The exhibition of Cossack and samurai weapons from the Feldman Family Museum collection will open in Bogdan and Varvara Khanenko Museum of Art on March 11.
Ukrainian Samurai or Japanese Cossacks? Cossack sabre or samurai sword? The new exhibition of the International Charitable Foundation “Oleksandr Feldman Foundation” titled “The warrior’s way – one for two” provides the visitors with the unique opportunity to compare two, completely different for the first glance sociocultural phenomena – the Cossacks and the Samurais.
“Initiating the new historical and educational project, we are trying to demonstrate, first of all, the imperishable value of courage, honour, patriotism, devotion, and self-sacrifice in various cultures; and to testify the special place of Ukrainian Cossacks in the world history and the topicality of their heroic traditions for the present times,” the patron and the collector Oleksandr Feldman indicates the main idea of the project.
The whole exposition includes near 70 different samples of Cossack and samurai weapons. The Japanese weapons include widely known samurai long tachi and katana swords, short wakizashi swords, tantō and aikuchi knives, hachiwara dagger, yanone long arrowheads, as well as specific kinds of pole weapon, like nagamaki and naginata. The oldest represented Japanese blades were made in the first half of 15th century, when there were no Ukrainian Cossacks on the stage of history. The Cossack part of the exposition includes sabres, yataghans, knives, daggers, arrowheads and bear spears, axe-hammers, and pernaches, the oldest of which were made in the second half of 16th century. Among the Ukrainian-made objects, the special attention should be paid to the unique, oriental-type sabre dated by the end of 17th – the beginning of 18th century, the pernach from the second half of 17th century, and the silver belt from approximately the same time that could be owned by a Cossack colonel or even hetman.
In general, the exposition demonstrates certain similarity of Cossack and samurai weapons. The exhibition will be open from March 10 to April 30. It will also include lectures, open excursions and folk music evenings.
