Side sword with Victorian chiseled hilt?

[ulfberth]

The blade is 17th century , The pommel is composite and does not belong to this type of rapier neither does it fit the grip its a shiavona type of pommel.
For the guard i lean towords 19th c based on these few pics ,more detailed pictures are needed to be sure , the back of the guard is missing it was probably the same guard ring is the front, altough this type of guard existed in the 17th c this one is pretty rougly made the original ones were usualy more refined .
kind regards
Ulfberth

[10thRoyal]

Originally Posted by ulfberth

The blade is 17th century , The pommel is composite and does not belong to this type of rapier neither does it fit the grip its a shiavona type of pommel.
For the guard i lean towords 19th c based on these few pics ,more detailed pictures are needed to be sure , the back of the guard is missing it was probably the same guard ring is the front, altough this type of guard existed in the 17th c this one is pretty rougly made the original ones were usualy more refined .
kind regards
Ulfberth

I think that's a good catch Ulfberth, it does look like the other half of the guard may have snapped off and someone may have sanded down the fracture surface. After looking at it more the pommel does look straight off a schiavona. Luckily the blade itself looks fantastic and I'm super happy with it. I'll have more details coming when I have the swords in hand.

Here is the rest of what is coming to me from that estate:

[ulfberth]

these 3 are all good , the schiavona looks complete and undamaged, the North Italian naval sabre 17th c has a nice blade, its pretty rare and looks nicer than most, the cup hilt is probably late 17th or early 18th c it has a nice colichemarde blade, more details of the gaurds , grips pommel and blade would be nice, these seem to be pure and unaltered items.
Here is a picture of a similar rapier as the one you bought, this particular one has the two guard rings intact and has the original pommel, it was sold at auction 11 years ago and described as 19th c but it was absolute completely all original.
kind regards
Ulfberth

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by ulfberth

these 3 are all good , the schiavona looks complete and undamaged, the North Italian naval sabre 17th c has a nice blade, its pretty rare and looks nicer than most, the cup hilt is probably late 17th or early 18th c it has a nice colichemarde blade, more details of the gaurds , grips pommel and blade would be nice, these seem to be pure and unaltered items.
Here is a picture of a similar rapier as the one you bought, this particular one has the two guard rings intact and has the original pommel, it was sold at auction 11 years ago and described as 19th c but it was absolute completely all original.
kind regards
Ulfberth

Its always so good to see your entries here!!!! Your astute eye catches all, and your assessments confident and IMO conclusive.

The cuphilt is amazing, I've really never seen one with a colichemarde blade. In my view, with the advent of the colichemarde blade in the period you note it is well established this type blade became de riguer in France and England.
It is remarkably rare to see one on a Spanish cup hilt as these were attuned more to the 'Spanish fight' (destreza) primarily, which was markedly different than the French technigues.

The generally held theory on the colichemarde was that it provided a stronger upper blade section for the parry, with the French style of fencing which concentrated on much more dynamic swordplay and the lighter and faster small sword. The thin distal end of the blade of course afforded the thrust of the rapier. Allegedly the colichemarde blade fell out of favor by mid 18th in the civilian sector but seems to have been held traditionally longer by the military with their strong sense of tradition.

On this interesting rapier in the OP, am I mistaken or could the dual markings on the blade be spuriously applied renditions of those of the house of Missaglia in Milan? One of the variations of their mark seems to be a 'tailed' cross ("Scottish Swords from the Battlefield of Culloden", Lord Archibald Campbell, repr. Andrew Mowbray, 1971, p.48).
With the unusual 'running wolf', this blade seems certainly a 17th century Solingen product, but unusual to see the Missaglia (?) mark. It seems of course that Solingen favored Spanish names and punzones, but with Milan being in Spains provincial sphere, many Spanish arms and armor had these connections.

[ulfberth]

Thank you for your kind words Jim !
Over the years I had two cup hitls with colichemarde blades , one was a very nice pierced cup hilt of high quality with almost the exact type of blade, the handling was incredible, i will look if i still can find some pictures of it.
You are right about the blade marks being Italian , perhaps they used a German export blade and stamped it when it was fitted ? Its just an assumption because i realy cant say why, we sometimes find things, contradictions to wich we cant answer with facts ( yet )
kind regards
Ufberth

[10thRoyal]

Originally Posted by ulfberth

these 3 are all good , the schiavona looks complete and undamaged, the North Italian naval sabre 17th c has a nice blade, its pretty rare and looks nicer than most, the cup hilt is probably late 17th or early 18th c it has a nice colichemarde blade, more details of the gaurds , grips pommel and blade would be nice, these seem to be pure and unaltered items.
Here is a picture of a similar rapier as the one you bought, this particular one has the two guard rings intact and has the original pommel, it was sold at auction 11 years ago and described as 19th c but it was absolute completely all original.
kind regards
Ulfberth

It's great to hear that there were some legitimate diamonds in the rough that I found. The rapier was under a literal pile of "made in Toledo, Spain" souvenir swords. I'll have everything in hand by Wednesday and can send more detailed pictures then. I forgot that I had two additional images of both the cup hilt rapier and Italian saber.




I was honestly worried about the blade decoration on the saber at first. It looked too much like arsenal tulwar decoration. But I later found multiple examples with similarly janky designs carved into them. The pommel cap is interesting. I associate that style much more with 18th and 19th century sabers.

On another note, do y'all have any idea if there is any significance behind these shapes on the rapier grip and quillons? Just the fact that it is repeated multiple times in different spots made me wonder if it was associated with anything. Or it's just a metal design that looks like a pretzel with zero special meaning.





Thank you again to Ulfberth and Mr. McDougall, y'all have a level of knowledge and desire to share that knowledge that new comers to the field can aspire to, myself included.

[ulfberth]

the naval sabre has indeed a later grip and pommel cap, the decoration on the blade reminds me on Italian blade decoration of the 16th c however on your sabre it looks similar yet different, not sure what to think if it.
The repeating shapes on the rapier is a good sign and i have seen it before, its more a baroque type design.
Here are some pictures of a cup hilt with a colichemarde blade, they are rare and different from the small swords colichemarde blades which are between 80 and 90 cm long while these rapier blades are between 100 and 115 cm long.
This particular one was hexagonal cross section hollow ground on the first wide part and after the fuller it changed to diamond cross section hollow ground.
kind regards
Ulfberth

[10thRoyal]

Originally Posted by ulfberth

the naval sabre has indeed a later grip and pommel cap, the decoration on the blade reminds me on Italian blade decoration of the 16th c however on your sabre it looks similar yet different, not sure what to think if it.
The repeating shapes on the rapier is a good sign and i have seen it before, its more a baroque type design.
Here are some pictures of a cup hilt with a colichemarde blade, they are rare and different from the small swords colichemarde blades which are between 80 and 90 cm long while these rapier blades are between 100 and 115 cm long.
This particular one was hexagonal cross section hollow ground on the first wide part and after the fuller it changed to diamond cross section hollow ground.
kind regards
Ulfberth

That is a beautiful sword, is it yours? I'd love to match the maker's mark to a time period. Do we know if the colichemarde started on small sword and were applied to larger format rapiers or was it the other way around? And I never considered the size difference in the blades. Looking back at the photos of the cup hilt coming to me, assuming the planks in the floor are two inches wide, the blade would be about 38in to 40in long so roughly 96cm to 100cm. I really appreciate the fact that this is not simply a small sword blade on a rapier but was scaled up for the application.


And I found one example of the kind of decoration I had in mind when I saw the naval saber. This came from a Christie's auction.

[ulfberth]

i had it in my collection untill 2021, the colichemarde type blades are in general 18th century and found on small swords, however earlier variations were used in rapiers in the last quarter of the 17th century.
The blade in your rapier is ca 1600 - 1650 the running wolf on the blade is German Solingen Passau but the stamps seem North Italian, i have not found an exact match yet, there was alot of export of these blades to other countries.