Living on a teacher's salary in Sweden it is not easy to own all the swords you dream of and to order a custom built one is for most people totally unrealistic. But with dedication and stubbornness and a bit of experience working in different materials you can convert existing swords into something personal and unique.
This is the story of how I decided to strip Albions ”Regent” into a bare blade and then dress it up into something quite different. (In fact my Regent was maybe the third one manufactured and actually Peters own hence the headline above)
The metamorphosis began with a visit to Skokloster castle outside Stockholm. They keep a sword there with a wonderful floral ornament on the handle. As soon as I saw it I wanted to replicate it. Badly.I I am very fond of those handles with a waist. So one cold winter day I went there to photograph it in the dark armoury where it had been kept since the 17th century. No electric lights only a hand torch allowed !
As I already own a cherished Arms and Armour sword with a superb fish tail pommel I began to ponder on the idea of replacing the regent pommel with something else. During a trip to Bern, Switzerland, I fell in love with those oval flat leaf shaped pommels. You can find them on several swords now mostly in Swiss museums.
Not being a skilled smith and with no access to a smithy I wrote to Craig Johnson at Arms and Armour, asking if I could buy a cast of a similar pommel in their production. To my joy Craig told me they had made experiments with a larger pommel, ultimately not being used but still laying around unpolished in the workshop.
This suited the overall design of the sword even better, the quite thick hollow ground blade needs a hefty pommel. This was made possible through the great generosity from another sword afficiado. Many thanks Craig!
The crossguard was filed into a different shape with faceted knobs.
I filed, sanded and polished the pommel and then spent hours and hours of painstaking filing with a needle file turning the round drilled hole into a square one. I prolonged the tang with a welded part. I made a birchwood handle in two parts removing wood for the tang. I glued and bound it with cotton string. Then I made a template from the handle in aluminium foil and redesigned the Skokloster floral pattern using the contours of this template. I turned two of the panels so that the floral pattern grows towards the tip of the blade. The ”up” of the sword when you hold it.
I cut and punched the pattern with a scalpel and the kind of tool you press down nails in wood with. The leather is naturally tanned cow 1.5 mm and worked flat on a stone surface. ( a floor tile c:a 33x33 cm ) The leather is slightly damped with a damp sponge before compressing the leather with the tools.One have to find the exact time when the dampness is perfect, then the leather holds the pattern dow, if too wet it will not compress enough. The leather is then painted brown. I glued on the handle leather with hide glue which allows a long working time and also makes the leather flexible when wrapping around.The surplus material was cut with a razorbalde at the sides, carfully not to cut the string on the wooden handle. The "thumb protector/ rain guard" Chape is constructed in in such a way it is going under the handle leather. It is also stiffened with an internal cylinder of shellac hardened 1.5 mm leather. The ornament is taken from a late 15th century bishop's effegy carved by Tilman Riemenschneider.
The scabbard is made from two parts of massive birchwood and cut with chisels in convex curves to fit the shape of the blade. After being glued the outside is planed and sanded. Historical scabbards are generally thin and elegant. Look at paintings and sculptures. I made the ornament on the scabbard leather in the same way as I did on the handle. I overlapped the leather on the back of the scabbard and cut in the middle through both layers with a razorblade. In this way the edges will fit exactly. It is not necessary make a seam. The ornament is taken from a late 15th century sword scabbard preserved in Vienna. I refined the leaves a bit. All the background dots are made one by one but it is surprisingly fast. It was then painted black and polished with a wax.
The silver chape is inspired by one in a late 15th century german painting. My original is sculpted in grey SuperSculpey polymer clay, cast in silcone rubber, recast in jeweller's wax and dipped in shell casting products to make a heat resistant mold which withstands the 800 degrees of melted silver, heatened to make the wax melt and the mould ready to pour melted silver in.The so called "lost wax casting process" ( wax was scarce and valueable in the Middle Ages and mostly used to make candles and pay the taxes to the Church with )
To my relief the casting went well. Hours of sanding and polishing followed. It was then glued to the tip of the scabbard. The fittings for the straps were instead sand cast (pressing the original model into a very fine red powder like sand in a wooden box which gives a hollow impression which then can be filled with melted silver). they were sanded and polished and rivited with handmade silver rivets on the straps for the swordbelt. The straps are cut in such a way they keep the sword in a good angle to draw it easily and make walking with it easy. I am actually quite pleased with the result. It does look like a convincing 15th century sword and scabbard. Please do see attched pictures of the building process.
bye from a Stockholm with frost,ice and snow in the air. This is Cimmeria. Winter is coming.
Stefan
Please find pictures of the process here...although I had put them in chronological order they ended up in a random.heap....heck I rather build swords than fiddling with computers..
http://s130.beta.photobucket.com/user/stefanmbop/library/
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