Does anyone know how the wood-grip is constructed/attached on a (mid 15th cen) baselard? Is there just a slim tang like on some bullock-daggers or a wide tang like on the early baselard? Also if anyone has any good pictures of authentic 15th baselard/swiss daggers that would be great, didnt find any in the album and only find 16th cen ones in my books.

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In the English language, there's some confusion between "swiss dagger" and "baselard". It's much more easy in german, as "Basilard" and "Swiss Dagger" (Schweizerdolch) are two completely different kinds of daggers!

What you show is a Swiss Dagger. Those had a small tang and a full wooden grip. The other kind of dagger, Basilard in German, had a riveted tang.

English authors should finally divide between those two types of daggers!

"Swiss Dagger" (Schweizerdolch):

[ Linked Image ] [ Linked Image ] [ Linked Image ]


Basilard:

[ Linked Image ] [ Linked Image ] [ Linked Image ]

Pics from Hermann Historica Munich.

As you can see, there's not much they have in common!

Best regards,
Peter

Wow! Looks like the Germans were doing "fantasy" daggers in the XVth century (basilard on left - in case it isn't obvious ;) ). Who knew!?!?!?

Very interesting about the terminology, you are so right!

This particular piece is of Italian origin, and I personally think the decoration is a later addition. :)

about building the handle...

as I remember, the tang is not really wide but not soo thin too. It seems that the right way to fit the handle is to built it separately from the blade because the two pieces of metal and the wooden handle fit in each other like papa in mama...
Everything must fit really tight.

To me a beselard is something between the dagger and the sword. Maybe the ancestor of the katzbalger; a sharp and short sword used by pikemen for a really close combat use.

A funny thing. Some years ago I have seen pictures of a group trying to reproduce the techniques in the cgm 558 (baselard techniques) with daggers... it is just like trying to do two-handers techniques with a rapier...

the article on wiki is quite good. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baselard

but...what really cares with a sword or dagger is the way we use it, not the name it might have...

Thise Basilard pictures aren´t short swords, there is just some variation as in everything, the earlier could be smaller, maybe in later times there were more shord sword like basilards, but in the 14th cent they are often depivted with dagger dimensions.

As I said before, there is much confusion about the terminology in the English language, so I will use the German terms.

There are three different types of weapons:
1. Basilarde: riveted tangs, no separate mounts (they are directly made out of the tang), could be double- or single-edged. See my examples shown above. Although some authors claim that they are related to the Schweizerdolche, I wouldn't sign that assumption, as there is not too much they have in common.
2. Schweizerdolche: small tangs, separate mounts, most often double edged.
3. Schweizerdegen: Short swords that are related to the "Schweizerdolche". They have the same hilt construction, but are longer (~50-80 cm). Most of the examples known date from the second half of the 15th century.

What makes all this even more difficult is the fact that daggers were called "Degen" in medieval german manuscripts. That's why Schweizerdegen and Schweizerdolch are often seen as one and the same weapon, which is wrong.

For those who can speak German, read Heribert Seitz' "Blankwaffen I". It's quite good for a general overview.

Peter

Peter,

That is an interesting break down. I have been playing with the idea of making a 'swiss' style dagger according to your system. Is the system you put up created by Heribert Seitz? If so when did he create it?

In the medieval period in England I have only rarely come across the term swiss dagger (I think once but it may in fact be 0), baselard seeminly was the broad termed used for any of the largish daggers that were not rondels. That said some order to the chaos might have been helpful. As far as I know the hilt designs in England are done in both the scales and tang to be rivetted as well as tang into the handle but seem to be simple and likely called simply baselard, possibly as a semi generic term.

Anyone know how they were able to get a one piece handle over a rectangular tang? Would it just have been done with a chisel?

RPM

Hi Randall,

I don't know if Seitz invented those terms. I do not think so. You can also find them being used by many other authors, as well as German auction houses and collectors.
Using the medieval terms is not very helpful. If we do so, we couldn't even use the German word "Dolch", as it's a creation of the 16th century (I don't know if it's also the case for "dagger"). Medieval manuscripts do often not exactly distinguish between the different types of daggers. It could be that all daggers with Swiss origin (Basilarde and Schweizerdolche) were called "Baselards" in medieval England. But that is not helpful for 21th century weapon collectors and connoisseurs, as we have to treat those as different kinds of daggers. So it is sometimes necessary to invent new terms. Remember that even the words "Gothic" or "Middle Ages" were not used in medieval times, but are later descriptions.

Best regards
Peter

Yeah I understand the idea of creating such terms. My real question was to find out how far reaching it is. My point on the medieval terms is that they were not so specific in period and as far as I know in English there is not such a system. That said I am not saying it is not bad to make such systems just that the use of such terms milage may vary.
RPM