There is something I have been wondering about historical federschwerter blades. To the best of my knowledge, most if not all surviving antique federschwerter have no fuller on them. Nor do they have, to my knowledge, edges that are rounded to the extent of what one would find on a sword like Albion's Liechtenauer.

This has lead me to wonder: why are there no historical blunt swords designed like the Liechtenauer? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am not aware of any historical blunts that have a deeper fuller and more strongly rounded edges. Yet such a design is certainly something that early modern Europeans could have come up with. Since, to my knowledge, there are no such blades with this design, I began to wonder if there was a reason why historical federschwerter were designed in this way.

My hypothesis comes from recent practice drilling with a Liechtenauer. I was using it, and my friend was using my relatively blunt Castellan. What I noticed was that the more rounded edges of the Liechtenauer seemed to perform a bit differently from the Castellan, and lead me to speculate that a sword with edges like the Liechtenauer mightly slightly distort one's sword practice. The blades on historical federschwerter, based upon the surviving one that I saw in Germany, seemed to be thinner, especially near the point section, than the Liechtenauer. Having a thinner blade in turn might allow the federschwert to handle more like a real sword than a more rounded blunt.

What are your thoughts on this? Am I mistaken about federschwerter; do some specimens have deeper fullers and more rounded edges? Have I simply misperceived the thickness of the historical blunts compared to the Liechtenauer? Or do they have thinner edges, perhaps for the reason I have suggested above?

Hi Craig!
This is a really interesting question, but two things are important to keep in mind. First of all we know of very few examples of preserved fechtschwerte with flared schildt, ie what is today commonly called federschwert. Currently we know of only 15-18 with any certainty. Possibly about 30 or so, although we are waiting for confirmation on the 2nd half.

As for regular profile blunts I don't know of any, but it wouldn't surprise me if there are some. It would probably also be hard to differentiate those from unsharpened swords.

If you are interested in following our international hunt for fechtschwerte then you can read more here:

http://www.hroarr.com/a-call-to-arms/

As for your question, if your notion is correct, that there are few or no historical blunts with a "normal" profile, then one answer could lie in how they were used. Some time ago I wrote a brief overview of what type of swords that are used in the various treatises and fechtschwerte with flared schildt are clearly more common for blossfechten, and regular swords for harnischfechten.

I'm a bit lazy so I will quote myself here:

Quote:

Of the manuals listed below as showing regular longswords, several show armoured fencing solely. Of the manuals that show both regular longsword and federschwert, there is a clear tendency to use federschwert without armour, and in armour, regular longswords are used. Federschwert are, with one exception (Ms.Germ.Quart.16), used in blossfechten, ie unarmoured fencing. Without armour, both types are commonly used, even showing the two types used against each other. Furthermore, of those manuals that do not show federschwert used for practice, the absolute majority show swords with leather rain guards and/or armoured combat/judicial duelling, the latter of course showing sharp swords designed to maim and kill. The two notable exceptions in the list below are both Italian; Fiore Dei Liberi and Fillippo Vadi. Neither of them show rain guards or federschwert, even in unarmoured combat.

http://www.hroarr.com/federschwert-or-a-blunt-longsword/

Perhaps harnischfechten was actually practiced with sharp or semi-sharp swords. Who knows?

Having compared sharp and blunt versions of the same swords and seeing how differently they behave it is my strong belief that the typical design of the fechtschwerte is intended to offer a safe training sword that feels and behaves more like a sharp sword, while still offering a degree of safety without loosing the most important characteristics that are needed for actual fighting. The flared schild is part of this and goes back as far as about the first quarter or third of the 1400s and looking to the treatises this design was distinctly more common for combat training.

It seems that the flared ricasso was just hand protection, and as such could be used on both sharps and blunts since you want your hands safe in both instances. In unarmored combat you don't have gauntlets so your hands would be more vulnerable. I think that's why the drawings show armored combatants without the flares, they aren't needed if you are wearing armored gloves.

If they were used to alter the weight of blunts then why do we see them on live blades?

Well, as far as I know there are very few known sharp swords that have flared shildt. Basically only a few panzerstecher and hunting swords and they are a bit different in designs. I think possibly they are related, but it is currently hard to tell with any certainty.

Bidenhänder have parierhaken and they might serve a similar function, but I think there is more to the flared schildt of the fechtschwerte than one might think. In many cases, the rest of the blade is quite narrow, sometimes even more narrow than the grip. With a broader schildt you both move the bind away from the cross and the hands and to where the bind would have been on a sharp, regular width blade or with the earlier less pointy designs, deflect the opponent's blade to the ends of the cross, again away from the hands. I think the latter is just as much an explanation for the design.

The old notion that the flared schildt was there to alter the balance of the blade, I think is completely wrong...

As for gauntlets meaning that there is no need for other "protection", I sort of agree, but there are a few treatises with harnischfechten where the fighters wear no gloves or gauntlets, like the Gladiatoria treatises and some others. But generally yes. :)