Naga Artifacts with Documents
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GUEST:
My grandfather was in the Air Force during World War II, and he flew the Hump Mission from India to dropping supplies off in China. And he was flying with Eric Sevareid and a bunch of other notables, and their left engine died so they all had to parachute over the Himalayan Mountains. And the headhunters had to help them walk to safety because there were no helicopters then, so they actually had to walk out 145 miles to the Air Force base.
APPRAISER:
And you have this great picture of Eric Sevareid.
GUEST:
This is my grandfather, and this is Eric Sevareid.
APPRAISER:
They went down in exactly the country where the Naga live, which is on the border of Burma and India. Now, this is a wonderful example of a Naga headdress which would have been worn by a warrior. And as you can see, it has age, which indicates that it has been worn and used. This is a headhunter's sword. This is also a nice example, and one of the things we look for is wear here, which indicates it's been handled and used. If this could speak, it would probably tell us a lot of bad stories, wouldn't it? Naga material as such really doesn't go for a lot of money. I mean, normally I would say a headdress like this would be, say, $500 to $700. I think that a sword like this, maybe $300 to $500. But what you have is a unique situation. You have all of this with documentation, and I think it would be worth $2,000 to $3,000.
GUEST:
Really? Wow.
APPRAISER:
Yeah, so I think it's a wonderful, wonderful collection.
Appraisal Details
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