What do you think, is this sword a fake?

A central place to talk about weapons and armour, as it relates to your kit. This is where you show it of or talk about making it. Discussing the relative merits of types of weapons goes in the WMA section.

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caedmon
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What do you think, is this sword a fake?

Post by caedmon »

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Peter Remling
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Re: What do you think, is this sword a fake?

Post by Peter Remling »

Well either a superb museum piece or a fake. I'd say fake due to the crispness of the engraving on the blade and the ends of the guard are way too pointy for something that old, that has been neglected or buried.
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Elleth
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Re: What do you think, is this sword a fake?

Post by Elleth »

I've certainly skeptical: the alleged prestige of its history - pictured on the royal seals/arms of THREE Plantagenet kings - but not a speck of gilding or gew-gaws?
(I can't find the images they're talking about either: I'd be curious to see them)

The pommel looks odd for the period with that "bolster-collar" at the base, and the inscriptions seem out of place for something owned by English royalty. Granted the photos don't really match the "spirals and pentagrams" of the text description, but I'd still expect something closer to the known Plantagenet aesthetic if that's where it came from.

All that said, a *lot* of my youthful pre-internet preconceptions of the medieval world have been challenged by all the photos and references filtering out from European museums for the last decade, so I suppose it's possible. I'd still be fairly surprised if all is as is presented.
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Greg
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Re: What do you think, is this sword a fake?

Post by Greg »

I would lean towards fake, stylistically alone. The guard reads too modern fantasy, and also looks like it wasn't ever quite finished before it aged, like most period pieces look.
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Elleth
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Re: What do you think, is this sword a fake?

Post by Elleth »

For what it's worth, I was looking through Oakeshott's Records of the Medieval Sword to find out a bit more about Type XIVs, and ran into the sword very similar to this one that the auction mentions. Blade proportions, guard and pommel all quite similar, although the documented one has no engravings mentioned.

Of the three seals mentioned, that of "Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily" and dated 1260-1280 - is the one Oakeshott described as showing "blade, cross, and pommel exactly like" the sword he had access to: .
seal-charles-ii-anjou-sicily.jpg
seal-charles-ii-anjou-sicily.jpg (85.61 KiB) Viewed 8841 times
In the book, the photo is poor and doesn't really look a close match - this online photo (found via pinterest and sourced to the U of Notre Dame) - is much clearer. Presuming both seal and photo are authentic, that moves the auction a heck of a lot closer to plausible in my mind.

The other two seals are that of Edward I, where "blade and cross are the same, but the pommel is a kind of 3-lobed one" - and "the Great Seal of the abortive King of Scots, John Ballilo," which "shows this style of cross with a typical 'Viking' lobed pommel."

(A bit of background: the Plantagenets are partly descended through Anjou, and John Ballilol was Edward I's desired man for the Scottish crown, so... Sicily, Scotland, and England aren't so motley an assortment as it might seem)

Regarding the inscription - there's a similar opposing-spiral motif pictured in Records..., but in all the examples the 'spirals' are pictured as either animal heads or leaf elements, and universally flank a Cross.

All of which is to say...I'm much more convinced the sword itself is plausible for a Plantagenet origin, agnostic but very curious about the engraving, and still skeptical of the "possession of the royal family" claim absent more evidence.
Persona: Aerlinneth, Dúnedain of Amon Lendel c. TA 3010.
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