War and Military Atlas

How Battles Were Fought
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Weapons System

Karambit

Medieval

The karambit is a small curved knife shaped like a claw, believed to have originated among the Minangkabau people of West Sumatra, Indonesia, where folklore holds it was inspired by the claws of a tiger. It began as an agricultural implement used to rake roots, gather threshings and plant rice across island Southeast Asia before being weaponized, its curved blade sharpened to maximize cutting potential and carried as a last resort weapon when a soldier's primary arms were lost in battle. Trade networks carried the karambit beyond Sumatra into Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Facts
Weapon Class
Weapon Class (category)
Sword / Polearm / Bladed 1
Classification
Service Status
Retired 1
Weapon Class
Curved knife 1
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Karambit
  • Lead paragraph
    a small curved knife resembling a claw
  • Weapon class classified from the entity's own sourced description text.
  • Weapon class (sword-polearm-blade) is a pre-industrial/melee weapon type by its own nature per the entity's own sourced description text; not carried in current active military service.
View the Source
Wikipedia: Karambit
Wikidata: Karambit
Wikidata Q286374, class allow-list match (w-wdresolver-0926)View the Source
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