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Post by Kilted Cossack on Aug 14, 2013 21:12:30 GMT
Gents: Done up in a rural "Cousin Jonathon" style, incorporating a vintage saber blade, elk antler, and bits from cutlery supply stores. Blade length: 31" Weight: 680 grams/23 ounces Point of balance: 7.5"
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Post by Beowulf on Aug 14, 2013 21:21:28 GMT
I love it!
That looks like an old school hunting sword. I like the handle/blade shapes together. I bet that ferrule works well in the gripping of it.
I'd love to get a Hunting Messer version of something like this, so basically I'd like this thing's Uncle.
Kick $emprini!
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Post by Kilted Cossack on Aug 14, 2013 22:35:40 GMT
Inspired by George Washington's hunting sword, photographs from Neumann's Swords and Blades of the American Revolution, and the exquisite recreations of Old Dominion Forge. I have three or four more of these saber blades, and I'm planning to try variations on a theme with them. This one uses a 3" tang, and is perhaps overly long in the blade for the form----my impression is that the hanger tended to run 24-28" of blade. Ordinarily a 7 1/2" point of balance would cause me to raise my skirts and run around shrieking, but it doesn't seem bothersome on this sword. I think that's due to two things: first off, it's 23 ounces, and second, there's my beloved canted grip.
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Post by Beowulf on Aug 15, 2013 1:47:47 GMT
Let me just toss some stuff at you.
This is closely related to the German Hunting Sword, and under that name you might find some very close kin to it, maybe even find some stats on proportions. These hunting weapons go back into the medieval period and show a close, tight family descendance. Not surprising, I guess, since also I can find the grandparents of the American Bowie in 15th century Durer drawing and paintings, same with the French Pattern Hunting Knife.
7 1/2" POB isn't that bad. Not to someone who knows how to use it. I am not sure about that pob though with it being a hunting weapon meant to dispatch wounded dangerous things, like boar and big antlered animals. Books/scholars tend to say hunting weapons were for the thrust. I am usually skeptical about stuff until I find historical corroboration, but having hunting experience it makes sense. You'd have the same exact target as a bow hunter, the heart, and a thrust is the best way to stop the beastie.
Would TheNewDavout or Patrick Kelly have any stats or insights into these?
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Post by Kilted Cossack on Aug 15, 2013 3:36:08 GMT
I came this close to buying a Windlass German hunting sword for my first ever functional sword purchase. I ended up getting the Windlass American Revolutionary War saber instead. Come to think of it, it was a SBG review that got me interested in the GHS (German hunting sword) to begin with. sbgswordforum.proboards.com/thread/11018I like the fairly plain aesthetic of this style, and the use of bone/horn/antler in grips (similar to some Middle Eastern or Central Asian styles), and I am increasingly sympathetic to what the smaller, lighter cuttoes represented: kind of an "every day carry" blade, perhaps more "scuffles on the street" than "Viking shield wall. (This one isn't quite so compact, but as MRL's blurb for the GHS said,the Germans seemed to have a preference for big blades.)
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Post by Kilted Cossack on Aug 22, 2013 2:13:42 GMT
You know, after you knock one of them together, there begins a mad scramble through all the parts boxes, for bits of this, and pieces of that. I've put together two more of my American cuttoes---once more, using up those blowtorched blades, and elk antler. I recycled Windlass guards---a Windlass Revolutionary War saber's guard reshaped, it's curve reversed, for one, and for the other, a Cold Steel 1796 light cavalry guard that had been stretched some.
As I go along, I'm noticing that the blades aren't identical----one of them was blunt! A mixed bag, but all about the same 32" length, all blowtorched loose. I fired up the 1x30 and put an edge on the blunt one, the for'ard 12" or so.
I'm having a blast coming up with these, and so far, I like the results. On the one hand, Christian Fletcher isn't worried about his future, if he can see these, but on the other hand: I like the aesthetic, I think they're fairly solid, and I'm recycling blades that would otherwise have been trashed.
So far each of them (to varying degrees) feels like a lightweight cut and thrust sword in the hand. . . which seems to have been the niche of the hanger or cuttoe, to begin with.
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Post by Beowulf on Aug 22, 2013 5:42:12 GMT
Man, if I were you I'd save one of the blades and slowly over the next couple of years find/get fabricated parts to make a really nice one.
I tried to find pictures for you of German Kurzmesser from the 1600s. No such luck. All I find are hunting swords that look like Hirschfenger (hunting dag) hilted cuttoes. You know the type... seashell guard, antler handle, little 'S' quillons peeking out.
I gave up. Search engines sometimes don't work well using antiquated German words in an American English made-to-help-the-semi-literate search engine.
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Post by Barnaum on Sept 27, 2013 0:22:32 GMT
That's a great and usually under represented design. Can I ask where you got the saber blanks from?
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Post by Kilted Cossack on Sept 27, 2013 0:29:53 GMT
I found them on e-bay, of all places. Six or seven of them, cut loose from the hilts with a blowtorch. (I'm just happy I could salvage them for reuse.)
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