Your thoughts on this rapier?

[werecow]

Originally Posted by fernando

So ... looking better at the 3rd picture, it should read GARAETA, a Basque smith name mispelled by Palomares as Lagaretea.
"Este hecho se produce especialmente en el caso de los de raiz vasca, como Pedro Lagaretea por Pedro de Garaeta"
He is reported to have worked both in Bilbao and Toledo.

Ah, so there's a third Pedro! The plot thickens. I had heard of the other two before but not this one.

Originally Posted by cornelistromp

What a coincidence, Iam from Leiden and I was bidding on this rapier yesterday afternoon, bought a hunting sword so we can combine shipping :-)
I stopped at a certain point because I was not sure if there was a crack at the quilon near the ricasso block, It may be ok, it was not clear on the photos

nevertheless concrats the rapier is beautiful, early and rare.


The Rapier is Italian 1540-1560, Norman Type 32, if you have the book have a look at plate 21. there are similar examples in the Met , the wallace collection and stibbert museum.


@ Fernando yes I came also to PEDRO DEL.........AGARETA

Ha! I knew you were Dutch from lurking on the forums for a while, but I had no idea you were from Leiden. Small world/country!

Thanks for the reference, that's a pretty close one, as is the one in the Norman book. Which book is the one you posted the screenshot from?

But re: Shipping; alas, as noted I did not get the sword, I just wanted to see if I was on the right track with my thinking and to learn a bit more about the engravings / markings. The world of renaissance rapier collecting is a bit daunting for a novice collector so it's good to be able to check whether I'm not just chasing obvious fakes (I half-expected someone here to raise their hand and say something to the effect of "those proportions are completely wrong and it's an antiqued €25 Marto wallhanger from the early 2000s" ). At least this may give me a small amount of confidence the next time around.