Seeking Help with Excavated 1728 Pattern Bilbo Sword

[G. Mansfield]

I recently received this sword of which is outside of my normal collecting area. Without having any idea of what kind it was, I later gathered that it likely fit the 1728 Pattern Spanish cavalry sword profile. The sword is in excavated condition, missing most of its components such as the hilt, pommel, and shell guard. The blade has an old break around presumably the halfway point of its original length and the edged are littered with contact slits and rolls. After researching some of the type, I had gathered a few questions that I would like to present here. Maybe others can add some information.

Firstly, of all the examples that I have seen either have two or four screw holes to mount the guard. With the examples with four holes, the holes are located in pairs on only two sides, opposite of each other. On this example, the holes are located at one each of the four sides. As this seems irregular, is this actually a pattern 1728, or a local version of the form?

Secondly, I would like to know more about this rapier blade. Many examples are sourced Solingen trade blades or Toledo, ect. I could not locate another one with this type of maker marks or motifs. If I remember correctly, I have seen similar marks before which thought to be Italian, but I cannot find the source of that.
I understand that these were popular from the late 17th to late 18th centuries and made in various styles with different mounted blades, sometimes much earlier blades than the hilt. They were exported to many European countries and was very popular with naval units and privateers alike, especially in the colonial period of the New World.

Whether true or not, it was stated by the seller that this sword was found in Martinique in the 1950’s by the seller’s wife’s grandfather when he was working as an engineer there. It was approximately two feet deep in sand and this is all that was found, without locating any of the other components of the sword. It had been in that family for the past 70 years. If anybody could add anything about the type, I would greatly appreciate it.

Geoffrey

[fernando]

Unusual (not rapier) blade decoration, apparently not seen in these swords ? Could it have previously been mounted in a different type of sword ? .
Paging the connoisseurs .

[JoeCanada42]

this sword looks and seems amazing to me, looks like the sword got a tattoo somewhere exotic, to me looks like spiders or ants transporting eggs..

[fernando]

Originally Posted by JoeCanada42

this sword looks and seems amazing to me, looks like the sword got a tattoo somewhere exotic, to me looks like spiders or ants transporting eggs..

Is that what you see, Joe ? Weird !

[JoeCanada42]

I know right... but I am being honest.
what do you see first glance?
aside from the fleur de Lis on top.
(the fleur de Lis looks to me, a little zoomorphic like an, Aso)

[fernando]

We all have different eyes; some more imaginative than others !

[toaster5sqn]

There appears to be the remains of a pean at the end of the tang suggesting that the tang is complete. This suggests that the guard is not original to the blade since the shell mount doesn't fit over the ricasso and the remaining tang behind the quillons is far to short.

Robert

[Radboud]

I agree with Robert; the blade doesn't belong to this guard. In the examples, I've seen the ricasso (in the correct meaning of the term) is straight-sided and there is a secondary shoulder where the tang goes into the grip:

[G. Mansfield]

Thank you for your thoughts. The tang in total is about 5" where 2" is riccaso and the remaining 3" of grip/pommel. This does seem short, too small for me use but somebody with smaller hands possibly. What about the other irregularity with the location of the screw holes? Could this be a French/ Dutch replicated guard in the pattern 1728?

Geoffrey

[toaster5sqn]

That's not a riccaso, it's just all tang. Remember there should be approx 1 1/2" of pommel on the end (the same length as is thinned down to round cross section at the end of the tang). If you replace the guard with a simple cross you will find the grip length is about perfect.

Also the slot in the guard should match the cross section of the blade at whichever step it ends but it's way to big for the tang and not big enough to go over the blade.

Robert

[Radboud]

I'm sorry, but that blade and guard do not belong together. If you look closely at the 1728s I posted, their ricassos are clearly defined and properly finished.

The entire tang of your blade has a raw finish as if it was never intended to be seen.

[fernando]

As firstly suspectd that hilt and blade had different origins (2#) and now well established, we might speculate that, the person that digged both items would have found them in the same location but separated one from the other; could then infer that they would be originally set together (or not) and join them as if they so were.
Notably the blade would (also) deserve some ID; it sure is a peculiar and genuine early item... wouldn't you guys agree ?

[Jim McDougall]

Fernando, that is a perfectly stated forensics perspective , and of course entirely plausible. I agree that this blade is a most unusual example of these early arming sword blades, and would warrant a look into other examples to compare. The decoration of course has nothing to do with makers marks but is filling aesthetic as often seen on colonial weapons.

It would seem there might be a reason for the apparent incongruity of these two contemporary sword components, which seem of comparable age and circumstantial consistency. In the colonies, weapons were constantly being reworked to maintain serviceability, and it is well known that large numbers of blades alone were part of the commerce aboard trade vessels. I know of numbers of wrecks in these areas in which boxes of blades were found, and of the period suggested for this sword (or paired components as it were). This is of course c. 1690s into years of 18th century.

I had thought that possibly the blade and guard component were perhaps in the process of being assembled at the time they were deposited into location perhaps during the volatile weather events known in these Caribbean regions. The thing is that the blade is clearly not one which would be in such process as it is broken and has marks of very rough existence already, not a pristine blade being used in remounting .

This suggests the blade was already mounted at the time it was broken, and perhaps the disassembly here was work in progress? The open screw holes seem to suggest that, typically there would be some residue of at least one instead of cleanly empty holes.

The fact that the aperture in the guard plate reveals disparity in the two components goes to the fact that it was necessary to use whatever was available, not necessarily exact matches in these colonial settings.
I have a sword from Mexico fashioned from components of three entirely different swords, and congruent fit was hardly a concern.

Possibly whatever components that once were with the sword were fabricated in this manner, and now gone, there is no way to know what the assembled sword looked like.Often these kinds of 'assembled' swords have been dismissed by purist collectors as put together by innovative sellers etc. But it would seem that such 'fabricated' efforts would at least try to approximate the sword as in original state.

It is certainly a mystery, which is in my view, the joy of studying items like this which come from such colorful periods in history. Though the 'story' of course is always in question, this one seems perfectly plausible as in the 1950s many of these Caribbean islands were relatively quiet and not heavily traveled.

It is well known that the dynamic storm activity in the Caribbean has often brought items up from wrecks on the sea bed, notably coins etc. and deposited them on beaches. In the same manner, items on beachfront can be moved about, and remarkably these two pieces remained in proximity. If the man who found them looked further, possibly the shell guard and pommel might have been found, perhaps not.

This sword (or components of it) in my view should be deemed as together with reason, not exception, and more research on the most complete item, the blade, should be carried further. While these blades with this section were present through the 18th century as 'dragoon' blades, notably on the so called M1728, later M1769 Spanish arming swords (called bilbo by the English)....these hilts and blades existed some time earlier, and likely into 17th c.
The hilt style itself evolved from North European 'pappenheimer' rapier hilts which evolved into heavier bladed swords like this deemed arming swords.

[fernando]

The more intriguing is that Martinique, independently from its location in the Caribe, is and has been " so French as France itself ". Discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1502 Martinique, having become a French colony in 1632, never changed hands again, apart from a couple of brief English invasions in the early 19th century.
So, it doesn't make it any easy to assume that someone dug out a Spanish guard from the sands in French Martinique, specially considering that no combats with the Spaniards are registered to have taken place over there. Neither it is probable that the French imported trade blades, much less 1728 cavalry swords, from the Spanish.
But of course, all is possible.

[Jim McDougall]

Exactamundo Fernando! To say these things are complex is a vast understatement!
Think of the 'Spanish ' cuphilt.....while popularized by the Spanish, to the point of cliche', these were often made in Italy (particularly Brescia, Milan), and in limited degree some were German. I have for example one from c.1640, of Milanese style (per Boccia & Coelho) but I know the provenance, and it was found in France. It had clearly been where it was found for a very long time.

I discovered that there were a group of Milanese swordsmiths who had gone to France, near Lyon, in this time in the 17th c. Spain and France were essentially under 'Bourbon' rule, and is not beyond reason that the cuphilt remained in favor in some degree in France, though of course not as well known.

France had already moved toward 'faster' fighting swords, hence transitional rapiers, into the small sword/epee.

France did not have the kinds of major blade making centers such as Solingen, though makers from there situated in locations such as would later become Klingenthal. Toledo had revitalized its sword industry in Toledo by 1760s, and were producing swords by 1770s. These arming blades (I believe you called the cross section dos mesas?) were made there by then.

This blade is likely from c. 1690s, and in that time Solingen was of course producing blades that were not only for Spain, and its colonies, but went to France, Netherlands etc. the typical port of departure was Rotterdam, or more well known Amsterdam. This is why these locations were deemed the arms center of the world, they dispersed all over from there.

However many Spanish blades still were made in locations other than the defunct Toledo in the 17th c. Barcelona, and others. Here these were sent out of Bilbao in Basque vessels. Many of the blades were hilted in the Bilbao region (hence the name Bilbao for these swords).
These could easily have gone into French hands, and been decorated in accord with that context.

Clearly Martinique was French,but weapons were not confined to one nationality or geography. Note of interest here........Blackbeards famed ship, the "Queen Annes Revenge" was actually a French slaver captured off Martinique in 1717, then called "LaConcord" . Ironically, it was apparently originally English built, captured by the French.

So the sword need not have had to be in Spanish hands to have ended up where it was found. There was once the conundrum of 'Scottish' basket hilts from France......found to be from contingents of Jacobite supporters there.
Many British sword blades have fluer de lis on the blades from the state arsenal in Paris pre Culloden.

These were complex times, and these conundrums are the real test in research!

[fernando]

Definitely this is a small world, Jim.
Ah ... the 'Spanish' cuphilt, Jim. Never miss the whole route. Look where you can find a unique example in the hands of an angel, on the top of a Portuguese church not far from my hometown.


.

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by fernando

Definitely this is a small world, Jim.
Ah ... the 'Spanish' cuphilt, Jim. Never miss the whole route. Look where you can find a unique example in the hands of an angel, on the top of a Portuguese church not far from my hometown.


.

Very true Fernando, and please pardon my inadvertent forgetting to specify the importance of Portugal in the legendary use of the cuphilt. Over many years here you have included valuable insights into many examples of these.

To return to our mystery sword...and how a 'Spanish' type arming sword would end up in Martinique, an entirely French place.

With the French. there were no Royal manufactories, but contractors in various cities, most notably St.Etienne.

from "The French Military Sword in the 18th c." (C.Aries, M. Petard, 'Gazette des Armes' #57, Feb.1978):
"...swords are always of foreign origin"
"..in 1730, the King is obliged to have recourse to foreign weapon factories"

He created Klingenthal, in Alsace, for producing swords for the army, however issues with quality etc. led to preference of swords from Germany.
Hilt were typically of local mfg.

clearly these conditions preceded into the 17th c. and acquiring swords already hilted from Spain in the factories producing in Basgue areas in the north producing the familiar 'bilbo' swords must not have been unusual.
The 'Bourbon' motif added accordingly would seem an expected affectation for this blade.
Though the main impetus describing these Caribbean regions always refers to 'the Spanish Main', these areas, trade, slaving, piracy included not only Spain, but England, France and Holland as well.

[midelburgo]

I believe both parts belong together.

Typical 1728s as the ones shown here are rather post 1760.

From the end of XVII century there were a series of experimental designs.
We have to think that boca-de-caballo swords in aspect evolve from the two shells Brescian hilts, and eventually from the Pappenheimer.

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=27384

But as a construction, because of the use of screws, they are related to cup hilts. And there are cup hilts with screws but shaped as Brescian hilts.

Initially boca-de-caballo swords had only two screws, but this made the two shells prone to colapse and break at the middle of the line between the two screws.

One of the solutions was to add a second set of screws at the sides with a reinforcement piece (later was welded to the pass de ane). I call these rhomboidal 4 screws hilts.

The blade seems to come from the same Solingen workshop as the "Enrique Coel" blades, just with no lettering.

I would not wonder too much on the Martinique subject. We know cavalry swords were sometimes embarked in the Spanish fleet, and the Royal Armouries at Leeds has a bilbo captured at Trafalgar. Any shipwreck could carry the sword to the island where most probably was used as a machete.

That the square has more room than needed for the ricasso is not new, as the structure is there to hold the shells not the blade.

[fernando]

Originally Posted by midelburgo

I believe both parts belong together ...The blade seems to come from the same Solingen workshop as the "Enrique Coel" blades, just with no lettering...

....And as for the atypical decoration; a later work, under onwner's commission ?

[midelburgo]

My experience is that the later the 1728, the more similar blades you find. For example, there are 4 different "Enrique Coel" formats, three of them common. Probably they are batches ordered in different years. In what I think are boca-de-caballos from the later XVII century, you do not find two blades alike, and blades from 50 years earlier or more are not rare.
Sometimes they do not have a real ricasso and it is just a tang. And sometimes there is a brass piece covering it.
At the end of XVIIth century there is fashion for flower scrolls at the sides of the blade channel. I suspect this is an Italian fashion and did not last long. Possibly they did anew on older blades too. In a simile, Victorians engraved often flowers on plain Georgian silverwares, for example.

[Jerseyman]

I can't help with the sword as it's outside my area of knowledge, but I do have a couple of thoughts.

The decoration looks to me like a specifically Rococo version of a fleur de lis with a running knot and ribbon, or knotted vegetal motif. We can also see the decoration continuing onto the tang for half an inch, which may be an indication of good quality craftsmanship.

My other thought is in regards to the edge damage. Usually I'm of the opinion that so called 'battle damage' is simply the grandkids destroying antiques in the back garden, but I'm interested in the different angles and depth of penetration on this blade. It speaks to me of close quarters fighting with both head and body attacks. If it is what it appears to be, then it's very interesting to see, because most weapon damage gets cleaned up after the action is over, unless of course the weapon is lost or discarded, as this one may have been.