Making a baselard sword/switzer soft kit -- myArmoury.com

Tom King

I've been throwing around the idea of making a swiss pikeman soft kit for the past few weeks. Considering the prohibitive cost of a landshneckt soft kit, i figure that i could make the more conservative puff and slash of the swiss confederacy myself. This outfit, paired with a cannibalized GDFB coif (for a bishops mantle) and some pieces of my similar period armor could give me a nice new look.

Baselard swords seem to be near nonexistent below the level of of the amazing ones Tod makes, even though the design is purposefully simplistic. I've been leaning towards buying a Albion Single-Hand XVIII blade and hilting it similarly to the Hanwei baselard dagger, but am concerned about the Length. A 28 inch blade would definitely be on the long side for the style and I'm not sure that the hilt style can balance that much blade. That being said, the preliminary 1:1 sketch i made proves that it would be a beautiful looking sword.

A few of my friends have also thought of swapping over to a switzer look, and we don't want to all look the same. It seems that onion pommeled two handed swords were popular, but del tin is the most economical maker of the pattern which is out of the petty cash level of purchasing. Kreigsmessers are also good, but the cold steel is a bit too ahistorical where as the lutel is on par with an albion in price and accuracy. I'm wondering if anyone else knows of any other commercial makers of typical 16th century infantry swords within the sub350 dollar price range.

Also, based on my knowledge of windlass swords, their Pavia great sword is probably crazily whippy considering its size, but at the price point it may be worth it as a show piece. In the same strain, the Hanwei lowlander sword seems to be a decent, incredibly huge, slaughter sword, while not looking stereotypically Scottish in design.

Right now i'm just in the conceptual stage of a new kit, so any recommendations as far as what direction to go will be helpful .

Tom King · Posted: Fri 28 Sep, 2012 2:36 am Post subject:

A photo of the basic design I'm thinking of for the baselard hilt

Mark T · Posted: Fri 28 Sep, 2012 4:15 am Post subject:

Hi Tom,

Sounds like a great project!

For a Schweitzerdegen, have you seen Arms & Armor's limited edition?: http://www.armour.com/limitededition.html I'm amazed more people haven't been all over this!

Arma Bohemia also have a couple of models: http://www.armabohemia.cz/Novestr/swordsA.htm

For ideas for kit, both of Gerry Embleton's books might have some leads, and there's a thread over at The Armor Archive which has some good Swiss sources, including the book One million mercenaries. (The thread is titled something like 'I want ot be a Swiss...' - you'll find it.) I think that thread also has a link to Albert Winkler's 1982 thesis The Swiss and war: The impact of society on the Swiss military in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries which has some good context.

Tom King · Posted: Fri 28 Sep, 2012 6:06 am Post subject:

mark, those arma bohemia swords are amazing, but their kreigsmesser jumps out at me more than the baselards. I think i'd actually enjoy the project of assembling the sword from scratch. Its good to see a few examples with full sized cut and thrust blades though on this hilt style. I'll be sure to check out the other resources as well; thanks for the help

Tjarand Matre · Posted: Fri 28 Sep, 2012 9:09 am Post subject:

The Kriegsmesser on the Arma Bohemia site is made by Pavel Moc (swords.cz). If you buy direct from him you save 90 euro ;-) I want one badly ...

Thomas R. · Posted: Sat 29 Sep, 2012 12:50 am Post subject:

Hi Tom,

maybe this photo is useful to you? It shows the various length of swiss daggers. I took it a couple of years ago at the Rothenburger Reichsstadtmuseum. I am looking forward to see you project finished!

Regards,
Thomas

Tom King · Posted: Mon 01 Oct, 2012 1:56 pm Post subject:

Basic idea for the hilt. grip would be made out of two pieces with the pathway for the tang milled out of the center. The guard and pommel plate would be made out of 1/4in mild steel plate, bent to shape (radius of 8in) with the blade inset and hole for the tang cut out. Water jet CNC or a CNC plasma cutter would probably work best for the guard and pommel, with the grip made on a standard CNC machine. If i can't get into a shop, i could build it with a sander, router, and jig saw.

Mart Shearer · Posted: Sun 19 May, 2013 7:40 pm Post subject:

I just stumbled on this miniature of an I-hilt baselard-sword from a German Speculum Humanae Salvationis from c. 1360.
http://tudigit.ulb.tu-darmstadt.de/show/Hs-25...rrent_page

Tom King · Posted: Mon 20 May, 2013 8:37 pm Post subject:

wow, is this a blast from the past; that happened to get the cogs whirring yet again now that summer has started....

I'm thinking of cutting down a HT longsword blade into a 20"-22" wideish bladed shortsword and turning the clipped tip into a 8ish inch bladed companion dagger. the perfect set for inter pikeblock fighting after the press.

Bart Jongsma · Posted: Tue 21 May, 2013 2:58 am Post subject:

Just as an FYI, Albion also sells a bare blade 18" fullered dagger that I think could make a pretty good baselard blade: http://www.albion-europe.com/swords/bare-blad...?model=140

As you can see from the scale picture, it's almost as big as the gladius, so more of a short sword than a dagger, really.