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Robert Muse




Location: Washington
Joined: 28 Sep 2009
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PostPosted: Sun 24 Jul, 2011 12:25 pm    Post subject: Broken sword into seax         Reply with quote

Hello All,

I have long wanted the seax sold by by ArmArt http://www.armart.antiquanova.com/short_blades.htm

Does anyone have any evidence of broken swords being turned into a seax? It only makes sense, but I would really like some input if anyone has photos or museum links.
Thanks
Robetrt
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Scott Woodruff





Joined: 30 Nov 2005
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PostPosted: Sun 24 Jul, 2011 10:39 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

I have never heard of a seax made from a broken sword blade. On the other hand, lots of sword blades were broken and then forge-welded back together. The ArmArt seax shown is purely fantasy.
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Viktor Abrahamson




Location: Sweden
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PostPosted: Sun 24 Jul, 2011 11:29 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Scott Woodruff wrote:
On the other hand, lots of sword blades were broken and then forge-welded back together.


Are there really lots of swords? Do you know of any examples?
Please show me some pictures if you know of any.
I thought that it would be impossible to fix a broken sword like that.
The high heat needed to forge-weld would probably burn the edges.

/Viktor
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David Gaál




Location: Hungary
Joined: 26 Mar 2011

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PostPosted: Mon 25 Jul, 2011 1:59 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

I thing in a war everything is imaginable, the goal is to kill your enemy and if you have no time to repair your broken sword it is the best idea to "recycle" it somehow like this blade. Or if you are someone who is not wealthy enough to repair it or just found its a good idea to make something like that out of it. Better to make something from it than to leave it rust.
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Scott Woodruff





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PostPosted: Mon 25 Jul, 2011 9:51 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

For starters, ther is the sword found in a burial mound at Hoff (or Hov,) Oslo and currently housed at the British Museum, London. Also, there is NM 1840:1 found at Peltorinne, Hame, Finland. With a little time, I could probably find another dozen examples. Both of these have breaks near the COP that were forge-welded in antiquiity. A few blades have been found that exhibit repairs to iron inlays that popped out in use, leaving a weak spot in the blade. On the other hand, I have never seen a single example of a seax that was just ground out of a double edged sword.
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Johan Gemvik




Location: Stockholm, Sweden
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PostPosted: Tue 26 Jul, 2011 10:46 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Never seen any seaxes that were made that way, but I've made one myself from an old sword and it's pretty easy.
So are there finds -probably none, but plausible to manufacture in that era -Hell yes!

Also note that thick made and wide bladed two edged swords with no fuller or a thin fuller could have been used to re-make into any number of seax finds we see today and we'd never know. Though it'd have to be pretty thick blades. Perhaps thicker than any found so far.

"The Dwarf sees farther than the Giant when he has the giant's shoulder to mount on" -Coleridge
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William P




Location: Sydney, Australia
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PostPosted: Fri 29 Jul, 2011 4:52 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

i dunno about seax but there are however, examples of rus and polish daggers which have what seem to be sword hilts suggesting the sword broke. like the sword of fellow reenactor quarf who broke his sword at ironfest on the helmet of another member of our group (i wasnt there to witness it unfortunately)

but as a result he is consdering regrinding whats left of the blade to be a dagger and showd me examples of the examples hes basing the idea off. and indeed its a pair of daggers with unusually large hilts.
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Gene W




Location: The South Of England
Joined: 01 Dec 2010

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PostPosted: Fri 29 Jul, 2011 5:24 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Viktor Abrahamson wrote:
Scott Woodruff wrote:
On the other hand, lots of sword blades were broken and then forge-welded back together.


Are there really lots of swords? Do you know of any examples?
Please show me some pictures if you know of any.
I thought that it would be impossible to fix a broken sword like that.
The high heat needed to forge-weld would probably burn the edges.

/Viktor


You often see forge welds on wootz sword blades. Most are part of the manufacturing process, scarf and lap welds to join cakes together, but I've seen some that are definate repairs to broken blades.

I take it you are only interested in European examples though?
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Randall Moffett




Location: Northern Utah
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PostPosted: Fri 29 Jul, 2011 5:51 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Would we even be able to tell is a seax was a sword originally? The likely fracture would be at the top and this likely would have been cut down for the new upper part of the seax. I know of no direct evidence this was done but it seems like physical remains would be hard to use for evidence.

RPM
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Johan Gemvik




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PostPosted: Fri 29 Jul, 2011 6:16 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

On the subject of re-using swords.

Any iron or steel tool or weapon could of course be re-used as metal raw material for making something new. It's unlikely you'd just throw it on a garbage pile like we do today. The point here I expect was more if a broken sword could be cold worked into a seax or if they'd usually end up as something else instead. Like plowshares... Wink

Cold working is much easier today with high powered angle grinders, even heavy machines like mills and such and that tends to affect how we work today with som many knives and other blades being done with stock removal. Especially re-making blades into different shapes is made easy. You could have used an historical grinding wheel to similar effect, foot pedal driven or even water wheel driven, though the former is more likely for viking age of course the other isn't impossible either for caftsmen having at some point visited Constantinople. But I still think most work was done hot. While this affects tempering it isn't impossible to re-temper a blade again if you have the skill and the edge material still retains enough carbon content to be tempered. Or even box carburize it to make up for lost carbon.

In the sagas ( I forget which one) there's mention of re-smithing a sword point into a spearhead. Both of which were said to have the same excellent quality. These are tales of dream and wonder, but it might indicate it was done. If it was a tanged slotted spear rather than a socket type it would have retained it's edge tempering, still keeping it the same quality so to speak. This could mean it was cold work ground to have a tang.
So then cold grinding to this degree where a seax could be made from a broken sword could be plausible? At least worth discussing.

"The Dwarf sees farther than the Giant when he has the giant's shoulder to mount on" -Coleridge


Last edited by Johan Gemvik on Fri 29 Jul, 2011 6:24 am; edited 2 times in total
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Johan Gemvik




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PostPosted: Fri 29 Jul, 2011 6:20 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Randall Moffett wrote:
Would we even be able to tell is a seax was a sword originally? The likely fracture would be at the top and this likely would have been cut down for the new upper part of the seax. I know of no direct evidence this was done but it seems like physical remains would be hard to use for evidence.

RPM


Yes I agree. Though a fuller as seen in the photo above would be noticeable and none like that have been found as far as I know. Perhaps if one had a very thin fullered broken sword and you made made one of those long thin seaxes and cut away the fuller, just using one side outside of it, that migth give just the right triangle shape we see in seaxes. Obviously the larger seaxes couldn't have been made this way from their shape, but certainly some of the smaller ones could.

"The Dwarf sees farther than the Giant when he has the giant's shoulder to mount on" -Coleridge
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Viktor Abrahamson




Location: Sweden
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PostPosted: Mon 01 Aug, 2011 4:39 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Gene W wrote:
Viktor Abrahamson wrote:
Scott Woodruff wrote:
On the other hand, lots of sword blades were broken and then forge-welded back together.


Are there really lots of swords? Do you know of any examples?
Please show me some pictures if you know of any.
I thought that it would be impossible to fix a broken sword like that.
The high heat needed to forge-weld would probably burn the edges.

/Viktor


You often see forge welds on wootz sword blades. Most are part of the manufacturing process, scarf and lap welds to join cakes together, but I've seen some that are definate repairs to broken blades.

I take it you are only interested in European examples though?



Yes mostly European swords, but any pictures with repaired blades would be much appreciated.

/Viktor
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Gene W




Location: The South Of England
Joined: 01 Dec 2010

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PostPosted: Mon 01 Aug, 2011 10:29 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Viktor Abrahamson wrote:
Gene W wrote:
Viktor Abrahamson wrote:
Scott Woodruff wrote:
On the other hand, lots of sword blades were broken and then forge-welded back together.


Are there really lots of swords? Do you know of any examples?
Please show me some pictures if you know of any.
I thought that it would be impossible to fix a broken sword like that.
The high heat needed to forge-weld would probably burn the edges.

/Viktor


You often see forge welds on wootz sword blades. Most are part of the manufacturing process, scarf and lap welds to join cakes together, but I've seen some that are definate repairs to broken blades.

I take it you are only interested in European examples though?



Yes mostly European swords, but any pictures with repaired blades would be much appreciated.

/Viktor



Hi Viktor,

This is not a sword of mine, it is owned by Rick ("RSWORD") It was repolished and etched recently.

I have an interesting crystaline wootz sword blade with a very visible lap weld which although not what you are looking for, would illustrate the difference?

Although repairs to European blades are not something I've ever really given much though to, I'd have to say that if a skilled smith can repair a material as 'difficult' as fine wootz without altering the profile, destroying the 'wootz' pattern or even leaving obvious heat traces, then a repair to an old European blade might not even be visible if done well. Especially if hidden by some oxidisation.



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G Ezell
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PostPosted: Mon 01 Aug, 2011 3:37 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

I don't think it likely because seaxes tended to be quite thick compared to swords of the same period, to the best of my knowledge. I will not completely rule it out, but I think it very unlikely.
" I have found that it is very often the case that if you state some absolute rule of history, there will be an example, however extremely unusual, to break it."
Gabriel Lebec

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Hadrian Coffin
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Location: Oxford, England
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PostPosted: Mon 01 Aug, 2011 11:33 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Hello,
I have some photos on my computer of Viking era pattern welded swords forgewelded to repair a fracture. It will have to wait though as my computer is currently undergoing repair. I believe there is a fixed broken sword in Swords of the Viking Age (Ian Pierce) but I'll have to check.

There are images of medieval swords being re-forged into other items, and ample re-hilting and re-use of swords throughout history. The concept of a sword being transformed into a seax is not out of the question at all. The reality is proving a theory such as this is nearly impossible. Predicting the original use of the metal in a seax is in general not possible. Even strong indicators that may suggest such a scenario are basically unprovable. If we take the ArmArt piece, for example, and pretend it is real, we would still have difficulty proving it was indeed a broken sword and not a purpose built completely new, unprecedented style of seax.

Cheers!

Historia magistra vitae est
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Dustin R. Reagan





Joined: 09 May 2006

Posts: 264

PostPosted: Tue 02 Aug, 2011 7:24 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

G Ezell wrote:
I don't think it likely because seaxes tended to be quite thick compared to swords of the same period, to the best of my knowledge. I will not completely rule it out, but I think it very unlikely.


Agreed. If one found a sword-turned-into-seax it should be quite obvious, since the thickness profile would differ so radically from that of most seax.

To me it is more plausible that a broken sword could be used as material in forging a new seax. Perhaps the edge steel of the sword could have been hot chiseled away from the blade and butt-welded directly onto the body of a new seax, for instance.
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Dustin R. Reagan





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PostPosted: Tue 02 Aug, 2011 7:25 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Hadrian Coffin wrote:
Even strong indicators that may suggest such a scenario are basically unprovable. If we take the ArmArt piece, for example, and pretend it is real, we would still have difficulty proving it was indeed a broken sword and not a purpose built completely new, unprecedented style of seax.


Yes! good point!
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Johan Gemvik




Location: Stockholm, Sweden
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PostPosted: Tue 02 Aug, 2011 4:33 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Visiting the Viking exhibit at Historiska museet here in in stockholm I examined the thin but fairly long Seax in the display. It's blade width of about 2.5 cm would have allowed it to be a part cut from a broken broad bladed thick type X sword outside the fuller. On the other hand we'll never really be able to say either way for sure.

Sorry, couldn't get a decent picture with my crappy camera in my phone, but I might get one off the vritual DVD I bought of the exhibit.

"The Dwarf sees farther than the Giant when he has the giant's shoulder to mount on" -Coleridge
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Jeroen Zuiderwijk
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PostPosted: Thu 04 Aug, 2011 3:26 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Saxes and swords have very different profiles, which don't lend a sword being turned into a sax as already mentioned. If swords were turned into single edged sax like weapons, you'd have to look for odd ones, which don't really fit within the standard sax types. There's one example that is described as being a modified double edged sword into a sax like weapon:





It indeed has a broad fuller and thin blade that clearly shows this used to be a sword. The blade is also also very unlike normal saxes. The hilt is also unique, and looks like a sword grip, rather then a sax hilt. It's made from bone, and short, two things you don't see on standard sax types.

There's one other odd sax (the one with a bird shaped hilt) which is said to be a cut down (single edged?) sword. But this is information from hearsay, so don't put too much value in that.

Jeroen Zuiderwijk
- Bronze age living history in the Netherlands
- Barbarian metalworking
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- Zip-file with information about saxes
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