[Greg E]

Hello,

I just recently bought a Windlass Viking spear and mounted it on a hickory pole today. Very solid. It being my first spear I have become very impressed with this style of weapon.
I have been doing some minor research into Viking Spears and reproductions of them. Looking at Pettersens spear typology it seems that there are only a few types that I have seen recreated like the G and H, which it seems the Windlass falls into, more or less. And I have seen some recreations that look like boar spears with sharp angles and huge wings/lugs on the socket.
What I haven't seen are the type A leaf blade type and the B and C leaf blade types with smaller wings/lugs. And the type E and I, long narrow bladed types. Maybe a Celtic spear would be historically similar?
Does anyone make a production spear head that is not the Windlass or A&A type of Viking spear? Have any of you bought or had one made from a smith that might be interesting and of the not so common types? I would love to see pictures and any information on them you might have.

Any thoughts on my rambling train of thought would be very interesting to me.

Thank You,
Greg

[Greg E]

These are pictures of some of the relic spears I would like to know if anyone has made or had custom made. The leaf blade shape with the wide point in the middle of the blade looks interesting. Think most of these are type B.

http://mis.historiska.se/mis/sok/include_image_exp.asp?uid=338933
http://mis.historiska.se/mis/sok/include_image_exp.asp?uid=338936
http://mis.historiska.se/mis/sok/include_image_exp.asp?uid=341009
http://mis.historiska.se/mis/sok/include_image_exp.asp?uid=341010
all from historiska.se

[Carl W.]

Greg,

Might consider Paul Binns - see his Frankish winged spearhead, & that may be just an example plus he does customize. I don't have a spear from Paul but he made me a very nice semi-custom sax blade.

http://www.paul-binns-swords.co.uk/Pole_arms.html

I have 2 A&A spearheads, Viking & 12th C. Both are very sturdy & I like them. I believe A&A will customize so they are likely another option.

Where did you get your hickory pole?

[Robert Muse]

Paul Binns is good, so is Petr. Just depending on what your budget is. You might try Peter Szabo. He has been making some Anglo Saxon spears for me. He does good work at very fair prices, if you don't want pattern welded. I have spear heads from them and a couple of others.

Robert

[Jeremy V. Krause]

I have a really nice and accurate 12th. C. spear with iron blade and hand-made steel edges made by Patrick Barta. His prices are extremely good for spears but his waiting list can be very long.

[Greg E]

Thank you for the options and opinions. I will have to contct those Smith's to see if they can make an accurate representation of a type b spear.

I got the hickory staff at www.woodenswords.com
I think it is in the Renaissance section under staffs.

[Greg E]

I have a Viking spear now on commision with Peter Szabo. So far all communication has been excellent. When it arrives I will post pics and maybe a mini review.

[Greg E]

Well I was just sent pictures of my new spear. To say that I am happy is an understatement. I chose to go with a Petersen Type C spear, which has a bit more of a point than the B.






Here are some originals
http://mis.historiska.se/mis/sok/include_image_exp.asp?uid=338933
http://mis.historiska.se/mis/sok/include_image_exp.asp?uid=338933

[Greg E]

Got the tracking number, so it is on it's way. A lot of looks, but no comments. I think I did well on this and it looks good.

[Jeffrey Hildebrandt]

Looks good! Amazing turn around time, too.

[William Swiger]

I really like the spear. Looking forward to final pics with it mounted.

[Robert Muse]

Hello Greg,

Yes, Peter did well on that one. I followed that one on his site. You will like it even better when you get it.. I am now on my fourth order from Peter, an Anglo Saxon Argon. Good work at fair prices, and yes, he can still do a good turn around.

Robert

[Greg E]

This is my first commissioned piece from any smith. So I am very glad that it has gone so well so far. It will not be my last. I will have to look for another Viking spear type that is not readily available.

[Greg E]

My Petersen Type C Viking Spear has arrived from Slovakia.
It decided to take a long site seeing vacation at the dock in New York City, but finally came home to me yesterday.

Peter Szabo is the Slovakian smith who I commissioned to do this piece. Working with him was a pleasure. He asks a lot of questions about how you would like the piece made. What methods used and the final finish desired. I was able to furnish him with a number of pictures of the type of spear I was looking for. One of them, from a Swedish museum, had a centimeter scale next to it which allowed a good determination of size for the project.

Since this was a custom piece he asked for payment up front, in case I backed out, he would have to sell it to recoup his money. I understood and agreed to his price for the piece and shipping, which in this case ended up less than $300 total. It did not take him long to finish the spear and to ship it off, providing me with tracking information. I tracked it to New York City, where it took about a week long vacation there before being sent off to me.

It arrived well packaged and in good condition, but for one thing. It had a small area of surface rust where the socket meets the blade on one side. Being that it was shipped dry and spent time at a sea port, I can see where this might have come from.

I decided to take some pictures with my 2 spears so that one might be able to judge shape and size better with the comparison of the Szabo spear and a Windlass Viking spear.

The Szabo on bottom and Windlass on top. Clickable pictures.

The Windlass Viking spear head is about 14 and 3/4" long and weighs about 14 ounces.
The Szabo Type C Viking spear is considerably more sizable at 18 and 1/4" and 26.6 ounces or 1.66 pounds.

I used 2 different shafts/poles for the spears.
For the Windlass I used a 1 and 1/4"x6' Hickory staff from Woodenswords.com or Purpleheart Armory as they are called. This was an extremely straight and hard piece of wood that comes with a lacquer or urethane coating on it. I left it as it came and attached the head to the staff with a couple of wood screws.

For the Szabo Spear I used a 1 and 1/4"x 7' Hanwei Ash Spear Pole OX005 from Kult of Athena. And as they say on the Kult site that they all seem to have some warp, I received one that was warped a bit in a couple areas. It comes natural with no stain or coating on it. I cut off about 8 inches of it and stained it with a walnut stain we had at the house. I attached the spear head using 2 nails and then hammered the head of the nails a bit to make them rounded and flush.

The Windlass head came unsharpened so I set about putting an edge on it and taking out some of the very obvious and annoying grind marks with 1000 grit, 2000 grit wet dry sand paper and 000 steel wool with polishing compound. I did not get it mirror bright, because, I don't care for that kind of finish, but I did clean it up a bit.

The Szabo came in a finish that is both smooth and forge finished. It is hard to explain, but you can certainly see that it is a forged piece that has been smoothed out a bit, but not polished. I like this finish on this particular piece. As I mentioned earlier it did have some surface rust that was easily taken care of with some CLP and steel wool. It came with an edge on it but I felt I wanted it sharper, so I put a slight sharpening to it and am quite pleased with the edge now.

As can be expected the Windlass spear is very light and maneuverable. it is easily used in a one handed grip overhand or underhand style. The Szabo is not hard to use at all, it is just not quite the easy whip around type like the Windlass. And seems much more usable in a two hand style with it's weight.

They both handle cardboard boxes easily, not having to put any real force behind them at all, going very deep up the blade. Now I did do a test that my wife did not approve of on a pair of Birch trees in our back yard. I stabbed a tree with the windlass in a half hearted attempt and it went in good half inch into the trunk. I took my hand off if the shaft and the blade bent and took about a 20 degree set. I pulled it out easy and bent it back with no problems.
I did the same thing with the Szabo spear and it penetrated about an inch and 1/8" and while it sagged slightly, it took no set when I let go of the shaft. It also didn't want to come out of the trunk easily. I can imagine if I had thrust with power and anger, I would still be out there wiggling the spear out of my tree. One thing I noticed is when I propped up the Szabo spear against the tree and let it drop against my wood deck, it hit it edge on and sunk into the deck a bit. I could see this indeed being used to hew and slash effectively.

The Szabo spear is my first commissioned piece of any type and I am for the most part happy with it. I like that fact that it is in a style that I really like and is not seen much. I am wrestling with the properties of a hand made piece. Not all lines are straight, the blade is at a slight angle to the socket, those types of things. I find myself liking symmetry of probuction in my pieces one minute and uniqueness of hand made pieces the next. So unfortunately, I will probably be buying production and custom in the future. My wallet is weeping at the thought of it.

[Danny Grigg]

Greg

Great looking Type C Spear, was this reproduced from a specific historical example?

As per a PDF translation of Jan Petersen's spear typology by Elling Polden this type is dated to the last half of the 9th century AD.

Could you supply some more dimensions of your Type C:

Blade Length:
Overall width including the wings:
Width of head not including the wings:
Overall length of head and shaft:
Overall weight of head and shaft:

Could you also provide the following for the Windlass Spear:
Overall length of head and shaft:
Overall weight of head and shaft:

Thanks

Danny

[Greg E]

Danny,
While it will be a while before I can get to the spears to give you the dimensions you asked for, I can point you to the second post in this thread which has links to a few of the pictures I sent to Peter to go off of. They are from a museum in Sweden I believe. The different spear heads all look very similar.

[Greg E]

[Greg E]

Windlass spear head should be 14 3/4" in length

[Danny Grigg]

Greg

Thanks for the information, I appreciate it.

Do we know how long typical Viking spear shafts were and of what wood they were made of?
Have any Viking spear shafts been found intact?
I believe there have been some Celtic La Tene spear shafts found intact, but I'm not sure about Viking ones.

So Greg when are you going to start on replicating the rest of Petersen's spear typology?

Danny

[Greg E]

From what I gathered the shafts on Viking spears were generally 6 to 8 feet in length, with many exceptions I am sure. Ash is believed to be what they were made of. My hickory spear shaft is definitely heavier than the ash one. The socket on the Szabo spear is a little bit bigger than the original to work on the 1 1/4" ash pole that I had.

I am currently looking to do another one of the Petersen types if I can settle on one and be able to find size data to go along with pictures. Thinking of a winged K or one of the really long wingless Ks. Not sure yet, but I am thinking about it.