A Beautiful Vikingsword, 9th Century!

[Lee]

My own experience in examining a number of Viking Age swords is very much in concordance with Jeff's observations.

That 'stretched chevron' pattern is, indeed, unexpected in Viking Age material; I have had this nagging déjà vu that I had seen somewhat similar patterns somewhere in pre-Viking material and at last I have placed this memory with the Danish/N. German Roman Iron Age bog finds and confirmed it by reviewing the marvelous recently published (2006) catalog of the Illerup Ådal finds.

[Pukka Bundook]

Cornelistromp,

Are the upper and lower guards you show made of Iron?
From all appearances, they seem to be non-ferrous metal, as they show little sign of corrosion.
Jeff was speaking of iron hilts being decorated with inlay/overlay, and was not speaking of non-ferrous hilts as it is well known that such hilts often have designs cut/cast into them.

Some iron hilts Do show Light engraving, where they had originally a non-ferrous overlay, (Silver or whatever) then a design cut Through the overlay, into the iron beneath, to show contrast.
Such engraving appears lightly done, compared to the heavy designs on the non-ferrous hilts.

As always, if we use the words Never or Always,...we get into trouble!

Best wishes,
Richard.

[Matchlock]

Hello Richard,

It's good to hear of you, my friend, and to learn from your both carefully and well balanced terms as ever.

Best as always,
Michael

[cornelistromp]

Hi Richard,

you are right if I use the word never in a discussion with my wife, 9 of 10 times it means that Iam in serious trouble

re:carving in iron in high relief.
In the national museum in Helsinki are (plenty) viking Hilt examples of iron carving in high relief.

what we know and have seen in viking swords is only "the top of the iceberg" there must have been 100's of thousands of swords.
Unfortunately there are only a few % remaining for study, which are obviously far from representative of what was common in forging /patterns and of what was common in the use of certain type of decorations.

best,

[Pukka Bundook]

Michael,

I too am no expert on anything, and very far from it on Viking age swords!
It appears one must be something of a politician, and say lots and yet say nothing, to avoid being wrong!

Cornelistromp,

Do you see the wisdom in my words aboove? I can get into trouble so easily if I say much at all!
I must look at the iron hilts from Finland, and may learn something.

Thank you for the direction!

Richard.

[cornelistromp]

there is very interesting book published about central and eastern european viking swords;

early medieval swords from central and eastern Europe, dilemmas of an Archeologist and a student of arms. by Lech Marek
isbn 83-229-2624-3
beautiful, interesting and scientifically correct approach of technological aspects of the blade construction, blade forms, inscriptions and techniques invocations etc. very recommendable

best,

[Jeff Pringle]

It is true we have only a tiny percentage of the era’s product to admire! The artisans of the Viking age were subject to the same limitations of technology, whims of fashion and economic restrictions as the rest of us, so you can make some pretty concrete predictions about the 99% of swords we have NOT seen from the time. Just as you will not find a Viking sword with an aluminum hilt (technology not available), you can be pretty sure an iron one with relief interlace carving is not going to show up – although technologically feasible, it was not the fashion of the time or what the economics of the situation would favor, inferring from the ones that have survived.

A few Finnish examples of Viking age swords can be found here:
http://www.helsinki.fi/arkeologia/ra...t_viikinki.htm
Though the photos are woefully small, you can see they were using the same techniques as the folks further South to render designs in a slightly different style.