Determining age is not something that a chemical sampling can do...unless there is a bit of trapped charcoal in there and that assumes the tree died when the blade was forged and was stuck in a bad weld and survived the thermal treatment of the steel........not likely.
I caution against saying any given blade is superior until tests are conducted.
One can say a shape is good or a weight or a balance, but just bending is not enough as to find the elastic limit the blade must be bent till it take a set and does not return true. To gain any information from the "flex test"...if we dare call it a test..one must bend under measurement to get numbers for the amount of force needed to bend to what angle. Anything else is merely stating "gee that blade bends well" which is nothing really.
If the blade is thin then it will flex and this shows nothing about its "temper" or quality for the steel.
I have seen some early European blades that were so thin the handle is 6" above a table surface before the tip comes off the table....they flex greatly under their own weight.
As to crucible steel or not:
Highly forged and welded bloomery steel can appear slag free and very clean to the eye. To determine slag content a sample must be viewed either on the blade via polishing In Situ or removed from the blade and done in a mounted fixture..
Please can you tell me where in your article you state weight and dimensions of the sword. I must have missed it.
I assume if it is not very heavy then it must be very thin. One must account also for the weight of the hilt..gold being heavy so in this case I would estimate weight of the blade via measurements off the blade and working out the volume from there.
I'd like to hold this sword and others in the Topkapi, but I do not think such would be allowed.
Ric
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