An extremely rare shasqua made by Eliarov Geurk, armourer to His Emperor's Majesty dating: second quarter of the 19th Century provenance: Tiflis Slightly curved, single-and false-edged blade, made of damask, the base finely engraved with laurel oak branches on gilt, micro-granulated ground; the first part of the back part features the signature "Е.И.В. ОРУЖЕЙНИКЪ ГЕУРКЪ " (His Emperor's Majesty Armorer Geurk) among floral motifs, on a black ground, then finely grooved and outlined. Massive, iron hilt decorated en suite, the grip framed with bands.Eliyarov Geurk Sarkisovich (Circa 1790-1855) was an illustrious armorer specialized in cold weapons featuring damask blades. He used to work in Tbilisi, Georgia. On May the 31st 1830 (approximately the period of the shasqua presented in our Auction) a set of damask arms were delivered to Saint Petersburg in order to be shown to the Tsar Nicholas I, who was so enraptured by their quality that he ordered to buy them for 160 ducats, a very conspicuous amount. After long negotiations, Geurk agreed to employ several masters from Zlatoust. On February 1831, the director of the Zlatoust arms factory sent the masters Basilio Yuzhakov, Karl Volfertsa, Dyatlov e Ivanov to Tbilisi. Geurk was formerly cited in a letter written by the Grand Duke Kostantin Pavlovich, who personally thanked the Colonel Yermolov for giving him a beautiful shasqua made by Gruev. Geurk is also cited in the poem "The Poet ", written by Lermontov in 1838. Nowadays, Geurk's arms are kept in important Russian museums such as the Hermitage, that houses two swords (3650 and 3108) and two daggers (3354 and 3300). Another sword is kept in the Dagestan Musem. We have no knowledge of private collections featuring Geurk's works. See also a picture of another shasqua made by Geurk with a very similar decoration. Provenance: A noble, Russian family. dimensions: length 92 cm.