I've seen some contemporary depictions of two-handed swords and bastard swords with the figure-eight crossguards like those found on katzbalgers (Urs Graf's caricature of a landsknecht is one) yet I never hear them mentioned on forums or see any replicas of them, apart from a beautiful custom 'katzbalger bastard sword' on A&A's website. I find this style of guard quite attractive, even more so when combined with a beautiful blade and a hand-and-a-half hilt. I would greatly appreciate any opinions and information on, or even just pictures of, these interesting specimens.
Cheers
Dan

Lutel has several at their site, Johann Schidburger used to make one that MRL sold, and Bjorn has a pic of one original on his site.

Check out this example:

[ Linked Image ]

Click photo to see the full-sized version in our photo albums.

Wow! Awesome pic Nathan Robinson. Something about those katzbalger guards just really does it for me. what Oakeshotte type might that middle sword be?

Check out some of the Lutels on this page:

http://www.lutel.cz/index2e.htm

Oops. That just linked to their opening page. Well, go to their Hans-and-a-Half page; there are sveral examples which might interest you.

JSA

I checked out Lutel's hand and a half page and I'm impressed. I'm not sure how much they cost because the prices are in Czech currency, but I certainly wouldn't mind getting one if I could scrape together some benjamins.

Although the arguement could possibly be made that it's a Type XVIIIa I would say it's probably a type XX, especially taking into account the late time period from which it came I think it's likely.