Left hand dagger for comments

[fernando]

Thank you Jim, for your input; i know you fancy these cups .
I am not qualified to weave considerations on this sword by myself, but i feel comfortable with the seller/author description, as also judging by the examples i see out there within this range... despite this specific one being more a 'business' example and not one of those fully decorated (filed + perforated) luxury specimens commissioned to adorn nobility attires, like those in Wallace Collection.
I find the concavity for the thumb, to optimize controll and apply strength, a unequivocal sign that this example was made for actual fighting or say, battle.
The XVII century seems to be a consensual attribution to this example.
It appears that these daggers, as also cuphilt swords of this period, could also be of Italian origin but, this specific one, given the details like the 'sail' guard, the caged grip and its (dagger) immediate provenance, will be Spanish or, in an embracing mode, Peninsular.
It is registered that left hand daggers were already in use in the early XVI century ... Spaniards and Portuguese being strongly connected, both civilian and military.
Having said all the above, i will further ask you to take it all with a pinch of salt; i am only a humble amateur .
Attached, two woodcuts from the collection of Rainer Daehnhardt, one dated 1536 and the other 1612.


.