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Jeroen Zuiderwijk
Industry Professional
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 Posted: Wed 19 Dec, 2007 3:28 pm Post subject: |
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| Kirk Lee Spencer wrote: | Hi Jeroen...
If I remember right, most of the info in the book was related to the blade. (There were X-rays of its structure.) I can't remember anything on the fittings... sorry!
The pictures are in color and it looks to have a yellowish color. If I were to guess, I would say gilded bronze.
ks |
The color in the photo can be deceptive (yellow light), and silver can turn yellow by aging.
N.b. speaking of small new details that may change the complete views on saxes, check out the thread I just started on SFI:
http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.php?t=85559
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Fabrice Cognot
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Thu 20 Dec, 2007 12:58 am Post subject: |
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| Jeroen Zuiderwijk wrote: |
Yeah, that's why I generally don't like when they are called saxes, as they are different things, which may have some inspiration from saxes. To me it feels like calling Conan the Barbarian's sword a Viking sword. |
Amen ! I wholeheartedly agree with you my friend.
I had prepared a lengthy reply to all this, using several examples from our local collections, but for some reason things messed up, and I can't bother to re-type it right now.
All I wanted to say was that most of the surviving grips I know here (which are not too many, as you can guess) are a single piece of wood, and that we have no evidence of rivet holes, with one noticeable exception (square hole right in the middle of the tang, metal showing evidence of the hole being hot-punched - though I'll have to confirm that). I was in chalon two days ago and I think I spotted a 40-50 cms seax with a metal guard of sorts, but I'll check that out next January - had I been aware of this thread then I'd have tried to take some pics.
But my impression on the seaxes in the Chalon storage rooms is that they show a local type. Or rather : I believe there are a lot of different seax types, depending on the place and the period - so we have to be careful not generalising when using a single example - the Charlemagne knife being a much later exaple for instance.
As for he grip being 'waisted' (the other thread elsewhere), the shape makes sense. Speaking of this thread : I have evidence of selective/differential quenching on other weapons of the same period too. Now, affirming it was deliberately made is another thing. 
PhD in medieval archeology.
HEMAC member
De Taille et d'Estoc director
Maker of high quality historical-inspired pieces.
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Peter Johnsson
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Thu 20 Dec, 2007 2:03 am Post subject: |
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| Jeroen Zuiderwijk wrote: | | Kirk Lee Spencer wrote: | Hi Jeroen...
If I remember right, most of the info in the book was related to the blade. (There were X-rays of its structure.) I can't remember anything on the fittings... sorry!
The pictures are in color and it looks to have a yellowish color. If I were to guess, I would say gilded bronze.
ks |
The color in the photo can be deceptive (yellow light), and silver can turn yellow by aging.
N.b. speaking of small new details that may change the complete views on saxes, check out the thread I just started on SFI:
http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.php?t=85559 |
Manfred Sachse says the grip is horn in his book on damascus steel. He also points out that the damage in the grip (the "cut out") leaves a window where you can see the tang.
Like you and Fabrice, I think that many knives that today is called seaxes have little in common with the originals.
The surviving blades can tell us a lot of shape and function, even if the methods and materials used for grips are going to be a bit more uncertain.
I just read your post on Don Foggs forum. I love that example of the slab handeled broad seax! At the same time it is a bit frustrating in a way, since that is *the one* solution I never expected to see!
It is great what we can learn about the overall grip shape and size. I find it interesting that the grip tapers ever so slightly in width as it grows more narrow further away from the blade. There is also a very slight waist in the middle. It looks from the rivets that the grip also grew thicker towards the narrow end.
This shape follows the same logic as some surviving mounts suggest: a grip that is wide and thin at the blade end, but grows a bit more narrow but also thicker towards the butt end. Without surviving organic matter of the grip itself it is impossible to know the shape of the actual grip, but it has seemed reasonable to me there could have been a slight waist.
When Eric McHugh and I did a study trip in Sweden and England, keeping an eye out for seaxes, Eric remarked on the similarity with some roman knife handles to the shape that is suggested in the some of the surviving material on Seaxes: a grip that tapers *slightly* towards the butt end with a slight waist in the middle.
Grips are pretty nebulous, but there are some hints to be had from different sources.
An other solution is shown with the "Charlemagne" seax: a long straight grip without any tapering of the width whatsoever. I have never seen a photo or drawing of this one showing the section of the grip, but I would not be surprised if the grip was thinner at the blade and thicker at the butt end.
If this one indeed is made of horn, we have one case showing something else than wood being used, but I think it is reasonable to see exactly the same type of grip being shaped from wood and then very possible leather covered.
The reason a leather covering makes sense to me is that is helps strengthen the grip. As the thickness of the wood is slight around the rather beefy tangs on these knives, it might be a good idea?
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Jeroen Zuiderwijk
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Thu 20 Dec, 2007 4:21 am Post subject: |
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| Fabrice Cognot wrote: | | I had prepared a lengthy reply to all this, using several examples from our local collections, but for some reason things messed up, and I can't bother to re-type it right now. |
Ah, please
All I wanted to say was that most of the surviving grips I know here (which are not too many, as you can guess) are a single piece of wood, and that we have no evidence of rivet holes, with one noticeable exception (square hole right in the middle of the tang, metal showing evidence of the hole being hot-punched - though I'll have to confirm that). I was in chalon two days ago and I think I spotted a 40-50 cms seax with a metal guard of sorts, but I'll check that out next January - had I been aware of this thread then I'd have tried to take some pics.
| Quote: | | But my impression on the seaxes in the Chalon storage rooms is that they show a local type. Or rather : I believe there are a lot of different seax types, depending on the place and the period - so we have to be careful not generalising when using a single example - the Charlemagne knife being a much later exaple for instance. |
That's true. There's a clear evolution visible (see attached picture, for Alemanni saxes), but there are many exceptions and local charactaristics, that's often difficult to make hard conclusions.
| Quote: | | As for he grip being 'waisted' (the other thread elsewhere), the shape makes sense. Speaking of this thread : I have evidence of selective/differential quenching on other weapons of the same period too. Now, affirming it was deliberately made is another thing. |
If you can show the evidence, please Are you speaking of the different hardness measure over the blade, or different hardness within sections of the same carbon contents? (without workhardening). So far I've seen many blades with varying hardness, but it was explained by a difference in carbon contents, and in non-quenched blades by workhardening.
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Jeroen Zuiderwijk
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Thu 20 Dec, 2007 4:36 am Post subject: |
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| Peter Johnsson wrote: | | Manfred Sachse says the grip is horn in his book on damascus steel. He also points out that the damage in the grip (the "cut out") leaves a window where you can see the tang. |
Thanks! Must have been a really big horn from which they took the hilt!
| Quote: | | I just read your post on Don Foggs forum. I love that example of the slab handeled broad seax! At the same time it is a bit frustrating in a way, since that is *the one* solution I never expected to see! |
I know exactly what you mean However, it's great to see more evidence of the grip, and also to know that if you can't figure out the glue, there's an alterative that, while rare, is historic.
| Quote: | | This shape follows the same logic as some surviving mounts suggest: a grip that is wide and thin at the blade end, but grows a bit more narrow but also thicker towards the butt end. Without surviving organic matter of the grip itself it is impossible to know the shape of the actual grip, but it has seemed reasonable to me there could have been a slight waist. |
Yeah, I'm thinking the same thing. It's a lot like a hammer haft actually, both in shape and size.
| Quote: | When Eric McHugh and I did a study trip in Sweden and England, keeping an eye out for seaxes, Eric remarked on the similarity with some roman knife handles to the shape that is suggested in the some of the surviving material on Seaxes: a grip that tapers *slightly* towards the butt end with a slight waist in the middle.
Grips are pretty nebulous, but there are some hints to be had from different sources.
An other solution is shown with the "Charlemagne" seax: a long straight grip without any tapering of the width whatsoever. I have never seen a photo or drawing of this one showing the section of the grip, but I would not be surprised if the grip was thinner at the blade and thicker at the butt end. |
That would also make sense regarding the optional shape from the horn. You have the solid point, which transfers into the hollow section, with the thickness tappering down as the horn widens. If you allow the hilt to thin down to the front, that gives you a longer potential section from the horn that can be used for the hilt.
| Quote: | If this one indeed is made of horn, we have one case showing something else than wood being used, but I think it is reasonable to see exactly the same type of grip being shaped from wood and then very possible leather covered.
The reason a leather covering makes sense to me is that is helps strengthen the grip. As the thickness of the wood is slight around the rather beefy tangs on these knives, it might be a good idea? |
I think so too, although if you think of hammers, they generally don't have leather covers on them as well. IMO on a hammer, the extra friction would only lead to more blisters. In cast of the smaller seaxes (up to broadsaxes), which may have been tools as well, I'd think that they may have been bare wood. There is one sax found with leather covering the grip though. I definately have to see if I can find the article of this sax.
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Peter Johnsson
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Thu 20 Dec, 2007 5:39 am Post subject: |
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[quote="Jeroen Zuiderwijk"] | Peter Johnsson wrote: |
| Quote: | If this one indeed is made of horn, we have one case showing something else than wood being used, but I think it is reasonable to see exactly the same type of grip being shaped from wood and then very possible leather covered.
The reason a leather covering makes sense to me is that is helps strengthen the grip. As the thickness of the wood is slight around the rather beefy tangs on these knives, it might be a good idea? |
I think so too, although if you think of hammers, they generally don't have leather covers on them as well. IMO on a hammer, the extra friction would only lead to more blisters. In cast of the smaller seaxes (up to broadsaxes), which may have been tools as well, I'd think that they may have been bare wood. There is one sax found with leather covering the grip though. I definately have to see if I can find the article of this sax. |
Jeroen, I would really appreciate it if you could find that article about the leather covered grip. I am very curious to learn if there are any similarities to those I´ve seen in the Vendel/Valsgärde material.
On bare wood: yes, certainly, it is possible in many cases with just bare wood from a construction standpoint.
The difference between a hammer and a knife handle is obvioulsy that the knife handle is hollow. Wit the dimension of the tang of many of the seaxes, there would have been a small amount of wood left. You would have to choose the wood carefully to avoid checking and cracks in use, I would assume.
The only seaxes I have made myself, have had metal bands as reinforcement. I have not tried to make with just bare wood. I want to test this to see how it works.
My impression is that the shape of the grip is important. Changes in width and thickness makes for a great difference in ergonomics and control.
As there were at least two major types of scabbards, this will also have an impact on the grip that would work well.
There are those that encase more or less of the grip (like the "Charlemagne" knife). I have seen several examples of this type of scabbard in a more humble design on display (in Köln museum for example). These were germanic seaxes of large broad seax type, I think. A grip that should work in such a scabbard need to be more restrictive in the design of the shape.
The scabbards found in Vendel & Valsgärde are different. They have wood core and does not cover the grip, but leave it completely exposed. Such a scabbard does not impose any limits for the shaping of the grip, but it seems from the remains that a rather simple outline was common: again this slightly tapering grip with a hint of a waist (perhaps? difficult to make out in some cases), that was thin at the blade end and thicker towards the butt end.
The blade shape of these seaxes are similar to a few of those in the typology Jeroen posted before. The ones named: "Atypische Breitsaxe" have similar outline and are of similar size. That would place them in time around 670-700. I do not know how well that fits with the dating of the graves. I would have thought they were slightly earlier. Need to check that.
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Tim Lison
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| Posted: Thu 20 Dec, 2007 11:34 pm Post subject: |
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Wow. This topic has gotten really in depth! I love it. I wanted to post these two photos that I have. Is the first photo the sheath, blade and HANDLE of the same seax? The second is definitely the same seax/knife but is this of too late a period to be of interest to someone looking for info on seax handles....I can't read the Russian but it does have the roman numeral 13 on it. Does that mean 13th century? Anyone read Russian?
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J Anstey
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| Posted: Fri 21 Dec, 2007 5:28 pm Post subject: |
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Translation
Knife Iron
With Bronze Handle
Length 14cm
13th Century
Sorry the caption was not more revealing.
13th Century seems late to my novice understanding?
Cheers
Jason
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Jeroen Zuiderwijk
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Sat 22 Dec, 2007 3:25 am Post subject: |
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| J Anstey wrote: | 13th Century seems late to my novice understanding?
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Yeah, generally I wouldn't consider anything post 11th century a sax. Naturally some knive designs continue to be used, or evolve gradually further though. There's people who still consider puukkos as being saxes f.e. (but I just rather call those puukkos myself )
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Dustin R. Reagan
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| Posted: Mon 15 Sep, 2008 10:42 am Post subject: |
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| Kirk Lee Spencer wrote: | Here are a few images I have of Seax with grip material....
ks |
I am very curious about the second saex from the top (the one with the caption "Bone Grip with inscribed Circles. Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, Leiden Netherlands Compiled from photos by Jeroen Zuiderwijk" ).
Those bolsters, and perhaps the pommel as well, appear to be forge welded to the blade. Do you agree, or could there be some sort of hidden pinned construction? Is there any more info on this, such as the date?
Thanks for any input,,
Dustin
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Jeroen Zuiderwijk
Industry Professional
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| Posted: Tue 16 Sep, 2008 12:20 am Post subject: |
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| Dustin R. Reagan wrote: | | Kirk Lee Spencer wrote: | Here are a few images I have of Seax with grip material....
ks |
I am very curious about the second saex from the top (the one with the caption "Bone Grip with inscribed Circles. Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, Leiden Netherlands Compiled from photos by Jeroen Zuiderwijk" ).
Those bolsters, and perhaps the pommel as well, appear to be forge welded to the blade. Do you agree, or could there be some sort of hidden pinned construction? |
It's hard to tell. I've seen the blade up close, and there's no pins visible. So it might be forge welded, or the attachment is just not visible.
| Quote: | | Is there any more info on this, such as the date? |
It's dated 750-1000AD, and is from Heerewaarden, Netherlands. The length is 43.7cm and maximum width 4.5cm. It probably also had something attached to the back originally, like a ring, as there's a little piece of iron sticking out of the hilt. It's very a-typical for saxes, so I'm not sure whether to actually call it a sax, or just a big knife. It doesn't fit in any typology at least.
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