I have started to work on another project that was in a pipeline for some time now - executioner´s sword. This year we will need it for one of our stage plays in our fencing group, so I decided to give it a go.

The plan was to make a simple functional tool - nothing fancy as some of those on display in the museum, but a simple design with some limited decorations. The sword should have represented a type that would be common on 16th/17th century, without trying to replicate any specific piece - a broad blade some 80 cm long (plus 20+ cm for a grip), with rounded tip, simple crossguard, wooden grip and a cylindrical pommel.

I wanted to have an inscription on the blade, and after a search on internet I´ve settled for German "In Diser Stunde Gott Staerkhe Mich", with some simple decorations (cross, gallows, breaking wheel).

The blade was made last autumn with bunch of others (pic. 1 - D) from a spring steel. When I made it, it had a lenticular cross section, with a short narrow fuller. After that I gave it a second thought and re-made it, making a wide fuller running along the whole blade up to some 3cm from the tip. One of the reasons was practical - as I said, this sword will be used in stage fencing, so it has to be blunt. A wide long fuller then made it lighter by some 100g.

The blade went for hardening and tempering to a professional company. In was lying in my workshop for some few months, but this weekend I´ve managed to work on it.

First, I have cleaned the blade with sand papers working it to semi-finish (pic. 2).

Then I took a 12 cm long bar of soft steel for the crossguard, drilled and filed the hole for the tang and started to shape quillons to octagonal cross-section, widening towards the ends, with some filework decorations (pic. 3 shows the start of the process, pic. 4 shows the crossguard after some initial cleaning).

The pommel was turned on a lathe, with 8 vertical grooves (to replicate the octagonal design) made by the angle grinder and finished by hand files (pic.5).

Finally, the last picture shows it all put together to check the proportions (pic.6). Next comes the final cleaning and polishing of the blade, inscription (I yet have to decide about the technique i´m going to use) and the grip. More to come (hopefully) soon.

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Very nice job with the shaping of the Guard and pommel!

You and Boris are coming up with new stuff at such a pace you make my head spin...:)

Looking good!! Indeed, the speed with which you go from one project to the other is astonishing.

You sure the cross guard is only 12cm long? More like 22cm...

Lukas: Of course, you are right. It´s exactly 22 cm. My bad:)
Julien: I´m just trying to keep pace with new projects keep piling up in my head :)

Yesterday we had public holidays, so I managed to spent few hours finishing the piece. First, I´ve made the handle (pic. 1). It´s made from an old oak (sandwich construction), soaked in oil, with steel ferules on both ends. I have also added a braid from twisted wire in the middle and two more on the ends.

Then came the long process of finishing the blade with sand papers. At the end, I´ve engraved the inscription. Engraving was an interesting experience as I have never done it on such a scale before. I´m not totally happy with the result, but next time it would be better (hopefully:))

Picture 2 shows the finished piece, with some details on other pictures.

Any comments or suggestions are welcome.

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That is one of the coolest stage blunts I have ever seen. Good job!

Very nice sword, i like it.

Oli