I just cut up a broken sword blade so that I could re-hilt it, I'm planning on doing something from the 8th century, so I was looking at this chart:

http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/download.php?id=35405

and I couldn't figure out what the hilt on the type 8 on the top left corner would have looked like. Was there organic material on either side of the thin metal plates on the upper and lower guard, or were they sandwiched metal as we see in some of the similar hilts? It would seem strange if it were a metal guard, because the rivets are still there, but most of the guards that have organic parts from this period have them sandwiched between two metal plates.

This type swords have mostly one iron plate between two organic plates.Sometime covered with thin iron or bronze plates on upper and lower sides and riveted together.Central plates are mostly inlayed with simply patterns in silver or brass.See W.Menghin,Schwert im fruhen Mittelalter.

Google photos of "Migration Sword"

Normally not iron , bronze for the most part, but you can use brass and achieve the same look.. Some are gold as well. The outer plates are never organic that I have seen except on a few modern reproductions. Organic hilts, most wood but some boon predate these by several centuries and are normaly refered to as La Tene

I own three of these swords, not orginals of course but one custom made, an Albion Migration D and a Daltin Migration sword. I am having a forth custom order done right now as well

You can also google "sutton hoo sword" and "saxon hoard" to see other examples

https://www.google.com/search?q=Migration+sword&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=K2lFUtadF9LC4APr6YCQCg&ved=0CDQQsAQ

https://www.google.com/search?q=Migration+sword&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=K2lFUtadF9LC4APr6YCQCg&ved=0CDQQsAQ#es_sm=122&q=sutton+hoo+sword&tbm=isch

and the La Tene photos
https://www.google.com/search?q=Migration+sword&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=K2lFUtadF9LC4APr6YCQCg&ved=0CDQQsAQ#es_sm=122&q=La+Tene+sword&tbm=isch

you can also search myArmoury for Migration Sword as well

David,

Late 7th/8th century (which is when the Behmer type 8s in question come in) is well outside of the "Migration Period" range (the 1st phase at least, which is the bit which mostly affects Western Europe).

Swords of this type often have iron hilt components, sometimes as the middle part of an organic/metal/organic sandwich which, as Robert points out, are often decorated with silver inlay (the inlay decoration of iron items being a common technique in the Merovingian period in Germanic regions), sometimes as casings for organic elements (such as one of the Dover Buckland swords which has wooden guards which are completely enclosed in iron sheet).

"bronze for the most part, but you can use brass and achieve the same look."

Debatable, some period metal is copper with tin, some is copper with zinc, lots of it is a mixture of all sorts of remelted scrap. Safer to stick with the archaeologists phrase 'copper alloy'.
The cleaned examples I've seen tend to look more like modern brass than modern bronze.


"Organic hilts, most wood but some boon predate these by several centuries and are normaly refered to as La Tene "

Sorry, but that's just wrong. Swords with all organic hilts similar to Behmer Type 1s were being used and buried at least until the 7th century in North West Europe. The vast majority of Anglo Saxon sword burials are of swords which have no surviving hilt elements because they were entirely organic. Some were clearly still in service because some examples (The Crundale and Cumberland for example) were still being decorated in the 6th/7th century, presumably in an attempt to make an old fashioned sword more contemporary.


As for what a sword with an organic/iron/organic hilt might look like, take a look at Hakun's Merovingian swords:-
http://www.hakun-risti.de/Spatha%20Merowingerzeit.html

I will respond to this later, one, with more coffee in me and two when I do not have an appointment to make

I will point out that the The Migration Period, also known as the period of the "Barbarian" invasions is generally considered to 400 to 800 AD and not well out of the period.

As to the iron and wood I stand corrected and thank you both for that information and link you sent.

Thank you Matthew, that sword is exactly what I was looking for. Do you know how wide spread these hilts were? In the chart it says it was from the continent, but they don't seem very common, certainly not in productions.

Is that a book that you cited Robert? I only found a Dutch forum when I searched it.

I just found a bunch of wrought iron, so I think I will have to see how forging it goes.

Peter, the book that Robert refers to is this one:-

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Schwert-fr%C3%BChen-M...3806203628

THE book to have for the serious student of early medieval swords. Unfortunately, copies are hard to come by and expensive when they appear on the market.

Hilts of this type fall into Menghin's type F. All of the examples which he discusses are from Germany.

So I have managed to do a little work on it, I had the forge running on Saturday and got the metal parts of the hilt roughed out. This evening I got the wood parts of the guards cut and sanded to size. Sadly what I thought was wrought was only a really strange cast, so the hilt will is in mild steel instead. all the work on the pommel has been hot so far, I might take the belt sander to even it up more, but it would be kinda cool to be able to say that it was all done hot :)

Ps. why can't I upload any pics? I've read the instructions here, but it doesn't seem to be working. I hit "browse" click on the pic I want to upload, hit "open" and then click on "add attachment" and it says "tried to upload empty file" so I tried to upload a file instead, but that didn't work either.

Try hosting the pictures on a site like flickr or photobucket. Then use the "copy image location" and paste the copied url in between img brackets.