[Christopher Lee]

While looking at a little bit of Irish history lately and reading more upon the Galloglaigh some synapses fired in my head and connected two things that had previously lain dormant. When looking at the Durer illustration of the Irish Galloglaigh for the umpteenth time I noticed the crescent pommelled dagger of the mailed Galloglach. I occurred to me that I had seen ones just like it but not in the context of Ireland.

So far I have found two examples of very similar crescent dagger pommels – one from Perthshire and the other from Norfolk. Both are identified as being 14thC. I was wondering if there are any other examples of crescent pommels from England or Scotland and if any example has ever turned up in Ireland? Are there any surviving examples of the type of dagger (or knife) that a pommel like that would have adorned? Also, as the crescent pommelled dagger was illustrated by Durer, my impression is that it is something which has become closely associated as being a weapon of the Galloglach – the Claiomh guys (who do Galloglach re-enactment) in Ireland have a modern reproduction of a crescent pommelled dagger. However, given the distance between Perthshire and Norfolk, my impression is that the type of pommel in question was not confined to one geographic area such as Scotland, England or Ireland (assuming that any examples have ever been found there?)?

[Scott Woodruff]

Oakeshott mentions two examples found in the London area in "Archaeology of Weapons." Daggers of this style are also portrayed in the Maciejowski Bible. It seems that I remember seeing some Scandinavian examples, but I don't have the references to hand. Hope this helps.

[J.D. Crawford]

I have seen other photos on the web of crescent pommels found in Britain, bronze I think, besides the ones you show, but I cannot remember where at the moment.

This thread is mainly about crescent pommel swords, but might have some general info of interest to you: http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=21804

[Christopher Lee]

Thanks for the direction to that thread, interesting and I spotted another example of a crescent pommel dagger. Both of the examples I’ve found, and the one in the thread all seemingly date from the 13th/14th centuries. Curious then that Durer ‘took a snap’ of an Irish guy wandering around with one in 1521. I suppose that it makes sense given that Ireland was somewhat conservative in their adoption and retention of weapons and armour which had since gone out of fashion on the continent. The dagger pommels appear to be quite unrelated to the Type O pommels; the dagger pommels are flat sided and more distinctly a crescent moon rather than a somewhat shallow ‘arc’. So, unlike the Type O pommels the crescent dagger pommel appears not to have been confined to only one geographic or cultural area? Are there any examples still attached to blades (I saw the one in the thread; are there any more details or better photos of it?)