[J.D. Crawford]

'The Sword in Anglo-Saxon England' by Davidson describes another sword of the same type found in the River Thames near Westminster, apparently known as the Westminster Hilt. (Figure 68, and pages 55, 71). The hilt is so close to the Witham sword that at first I assumed it was the same sword by a different name, but the book talks about both swords separately and correctly describes the Witham sword, so it seems unlikely that there would be such a mix up. Going by the figure: exact same shape of guard with lozenge decorations (doesn't say if they are the same substance) and same pommel with more lozenges, except there is a double lozenge on the central lobe of the pommel. The tang is also similar, although it is a bit asymmetric and does not narrow as dramatically. The book lists this sword as being in the British museum. I was there a few months ago but stupidly did not take pictures, and now can't remember if I saw it or not. Maybe someone else is more familiar with this piece?

If the Westminister hilt is separate and legitimate, that makes for at least two authentic Saxon era sword hilts of the same type.

[Dan Dickinson]

Patrick Barta makes a copy of the Westminister sword, but I'm not sure if he had access to the original or not.
Dan

http://templ.net/pics-weapons/130-sword/130-hilt-v.jpg

[Shane Allee]

I had hopes from the topic title that this might be about the Westminster Reach sword. For years now I have wanted to see better pictures of it. The only picture that I was able to find was in Laking's A Record of European Armour and Arms that can be seen here (C).


http://www.vikingsword.com/laking/lak001b.html

From the picture the angle of the upper guard looks different from the Westminster hilt as drawn by Oakeshott for The Sword in Anglo Saxon England. Part of it might be the lighting in the photograph though.

Shane

[J.D. Crawford]

[Kirk Lee Spencer]

[Maurizio D'Angelo]

If I were the buyer, after what I read I should be worried...and if the wrongdoer's me,
I Joke.
Chad written: "It could be a fake, of course, but that would mean it fooled the people at Christie's and a curator from the British Museum. Certainly possible. The buyer who paid £ 32,450 for it must have been convinced."
I can share.
But if it is a fake, one must admit that whoever did this knows the techniques of ageing steel.
Ciao
Maurizio

[Jeff Pringle]

An early mention of the Witham sword from ARCHAEOLOGIA : MISCELLANEOUS TRACTS 1887… erroneously describes the applied ornament as gold, but accurately mentions the parallel engraved lines, contrasting that with the koftgari-style crosshatching used on the “Scandinavian type” sword under discussion in the article:

“A finer example of the same type [ swords with curved guards & pommel bars ], found in the river Witham, and also in the Museum series, illustrates the sword we have here ; the decoration of the hilt consists of rows of lozenges of gold bordered with lines of copper ; the gold plating is fixed in the same manner, but that in the Witham specimen the hatching is formed by perfectly regular vertical lines.”

In the article “Some Neglected Late Anglo-Saxon Swords” by David M. Wilson he describes the Westminster sword’s decoration, sounds like koftgari-style again:

“The iron guard is curved and thin metal has been applied to each face by hammering wires into a surface prepared by cross-hatching. Set against a general background of silver is a series of lozenges which do not touch each other. Each lozenge is made up of two different coloured metals, a red brass frame round a copper centre. The curved pommelguard is decorated in a similar manner; the tang is featureless. The pommel-knop is attached to the pommel-guard. It is trilobate and the outer lobes have a moulded contour, each of which almost forms two extra lobes. The channels between the lobes were originally filled with a pressed copper sheet imitating three wires twisted together to form a herring-bone pattern: much of this sheet has now disappeared. Traces of the same pressed sheet can be seen in the channel between the pommelguard and the pommel. The surface of the pommel was silvered (much of the silver inlay is now missing) in the same manner as the two guards, and the two central lobes are further embellished with elongated (and slightly irregular) lozenges which have a copper centre and are framed by a silver and a brass wire.”

None of the swords with ‘lozenge’ decoration that I have seen or read about used gold. Brass copper and silver are the metals used on just about every sword in the Viking Age, “white gold” is nonexistent in period as far as I know – has anyone heard of that metal in an Anglo-Saxon context?

[Shane Allee]

Thanks for the picture Kirk.

Shane

[Richard Hare]

Jeff,

Thank you for your detailed reply. It gives a much better idea of what the sword was like originally.

Re white gold, No, I have never heard of it on Viking age weapons.
Gold seems much rarer than in the Migration or early Anglo-Saxon period but what I've heard of is the yellows or red.

Richard.

[Peter Johnsson]

The decoration on the Witham sword is not pressed/damascened into "perfectly regular vertical lines" as described in the article “Some Neglected Late Anglo-Saxon Swords” by David M. Wilson, but indeed made up from wires worked into crosshatching. The cross hatching is not done with the "normal" angular sloping lines across the surface, but vertical and horizontal.
I don´t think the solid areas of the lozenges were made by cut sheets pressed in place, but rather thin wire worked into a covering surface, just like koftgari. This also goes for the background that was most probably silver. The lozenges are made with a border of red coper and a filling of yellow metal. The surface is now worn so the decoration only remains in the groves of the cross hatching in most places. The silver background is mostly eaten away, but the lozenges survives to a greater degree.
Below is a detail showing what the original now looks like:

[Peter Johnsson]

[Maurizio D'Angelo]

Hi Peter,
I do not know the techniques for aging steel, I can only think of some acid or chemical, but I have no experience for that.
Certainly, if someone like you has doubts of authenticity, I confirm: the buyer is right if worries about a bad purchase.
Ciao Peter
Maurizio

[Dan Dickinson]

Peter certainly could make a great fake.
Here's one he did a few years ago for fun (looks pretty convincing to me, but I'm no expert).

Speaking of “Some Neglected Late Anglo-Saxon Swords” by David M. Wilson, does anyone have the accompanying plates?
I have the article, but not the plates it references.
Thanks,
Dan

[Jeff Pringle]

Ha!
I was going to say in my last post that you cannot rely on the written descriptions of swords you find in books. They are always imprecise and often wrong, from the perspective of a maker at least. I think “Swords of the Viking Age” mentions parallel cuts, but not that they are in more than one direction. I suspect many fakes were made by people who have not seen any/many originals up close, so perhaps the inadvertent misdirection in the literature is a contributing factor to some of the fakes ‘looking’ fake.
The big problem with white gold in the Viking era is that there are many examples of metal workers making base metals look more precious, covering iron hilts in sliver and copper, tinning copper to look like silver etc. but since white gold looks like silver it would be making a precious metal appear more base. In the days before standard government hallmarks & ‘18K’ stamps it is unlikely anyone would conceive of ‘white gold’ or think it was a good idea.

[Jeff Marlin]

I found some pics of the one in the Hermitage which is often mentioned alongside the River Witham sword because of the similarity of their insciptions:

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=10337

Thought it might be good to post for comparison because this sword seems rather ill-published in the West.
It has a different blade type (Geibig 3) and hilt style than the Witham, so it seems less a good match than the mysterious Westminster Reach sword Illustrated in Ellis-Davidson which nobody seems to have a good photo of.
Of course who's to say a single shop didn't make more than one style of blade, but the hilt is certainly different.

[Jonathan Fletcher]

I am going to revive this thread from the depths...

The sword that sold at Christie's is not the Westminster sword.

The Westminster sword in Ellis-Davidson, etc, was published in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries in 1887. It was then in private hands, current whereabouts unknown.

I have a copy of the original PSA article, kindly sent to me by Barry Ager at the British Museum. This, particularly the scale drawings, were used by Pat Barta to make a reproduction. I do not have the article to hand to offer a proper reference.

Note, the photo's on Pat's site show his first attempt at the Westminster hilt, using silver and gold foil hammered into hatched grooves cut into the iron. Alas, this didn't turn out so well as, we thought, the foil was not thick enough: Pat couldn't source thicker gold foil in particular. In a nut shell, it looked painted and fragile. On reflection now, seeing Peter's photo's of the Witham hilt and reading about hilt plating in Peirce's 'Swords of the Viking Age', both the Westminster and Witham swords must have utilised very fine wire hammered into the cross hatched grooves and then assumably hammered flat/blended to form a proper plated finish without any gaps between the individual strands of wire.

Thankfully, Pat took the sword back to be re-hilted. I still have pangs of guilt about doing this, but then the resulting 2nd attempt at the hilt, using silver, copper and brass wire inlay is stunning. Pat seems to be offering some newer hilts with plating using the wire inlay method: See the silver elements to this hilt http://www.templ.net/pics-weapons/154-sword/154corpus-v.jpg which show how the silver wires have been blended into a plated finish.

The sword/hilt handles beautifully, the curving graceful guards very Anglo-Saxon, very ergonomic. The Westminster blade was 'damascened' according to the original publication, hence we opted for a PW blade not an 'Ingelrii' or other inscription. It is wide (c.6cm) at the cross, similar in profile to the inscribed blades of Ulfbhert & Ingelrii, etc of the same period.

Enjoy, Pat's work as amazing as always...

[Jonathan Fletcher]

In case anyone interested, the original publication of the Westminster Sword was p.390-392, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of London, November 21 1895 to June 17 1897, Second series, Volume XVI