Seeking Help with Excavated 1728 Pattern Bilbo Sword

[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.


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[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.


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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.