I suspected as much, but very much appreciate your input!

A walking cane should be fine, as this is a “free” application where there really isn’t any consequence if the wood moves in one direction a little bit. That’s a lot different than a cabinet door where even a 1/8″ move could be noticeable.

we have african black wood and gabon ebony too in egypt small lumber

Are you familiar with the scent of ebony when being worked? Aside from this, you’d probably need to look at the end grain portion, though it’s too bad there doesn’t appear to be any sapwood, as it can be easier to see the anatomy in the sapwood portions — otherwise everything tends to just look black on black.

Thank you for your time and this great database!

Bert
Birdmanknives

No, they are not. The vertical lines are rays and the horizontal lines are parenchyma bands.

Might be blackwood. I have some similar Makonde carvings from Mozambique. Those carvers are usually very economical with the wood, so that they minimize the carving waste. The closer you get to the sapwood in the tree, the lighter the wood gets to where the actual sapwood is a cream color. if the various projections on the carvings are lighter than the areas deeper in the log, it’s probably blackwood.

Any idea about this wood

Thanks

It doesn’t look dark enough to be blackwood or ebony. Possibly leadwood?

I live in Australia and mill blackwood logs on a regular basis, and can say that that is definitely not Australian blackwood.

Are you confusing Acacia melanoxylon with some other wood species? Despite its name, Australian blackwood isn’t really black.

Appears to be either African or Australian Blackwood (Dalbergia melanoxylon or Acacia melanoxylon) judging by the large ratio of heartwood per total area of the cross section. There are other Families that produce genus and species that also have a similar appearance to the specimen in the picture, but this much heartwood volume stands out.

Ebony is so dense it does not float, so it’s unlikely that a piece ended up on a beach. However, its distinctive odor when milled could more positively identify it.

For woods like this, I would really be looking at the lighter colored sapwood to make out the anatomical details. Based on what I can see, I can’t make out any banded parenchyma, which would rule out ebony. This is of course assuming that your photos are in adequate enough detail to see the bands in the first place. There’s a chance that they could be there but the photo just isn’t sharp enough to show them. You would need to finely sand the endgrain and try to get an even closer pic of the lighter colored portion.

Also keep in mind that the endgrain of many dark brown woods can appear black as the endgrain just tends to be darker than the face grain in general. I’d be curious to see if you have any sawn/opened pieces with the face grain visible.

Not sure if these pics are clear enough. It looks rather dull black.