When did they appear? What are the first swords that are assembled with screwed pommels? I asked this inspired by the topic of Mr.Gazharian's swords.

This is a direct quote from Mr. Gazharian

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If I had chosen to make the hilt the historic way, I wouldn't have been able to take it apart now to take this picture, for example. In the middle ages, when there was no threading, screws, bolts and nuts, the accepted way of assembling and locking everything up on the tang was peening the pommel in place. This was considered a permanent assembly. The screws, threading, etc was invented in the 18-th century and was put to use during and since the industrial revolution.

I am just repeating what I read there, I have never looked into this myself.

Here are some threads that deal with this topic:

http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=5298
http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=4901

I know there are others on this forum as well.

Here's something i stumbled upon while reading some old manuals.
It was refered as throwing a rock somewhere else, but on better pictures you could easily recognize the naked tang:

[ Linked Image ]

Anonymous "Gladiatoria" early 15th century.

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Merckch daz zwolffte stuck ob du wilt reschlich mit ym entten So nym deinen spies vnd swert zu sammen an den arm vnd schrawb ab den knopff von deinem swert vnd würff hertigleichen in yn vnd lauff nach dem wurff mit ym ein vnd nütz daz swert oder den spies welchs dir eben sey . ab er also auff dich würff mit dem knopf . so nym dein tartschen für dich vnd vach darauff den wurff vnd nym den spies für dich yn dye recht handt zu dem stich vnd rett dich das er dir nicht einlawff als er daz yn dem synne hat

"So take your spear and sword together at the arm and screw off the pommel of your sword and throw it in him and walk onto him after the throw and use the sword or the spear whichever you like."

That's a waterproof evidence of screwed on pommels before 1450. And it's not just "take off" the pommel... it is by all means "screw off". This dedicated word implies for me that screwed connections in general were not that unusual around this time.

The "technique" however... merely distracting the opponent to close the line. The advice for countering this is plain and simple to block the pommel with your tartsche (shield) and using your own spear to keep him on distance.

Hi,
Screw technology was in everyday use by the Romans on wine presses, not too big a leap to suggest a skilled craftsman could apply same principles to costly weaponry. But when ?
Regards,
Norman.

Good points Hugh,

It's important to recognize that those books emphasize the "special" techniques, the not-so-common things.
Those that merchandise the author or fencing teacher and set him apart to others.

I do not think that screwed on pommels were popular back then, and that's exactly why it is shown at all.
As an eye catcher to my beliefs. As something special, an avant-garde piece of kit maybe. Just like Talhoffers spikey dagger with screwed on looking pommel. The technique itself is so silly, time consuming, leaving you with a sword ready to disassemble itself (depends of course)...just for this little distraction.
It wont be worth paying a drawer and writer for it. On the other hand... Talhoffer payd someone to draw the hat-throw :)

However, how it is written here is very casual and natural. Just like everybody would understand it immediately. It seems not nescessary to get into detail about that pommel, but it is still valuable and/or avant-garde enough for beeing mentioned. For me it sounds (and that is very speculative of course) like they were produced rarely and this "second application" of those "new pommels" (that were maybe too crude to really spread back then) is the novelty that the author wants to emphasize.

Of course you are right it's not the final evidence, we wont have any until we dig one out.

Hello all,

It's also necessary to look at these fight books in their cultural context.

Some locales' judicial dueling lore stipulated that something need be cast at the beginning of the duel. This is likely a holdover from much earlier dueling traditions. The pommel throw is quite possibly a way of staying within the letter of that law without parting with one's spear. Under these conditions, the thrown unscrewed pommel makes excellent sense, even if it does rather seem unsportsmanlike to our modern eyes!

As for Bellifortis...we should exercise caution in judging it. I doubt as much of it is actual lunacy as most feel on first reading it. A good for instance is the diving suit, which looks like a crazy scheme but which has been created using period materials by European living historians; the recreation performed safely to a depth of 18 feet.

It's doubtful that Keyser's artillery/siege treatise was regarded as goofy in its time; something like a couple dozen copies were made throughout the 15th c, including redactions in several Fechtbücher. Neither was Keyser's book unique - there are other, similarly-aimed, siege books from the period - the Bengedans Kriegsbuch is not derived directly from Bellifortis, for instance. And like Bellifortis and all the Talhoffer manuscripts, these are mostly advertising blurbs, which is why they're so incomplete and poor in text in most cases. Bendedans' work is fascinating in that it is accompanied by correspondence to the Danish king, with whom he was hoping to secure employment.

All the best,

Christian

On the original topic, which was, "when did threaded pommels appear?" It would seem to me that the answer wouldn't be to debate the use of a technique that employed a threaded (and removable) pommel; rather it would be to look at surviving pieces and see how many of them had threaded pommels. This isn't something that I can answer, but perhaps someone who has access or has had access to collections can answer this?

Steve

In one of the threads Mr.Arnow posted is said that we first see specimens with screwed pommel in 17th century. Thanks, Chad. If anybody has any new data, please share.

Hi Hugh,

Hugh Knight wrote:

While you're obviously correct about needing to throw something, the pommel is a foolish choice for several reasons. First, it takes too long, no matter how loosely the pommel is screwed on to begin with--it's pretty clear in the picture it's on a threaded tang, and would have required a few seconds at a minimum to undo--that's a huge amount of time in a fight, time which your opponent would be unlikely to give you. In the second place, it's obvious his opponent threw neither his pommel nor his spear, so he either wasn't laboring under that rule or he threw something else, such as his target. In the third place, it wouldn't do enough damage to even be worth blocking (unless it hit directly on an open face). And in the fourth and most important place, it would render the sword thus denuded of its pommel far less useful in the fight, and the sword was, after all, the most important weapon in these kinds of fights (witness that every single manual that shows Kampffechten shows far more techniques for the sword than it does the spear). I suppose you could argue that the dagger was as important, but I still can't help but note how many plays of the sword there are in this book--quite a lot for a disposable weapon.

That's assuming the other guy has the legal option of doing anything before the spear/pommel/whatever is cast. I'm given to understand that in some cases, he did not.

Judicial duels are governed by customary far more than practicality. Do you think it's practical to stand in a pit with one arm bound to you? Of course not, but it was the custom in some regions.

One likely reason masters show so much dueling is to announce their familiarity with the customary of a given patron's area, and the surrounding areas.

The pommel throw likely isn't useful in and of itself, but is rather a) a means of throwing something you're willing to part with and b) a distraction for your opponent for a short moment.

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So I'm sorry, but with respect, this is just a Fechtmeister showing off his cool secret tricks to impress people, it's not a viable technique. But how does it seem unsportsmanlike? It's foolish, but I see nothing unsportsmanlike about it.

I've answered these above.

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Perhaps this wasn't considered goofy in its time--we can't know, but you're probably right from its frequency of being copied. But that doesn't mean it's useful or valid information, regardless.

Not in and of itself. Some of these things might not have worked.

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While I'm sure we've all seen the diving suit example, I have yet to know of any evidence that one was ever made in period (as the essay on the suit that I read in G. Embleton's book makes clear). For all we know, the fact that it works was luck, and the actual drawings were just wild guesses.

Right, but that's proving a negative again, right? That's also not a particularly good argument coming from any reenactor who bases 99% of what he does and wears on items that only appear in manuscript form. We have only random tidbits of clothing and equipage from even the late medieval period, after all.

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But while not everything in that MS is unworkable, much of it pretty useless. Consider this device for attacking people in a trench: http://www.kb.dk/da/nb/materialer/haandskrift...2_290.html (then go to p. 51) The text tells us that you fill it with rocks and then roll it downhill at soldiers in a trench. Unfortunately for it's practicality, you simply have to move to one side to avoid it because it can't be very manueverable by its very nature.

That's your tactical guess looking at it. As neither you or I are siege engineers, such an analysis must remain just that: a guess.

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Or consider p. 70 on that same site: You're supposed to be able to lift yourself up by your own bootstraps--I don't think so. I'm not saying a very strong man couldn't possibly do it with a very carefully-built machine, but as a regular thing? Not practical at all.

Hugh, there a hundreds of people who would look at fighting techniques from the treatises and make the same pronouncements - without specialized knowledge, which you don't have here, many things look 'silly' or 'impractical'. In fact, you should review many of your *own* posts on various fora years ago wherein you decried Fechtbucher just that. Some thing is silly...until you find out it isn't.

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So the simple fact is that most of these things were never built and used, because they wouldn't have worked, or at least wouldn't have worked well enough to justify doing so.

That's not a fact, it's an opinion. You don't know they wouldn't work and you're assessment of any given device's relative merits is based on out of context personal opinion.

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You hit the nail on the head: Bendedans was looking for work in a time when military engineering was the "magic science", and being able to show wild gizmos like this to a group of people who didn't know they wouldn't work (or, at least, wouldn't work well) could do just that. And we can't say the potential employers were experts at war and would know if these things would work or not--after all, this was a time of great ignorance and confusion (if perhaps not as bad as modern people think): Many astrological books (e.g., the the very Talhoffer book we're looking at) and alchemical books were widely copied even though neither "subject" has any validity in real life and therefore couldn't *possibly* be made to work. Or look at Talhoffer's 1443 Gotha Codex, with its silly magical spells for determining the best time of day in which to fight based upon your name--this sold to a credulous audience, and yet is obviously ridiculous.

Since such superstitions were common in the day, and would clearly affect your opponent's psychology too, just how silly is it? If you think you'll lose - you will.

It's really easy to pick and chose what we find attractive, effective, or similar to familiar experiences, all the while throwing out whatever offends our sensibilities. Unfortunately, as appealing as such approaches can be, they miss much of the gestalt of the tradition. We can't analyze anything from this period based purely on technical merit, as my above illustration of dueling traditions indicates. How people felt, what they believed, and their personal motivations, were just as important.

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No, I'm sorry, but we can't say that just because something was widely copied it was obviously workable.

I never implied that they must be workable because of the work's popularity, simply that we should accept that some folks in period clearly thought much of it was workable.

All the best,

Christian

Hi Steve,

Steven Reich wrote:

On the original topic, which was, "when did threaded pommels appear?" It would seem to me that the answer wouldn't be to debate the use of a technique that employed a threaded (and removable) pommel; rather it would be to look at surviving pieces and see how many of them had threaded pommels. This isn't something that I can answer, but perhaps someone who has access or has had access to collections can answer this?

I wonder if someone like Peter Johnnson might have some info on this?

All the best,

Christian

Hi Steve,

Yeah, we should ping him.

On the other hand, I really can't see how the idea of a screwed on pommel is particularly controversial, even if there are no extant examples.

Addressing three points - the viability of the design, its likelihood in the 15th c., and the necessity of surviving pieces, I'd add:

1. Other weapons screw together in the 15th c. Some poleaxes' pyramidal side lugs screw together through the haft, thereby securing the head. Talhoffer shows this in the Thott codex.
2. Gladiatoria isn't the only manuscript showing screwed pommels - the Thott codex shows this too.
3. Certainly, some later swords have such pommels.
4. Most judicial duel treatises, from either side of the Alps, show specialized armoured dueling swords of considerable variation, whether it's spiked pommels in Kal and elsewhere, the adjunct rings added at mid-blade, or the flared reinforced points of Vadi's swords. Are all of these, from two dozen different works, all flights of fancy that no one would have used, simply because our museums don't have any?

All the best,

Christian

Just to inject a bit of information about the craftsmanship needed to hand-make a thread: I had a book that I read several years ago (wish I could remember the title and knew where it has gone to) about the history and use of the thread (yes, a whole book on it!) and the author concluded that the earliest datable threads in iron(that he was aware of) dated to about 1440. The important note he made on it was that early threads had to be hand-made with chisels and files, so it was a major task to put a thread into iron (much much more work than wooden threads), moreso to thread a nut (need to make a thread-cutter in carbon steel and keep resharpening it) and that mass-produced machined threads only appear in the eighteenth and nineteenth century as a byproduct and input to industrialisation. To thread a carbon steel tang-end is even more of a pain as the chiselling stage must all be done hot, otherwise the chisel lines become fracture points, and you break off the thread and swear a lot. An early use was titling harness (bolt-on doubling plates); mostly high-end and expensive items. So having a threaded tang on a sword pre-1500 would have been partly a way of showing off, but wasn't necessarily an improvement structurally over peened tang-ends, as the threads were not precision cut and could easily loosen, even with locking nuts.

Hugh and Christian,
Not only is the topic of fechtbuch interpretation off-topic to this thread, the discourse about it is not staying courteous in every case.

Hugh,
Our rules are very simple. If you see something out of line, report it or contact us. If we see something out of line, we'll deal with it as we are right now. Taking pot-shots at how we do things will not help your case--at all.

If anyone has anything more to say about this, contact a moderator directly. Let's leave the fechtbuch discussion and return to the point of the original topic.