This is a fantastic Blackfoot / Blackfeet Native American Indian dag fighting knife dating to the 19th Century. Provenance: Poulin's (James D. Julia) Auction, Ex-Paris, France private museum collection, sold in 2015 as circa 1850 by NAAC. The piece is of a very large, heavy, menacing size and the construction shows a thick, heavy blacksmith forged bastard rasp file with thick, raised medial ridge on one side, which is set and secured with poured bullet lead to a phenomenal quarter sawn oak, hardwood, beaver back paddle handle. The piece has a traditional heart beaver tail paddle hilt shape with incised forefinger rest and tapering angled gripping area, which ends with a rounded pommel end. Both sides of the knife handle show brass covered metal tacks; at the top is a heart with central dot, five-point line on each side, and six-point circle on each side of the round pommel end. The handle is quarter sawn oak, and the poured bullet lead securing it can be seen at the blade connection point on each side. The rasp lines have been forged flat but can still be seen, and the blade has a nice dark original coloring. Provenance: From the ex-collection of Ralph Parr of London, England, from the ex-private-museum collection of Historic Native American Artifacts and Weapons in Paris, France—sold by NAAC in 2015 as a Blackfoot circa 1850 example and found to be an authentic Native American dag knife by the experts at Poulin Antiques. Measures overall 17.75" L x 2 5/8" W. This is truly a fantastic 1800's examples. The front has a crack and one missing tack, which exposes the nice, rich, aged wood beneath, further lending to the piece’s early authentic age. This is one of the largest examples we have offered for sale.*