[Richard Fay]

[Bill Grandy]

[Roger Hooper]

Re: the Manning Imperial Dordogne sword -

To make a good replica or recreation of an original, you need more than an outline drawing. You need to see that sword in person, hold it in your white-gloved hands, take extensive measurements, photograph it from all angles, make some drawings. The Manning Dordogne has a fuzzy look to it, as if it were a copy of a copy of a copy. As if when it was finally made in the Philippines, there wasn't an absolutely clear idea about the design or the original sword. This is especially apparant when you look at the type 11 guard and the pommel.

I know it is very unfair to compare this sword to the much more expensive Albion Castellan shown below, but that is the kind of design that you get when you do all the research and then really decide to go for it.

Edited to say - I mistakenly called it the Manning Imperial, but really meant to say Imperial Weapons Generation 2 Dordogne Sword (as Chad points out below) Apologies to Australia.

[Chad Arnow]

[Chad Arnow]

Regarding the Ranger: that weight would be at the upper end of historical norms for its size and shapes. Is it unreasonable? Not necessarily, but it is on the heavy end for sure.

I think the very thick guard contributes to the weight:





From what I've seen of Generation II swords (not a whole lot admittedly), the guards are can be too thick.

[Clyde Hollis]

[Roger Hooper]

[Glen A Cleeton]

Honestly, I had never really payed much attention to the various Ranger incarnations from Generation 2 that now go back some years. There was even discussion of this same basic design when it was in the prototype stage. In visiting the site today, I see the new one listed at 3.75 pounds. IIRC, the first designs of this were coming in closer to six pounds (SFI threads, possibly old board)

Niche and handling aside, let's look at overall length for a minute. Visually, it is a fairly broad blade. This isn't a school of German longsword profile. It seems senseless to call it a hand and a half with those handle dimensions. However, owning an A&A GBS, I ask myself; Where does one really want to draw lines?

The Albion Chieftan is projected to be very much the same overall length and ballparked close to four pounds(3lbs 15ozs). It does list a longer blade, certainly is pointless to compare many other factors but is another wide-body of the same big profile. Again, handling aside, very close in overall length and weight.

~~~~~~

I do agree the Generation 2 fittings have a tendency to look bulkier than historical counterparts. It is not hard to see that several hilts look almost more like someone traced around the fittings of a similar swords and mailed/faxed off a sketch/drawing. It has been through feedback that some things seem to be slowly changing.

As the Oakeshott drawing seems to be no more than a sketch, not a detailed blueprint, it probably does lose yet a little more in shop translation. IIRC the counterpart to this thread elsewhere went very much the same way but other examples of this hilt type were brought forth that aren't as svelt as the Castillion most here are wont to compare. Will Hank, Clyde and the forge modify things over time? I don't know. For this model, I have a feeling they will more likely stick to their philosophy of "that's what the drawing shows".

At the price point, these could become good competition for other offerings. It still seems to be a growing process. Another I noticed on the IMperial site is a version of a XIIth century sword, quite like the A&A standard. It seems an effort to offer lower cost versions of some popular designs.


I may take a field trip over to one of the retailers of these (Silvermane). It is more than just across town but not a state away. I'll more likely try to catch them at a festival that is quite local.

Cheers

GC

[Chad Arnow]

Clyde,
I'm not debating the accuracy of the drawing. The drawing looks pretty close to historic examples I've seen from that find. However, the replica doesn't fully capture the lines and proportions of the drawing or the originals in my opinion. The guard is different. The pommel looks different, too, though not as much as the guard.

[Clyde Hollis]

[Roger Hooper]

I guess it depends on how accurate you want to be. If you wanted a replica or recreation of high accuracy, perhaps you should have chosen an original about which you had much more data, not just an outline. If you wanted to make a generic 15th century type XV, then maybe what you had was good for that purpose.

[Richard Fay]

Hello all!

Let me give some input regarding the drawing versus the replica of the Generation 2 Dordogne Sword from an artist's perspective. I have actually drawn swords, just from photos in various Oakeshott books, but I have put "pen to paper", as it were, to create drawings of swords. If I were to go in reverse, from the replica to the drawing, I would not draw the cross the same way that it's portrayed in the Oakeshott drawing. Being someone who is very concerned with lines and form, I notice right away that the lines on the Oakeshott drawing show more curvature, especially on the underside of the cross, than the replica. The underside of the cross on the replica is almost a straight line that cuts down at an angle, instead of a curve. Also, the transition from the straight part of the cross arms to the knobbed ends appears more abrupt in the replica. In the drawing, the transition looks much more "fluid", showing more gentle curvature. I also suspect, assuming that the little circle in the drawing represent a cross-sectional view of the cross, that the original display a more rounded cross-section than the replica. The replica cross appears to have a square or rectangular cross-section for most of it's width. I would draw the cross-section of the cross on the replica as a square or rectangle, not a circle.

The pommel on the replica is similar; it looks much more like the pommel in the drawing. The pommel near the grip on the replica may be slightly wider than in the drawing, but it's hard to say. The lines on the pommel of the replica do look roughly like the lines of the pommel in the drawing.

Again, this is not meant to be a criticism, just an observation. The replica looks roughly like the drawing, but it's not an exact match, at least not to my "artists's eyes". I hope it spells out how some may be perceiving how the replica differs from the drawing. Sometimes little details become big issues, especially when expectations run high.

However, I also encourage Clyde to continue doing what he is doing. I hope he takes comments made here as constructive criticism, and may utilize them to help his product line grow and evolve. I personally believe there is a niche for more budget-minded swords. The Dordogne certainly looks nicer than some swords in that price range. It's not terrible looking.

I also wonder, can we say for sure that no historic medieval sword of the same type had a "chunkier" cross than the one in the photo Chad posted, or in Oakeshott's drawing? I realize that they usually had elegant lines, but there was variation historically.

I hope this all made sense!

Stay safe!

[Chad Arnow]

[Chad Arnow]

[Richard Fay]

[Chad Arnow]

For fun, here are 15 of the 17 Dordogne swords, from an article by Oakeshott, discussed in this thread (the remaining two are quite different, though one has the same guard as some others). Two of these fifteen are of this form. One is the oft-published one, pictured above. The other one may be the "other one" being discussed here, unless the article doesn't include them all.



Below are scans of the two hilts:

[Joe Fults]

I'd like to hear more about the training sword.

Like for instance, how thik are the edges?

Has anbody handled it?

Could a shallow fuller trim some wieght without negative consequences?

[Tim M.]

I was wondering if anyone liked the new Gen2 Pro Sword Line Norman Medieval Sword?

[Jonathan Hopkins]

[Chad Arnow]