-gkg/y-ghn/y-chn8.mpg
Keum-Boo
http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/keumboo.htm

The main difference between all of the above and Indian-style koftgari is the use of a chisel to do the cross hatching, I think in the mideast and India it is more common to use a needle to scribe the lines in, though I have seen old blades from Iran/Afganistan that were chiseled. A friend of mine, who apprenticed in Germany as a blacksmith, was shown how to do it with a steel needle, so they must have forgotten Theophilus machine (which uses a chisel) over there.
It is not the easiest craft to get right off the bat, but you could get the hang of it with a little perseverance. Getting the metal to stick consistently is the initial issue, then cleaning up the lines and erasing the cross hatching between them without messing things up can pose challenges  check out the websites and let me know what you think.  :Smilie: 

Jeff

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## Sandeep Singh

Thanks Jeff  :Smilie: 

Here i am attaching my pic doing the koftgari with silver wire and i have also attached the pics of my tools.
I do this art by hand's only , i dont use any machines.

Thanks
Sandeep

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## David Lewis Smith

Thank you for sharing that Sandeep, thats marvelous.  
I will have a pm for you this week, it got busy hear for a while.

Thanks again for sharing

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## Greg T. Obach

thank you for showing

seeing the tools of the craft is wonderful...   
you do very cool work.. !!

thanks again
Greg

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## MumtazB

Nice pics Sandy!

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## Manouchehr M.

Sandeep

Impressive work.  Thank you very much for sharing it with us here.  Would you please open up a new thread and show us different pieces of your work?  Do you also do inlaying?

Regards
Manouchehr

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## David Lewis Smith

Sandeep that would be very nice with a thread of your work, and art

Thanks in advance!!

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## s.taak

sandeep, My name is Surinder Singh (Sid) and hopefully I will be coming to India in November this year from the U.K, It would be great to see your workshop and what you make. I have a few antique pieces and would like to extend my collection as I practice the Sikh art of Gatka. :Smilie: 

Hi, to everyone on this forum.

O lord of thee these boons I ask,
Let me never shuna righteous task,
Let me be fearless when I go into battle,
Give me faith that victory will be mine,
Give me power to sing thy praise,
And when the time to end my life,
Let me fall in mighty strife.
                    ( Guru Gobind Singh)

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