What do we know? I mean really.

[Ed]

This thought has been with me for some time and I think that I actually posted something along these lines ages ago but I thought that it would be worthwhile to revisit the idea.

I will speak for myself here. My interests have tended to be in the time period 1400-1650 or so. 250 years. During this time, how many swords were produced? Millions, certainly. But 10 million? More? How about articles of armor? And of these, how many survived? 1% I doubt that. Maybe 1/10 of 1%? And which kinds were among the survivals? In other words, could you say that the survivals are representative of those objects whose population they were drawn from?

The reason I bring this up is that often I hear (particularly from my friends in the curatorial profession) that something "does not look right because we've never seen one before" or words to that effect. So a certain foliation decorative element is "never seen before the 15th century". Fine and good, but what is such a judgement based on?

The fact is that we really don't know what the range of decoration or other embellishments or even the form of weapons might actually be for the period in question. The sample that we have is vanishingly small and is almost certainly not representative of the those objects in use at the time. By representative, I mean a sample randomly drawn. They aren't.

I am not a nihilist saying that we can know nothing, rather I am suggesting that we should not be too quick to dismiss an object because it is not contained, in it's precise form, in our references.

Of course, we have documentary evidence, from the arts, particularly manuscripts. I think that manuscripts have their own problems and have resulted in fantasies gaining traction (the massive and silly repro of the gun shown in the Milemete Manuscript comes to mind) but they do form a useful part of our intellectual corpus.

I am interested in knowing your thoughts.

[Roland_M]

Ed,

This artist might be interesting for you (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albrecht_D%C3%BCrer).

He was one of the most talented painter in the late medieval period and he made tons of drawings and paintings which are very realistic.
He also made hundreds paintings of war or soldiers with extremely good views of the weapons of this period.

I have one book full of knights, soldiers and edged weapons from him: "Albrecht Dürer - Waffen und Rüstungen" (Albrecht Dürer - arms and armor)
I added one painting from 1498.


Roland

[cornelistromp]

Originally Posted by Ed

The reason I bring this up is that often I hear (particularly from my friends in the curatorial profession) that something "does not look right because we've never seen one before" or words to that effect. So a certain foliation decorative element is "never seen before the 15th century". Fine and good, but what is such a judgement based on?

.

it is based on nothing.

in those rare cases when some self-appointed specialist tells me that he has never seen it before, I Quote Oakeshott:

"that you have never seen it, means absolutely nothing unless you have seen them all, those hundreds thousands of swords"

and of course this is the truth, it means absolutely nothing that an individual has seen something never before, In most of the cases, it does not mean that it is not possible.

best,
Jasper

[Sancar]

"History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon." - Napoleon Bonaparte

[Bob A]

Originally Posted by Sancar

"History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon." - Napoleon Bonaparte

History is also the story of conflict written by the winner.

That said, there is documentation available, written by interested or uninvolved third party sources, which is subject to cross-checking by those knowledgeable in that art.

The siege of Troy was long thought to be mythic, until the actual site was found and excavated. (Of course, Homer knew the tale as reality. But even that is problematic; my Greek teacher told me that those epics were not written by Homer, but by another Greek with the same name.)

We can only approximate historical truth - even the immediate and contemporary is open to question; see today's newspapers. But making an honest effort is always worthwhile, and can be informative in many dimensions, some quite unexpected.

I personally have little experience in the subjects under study here, but even a few years' exposure has brought me to a point where I can detect the more obvious errors and anomalies. There's more than a little merit in long experience, but a thoughtful examination of the source of data, and a certain skepticism, is part of the process.

Those are my thoughts. I doubt they'll contain answers, but that wasn't the object of the exercise, of course.

[Marcus den toom]

Just thought about this and i think that style is mostly a luxury which is abandoned during times of war. Only the functionality matters with weapons, so any gun could differ. Also the maker's age adds to the stylistic variations, Michael once wrote about this as well.

This is, i guess, mostly true for the late gothic/early renaissance and onwards.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by Ed

This thought has been with me for some time and I think that I actually posted something along these lines ages ago but I thought that it would be worthwhile to revisit the idea.

I will speak for myself here. My interests have tended to be in the time period 1400-1650 or so. 250 years. During this time, how many swords were produced? Millions, certainly. But 10 million? More? How about articles of armor? And of these, how many survived? 1% I doubt that. Maybe 1/10 of 1%? And which kinds were among the survivals? In other words, could you say that the survivals are representative of those objects whose population they were drawn from?

The reason I bring this up is that often I hear (particularly from my friends in the curatorial profession) that something "does not look right because we've never seen one before" or words to that effect. So a certain foliation decorative element is "never seen before the 15th century". Fine and good, but what is such a judgement based on?

The fact is that we really don't know what the range of decoration or other embellishments or even the form of weapons might actually be for the period in question. The sample that we have is vanishingly small and is almost certainly not representative of the those objects in use at the time. By representative, I mean a sample randomly drawn. They aren't.

I am not a nihilist saying that we can know nothing, rather I am suggesting that we should not be too quick to dismiss an object because it is not contained, in it's precise form, in our references.

Of course, we have documentary evidence, from the arts, particularly manuscripts. I think that manuscripts have their own problems and have resulted in fantasies gaining traction (the massive and silly repro of the gun shown in the Milemete Manuscript comes to mind) but they do form a useful part of our intellectual corpus.



I am interested in knowing your thoughts.

Ed, I have read your post several times. What do you mean? Your text wobbles between an affliction with numbers and a peculiar concept of what is art......and the meaning of life? I met someone once who was cursed by numerical progression; He would go to the desert and count palm trees and arrive at an equation the square root of which was equal to the number of grains in a level teaspoon full. He was crackers. Psychology certainly plays its part in all walks of life, however, I have seldom seen reference to it on these pages...

I cannot see where this fits on the weapons pages although you could achieve better traction on Ethnographic Miscellania thus I suggest that could be more appropriate.

[Jim McDougall]

It does seem that expounding on a specialized study of art, weapons or anything for that matter from a historical standpoint using philosophical approach can of course be frustrating as perspectives and ideas are exchanged. It gets far too deep as there are few boundaries or guidelines for subjectivity.
This kind of discussion could go on ad infinitum, without any sound addition to our understanding or knowledge on weapons here, though it is fascinating to see these studies in serious consideration.

I think a remarkable study in the analysis of history, in a wide range of applications, is "After the Fact: The Art of Historical Detection", by Davidson & Lytle, Knopf, 1982.

I think this discusses responsible and logical approaches to serious study of historical matters, whether tangible items or analysis of events or persons.
I think most of us recognize the need for cross checking and developing accurate and supported data as we study items. These methods need not be 'academic' as far as protocol, but primarily and simply common sense and prudent study.

An interesting topic, but not sure where it leads beyond attracting a lot of essays on the philosophy of studying arms, which seems a matter of personal preference.

[Ed]

I think that you are reading too much into what I am saying.

To strip the argument to it's bare bones, when we say that a piece is "good", ie authentic, based on hard evidence, we are probably correct.

When we say that a piece is "bad" ie fake/repro, based on a lack of examples, we are on thin ice since our sample base is woefully inadequate to claim that it is representative.

[Jim McDougall]

I think that when evaluating an item, one has to keep somewhat an open mind and naturally use known comparable items, and consider viable reasons for any deviation or variation in its character. In addition to visual comparisons which correspond to provenanced examples or otherwise detailed support, there has to be physical or 'forensic' examination.

We cannot (in my opinion) disclaim an item or elements of its character based on absence of similar examples or style etc.
The thing is about 'how much we know' is, that our core of knowledge in various areas and fields of study is ever increasing. That is why research never ceases. We are never complacent in holdings of data, as these can often be further supported and proven, or equally disproven. In such cases further research might be seen as , to know what something is, sometimes we have to qualify what it isn't, in an oblique perspective.

The purpose of discussions we have, again in my opinion, is to present and exchange ideas and information, bringing together as much data as possible for evaluation. We all have areas of specialty and experience in a broad scope of subject matter. Bringing these together in venues such as ours makes it possible for the advancement of the knowledge in many areas.

It is a difficult and sensitive thing to cast dispersions on an item, and declare it a fake or reproduction, and those kinds of assessments should be carefully worded and explained. I really don't think most would be as cavalier as to dismiss an item as such simply because they had not seen one like it before.
Such an admission would only reveal, depending on the persons expertise, the fact that they had not, but gauged on their experience might be more or less compelling.

Too many collectors insist on neat and concise classifications, and in my view, items may often fall 'outside the box' , so one should carefully qualify such exceptions accordingly.

Those are my thoughts.

[ulfberth]

Hi Ed,

If I hurt your feelings I'm really sorry, It was not my intend, all I meant that I never seen this type of blade before was just that, I never stated any conclusion to it that is was bad, I could just as well be understood that its rare.
The facts ( what we do know so far ) is I asked for other forum members If they had more info on this type of blade, that does not seem like someone who has drawn any conclusion but rather someone who wants to learn more. Lee is the only one who answered, other than that I have seen no photos of similar blades, so it must be a rare deviation.
I really think its sad that there is such a fuzz for just admitting my lack of experience on this type of blade ( not seeing it before ) is so misunderstood, the message after this no topic is however very well understood.
And self appointed experts what do we know about them? Well the fact is as Michael always said , there is no school were you can study antique arms, therefore all experts are self proclaimed or appointed by other people that are self appointed experts themselves, so this whole point of debate is pretty pointless, which brings me back to the original question, " what do we really know" perhaps ...... Its also good to ask ourselves "what do we really want to know and what not"

kind regards

Ulfberth