[Darrin Hughes]

Thanks for keeping this alive chaps And thanks for the article about the Ulfberht mark. I'm not sure how this ties in with the Type L discussion, Albert and I have both touched on the whole issue of Frankish made swords being hilted up by local cutlers, but I thought that I would just add a quick comment about the Ulfberhts and their apparent longevity. I was discussing this recently with Paul Binns, with regards to the possibilty of forgeries and how easy it is to distinguish a copy from the real thing, and he seems to think that we could be looking at several generations of Ulfberhts, where the founder of the original workshop has established a reputation, and then passed the business on to his sons. As their reputation spread they may well have employed other workers but the workshop would have remained in family hands, this way the Ulfberht pattern-welded into the blade is both a trademark and a signature.

Cheers,
Darrin.

[Richard Hare]

Good morning, Darrin.

I think Anne's article ties in very well with your questions re. Type L's.

For imstance, you asked why we continue to call type L's Anglo-Saxon, when more have been found in Pagan Scandanavia.
Her very in-depth research has shown Exactly the same results regarding the Vlfberht blades,...Few found in the Frankish realm where they were made, and Many more spread over 23 countries.
Do you not see the parellel?

Regarding your discussion with Paul on the Vlfberht swords, I would beg you to again read Anne's paper, and chech her nearly two full pages of references. I do not think her findings are something we can brush of lightly, as her finding are such...findings, based on research, and not just her ideas.

The type L's may be spread wide, but are still Anglo-Saxon. This hilt may be found in a plain or plainer version, in particularly Norway, but the Norwegian versions have no Anglo-Saxon decorations, And are of a somewhat later date.

When we remember how close the ties were between Norway and England at this time, and how raids On Norway, From England are recorded, it is not surprising how the Type "L" found its way there, the hilt in time to be copied by any smith who found it useful.(my supposition!)

Speaking of the Norwegian -English ties, It appears that up to a generation or so ago, you could take a farmer from the Yorkshire Dales, and a Norwegian, and they could pretty-well understand each other.
(FWIW, I was born and raised on a farm half-way between Ormesby... (Snaketown!) and Normanby...(Stronghold of the Norwegians...according to "English place-names"))
I don't add this to impress anyone, but simply to show the Norse influence in the noth, ( though I know Darrin, you are fully aware of this!!)

Sorry for rabbiting on.

Richard.

[Kirk Lee Spencer]

[Darrin Hughes]

Thanks Kirk. The number of different variants of type L hilts is one of the things that had me wondering about origins. In the Davidson book there is the rather hopeful comment that maybe one day we might be able to identify a single workshop where these were turned out, as though we were looking at an Anglo-Saxon cutler or silversmith working in an Ulfberht-like fashion. But to me this is good evidence of a number of workshops hilting up blades in their own style. I've already mentioned that I have no problem with the idea that some of these hilts were created by Saxon craftsmen, as you have pointed out the high peaked variant seems to be the best candidate for this as all of the known examples seem to have the elaborate Hiberno-Saxon decoration which gets labeled as Trewhiddle. I have a slight problem with this as, from what I've seen, the Trewhiddle hoard includes pieces which display at least 3 different styles of decoration, but the interlocking Celtic/Saxon designs which appear on these sword hilts is in there so I'll not over-complicate matters by going over that here.

Also, the lack of Type L's mounted on Ulfberht blades doesn't worry me too much. Not all of the blades that came out of Frankish workshops were Ulfberhts, and some of the type L's have been found with blades that bear simpler marks, such as crosses and omega signs. The river Witham sword that you have included a picture of has LEUTRIT in the blade I believe, and with the second T up-side down, so possibly another one in favour of an illiterate smith, this one also has a thicker lower guard with Copper-inlaid diamonds which I certainly wouldn't consider to be Anglo-Saxon decoration. A really nice example that came out of theThames and is dated to the early eleventh century, the time of the second major scandinavian incursion, has INGELRII in the blade. This one is beautifully done as well, maybe INGELRII employed better copiers , and doesn't have the high central peak.

What I've been trying to get at here is who were these swords actually for? Who was using them? If a sword consists of a Frankish blade, and is re-hilted by a Saxon craftsman, for a customer from Norway. Does that make it an Anglo-Saxon sword? This is the sort of scenario that I believe would have been entirely possible given the conditions that existed in North-Western europe in the 9th and 10th centuries, for reasons that I've tried to outline in the previous posts. At best I would have one Type L variant in an Anglo-saxon style, and even then I would not neccesarily say that it was the orginal type L, but rather a more elaborate version of a simpler Frankish, or possibly Scandinavian design, brought in by the invading Vikings.

Cheers,
Darrin.

[Darrin Hughes]

Hello Richard, I thought I should comment seperately on the Anne Stalsberg article rather than lumping everything together in another big post

Whilst I'm not dismissng the article out of hand as it's fairly obvious that it has been well researched, I would point out that it is still very speculative in the two main areas, ie, who was making the swords, and how they were being distributed. The author makes it perfectly clear that she is trying to put forth one possible explanation, based on what is known of Frankish culture, which is exactly what I'm trying to do with this thread, based on what we know of Anglo-Saxon and Viking culture in the 9th and 10th centuries. The whole argument about the Ulfberht workshop being attached to an Abbey is based entirely on the idea that priests could read and smiths couldn't. But I'm pretty sure that a respected and wealthy smith could afford somebody to write his name down for him and he could have also afforded slaves, so it is really no more than one possible explanation, albeit a well thought out one. Again I'm not saying that Paul's explanation is any more correct than Anne's, being a smith himself he is probably more likely to favour an arguement that favours smiths, however until somebody digs up the remains of a Frankish abbey dated to the 8th-10th century, with a dirty great smithy associated with it, or turns up some detailed records of transactions, then it is still just informed speculation.

By the way, the reason I thought of Paul is because of the mention of the sword with Ulfberht on one side and Ingelrii on the other. Paul was the person who first told me about this sword, as it, or one like it, is in a Museum in Wisbech close to where he lives. I know that he was trying to arrange a viewing so that he could get a closer look at the welding of the letters, I'll have to ask him if he had any joy. Also, the Anne Stalsberg paper makes it quite clear that she won't be going into the metallurgy and forging techniques, whereas this is something that Paul has spent a good few years looking into for the purposes of his work.

I think where the paper gets really tied up in knots though, is over the issue of distribution. I know that this is where you are trying to draw a parallel between Frankish blades and type L hilts, but I think that there are some fundamental differences between the two. For a start the sheer volume of Frankish blades that have been found would indicate to me a large trading network. If all of the Ulfberhts that have been found are only a fraction of what actually existed, and if in turn these are only a fraction of the total number of blades, taking into account the Ingelriis, and other marked blades, along with all of the un-marked ones, then that is a lot of blades. The idea that they might all have been taken as plunder doesn't say much for Frankish security,especially as we are looking at presumedly small, opportunistic, bands of Viking raiders stealing large quantities of weapons, over a long period of time, from the best organised empire in christendom at that time. The idea that they might actually be organising large scale raids, specifically targeting Fankish military barracks, would I think be particularly alarming to the Frankish hierarchy, and not something that they would have been prepared to tolerate for any great length of time.

I know that there are good references in the article to records saying that weaons should not be allowed into the hands of merchants, but to me that would imply that maybe the Frankish arms trade was state controlled. Something that would have probably appealed to the Carolingian mindset. After all if there's money to be made from selling arms why do it indirectly through taxes, when you can swell the royal coffers doing it directly through your own agents. I'm sure that the idea of financing your own military by selling equipment to the enemy is not a modern one, and it's not as though you would even have to sell them the good stuff. We know from studies that have been carried out on blades found in scandinavia that a lot of them weren't very good at all, with poor welds, cold shuts, microfractures, etc. If the Franks were mass-producing blades, then I'm sure a lot of them would have been deemed unsuitable for their own use, but perfectly acceptable for trading with illiterate pagans, who may never know that they've been sold junk until it's too late. After all how good does a sword need to be to cut down civilians running in the opposite direction whilst your mates set fire to the thatch?

As opposed to this kind of mass-production for profit, and as has been pointed out already, the manufacture of hilts seems to have been much more of a cottage industry. If a type L sword hilt turns up in the Ukraine with Anglo-Saxon decoration on it, then I'm quite happy to accept that it probably came from an Anglo-Saxon workshop, but this is only one of a number of different variants of the type, and not neccesarily one that was ever made with a Saxon customer in mind, and certainly not for the puposes of international trade. That is why I don't think that the distribution of Frankish blades is particularly relevant in a discussion about one particular type of sword hilt. Lots of Frankish blades ended up with hilts in all sorts of different styles. I'm just interested in why one particular type of hilt ended up with the blanket designation of Anglo-Saxon, when I don't think the evidence, either archaeaological or literary, warrants it.

Cheers,
Darrin.

[Richard Hare]

Good evening, Darrin.

If Paul gets a chance to examine the Ingelrii sword, I am sure his findings would be of interest to us all!

The large amount of Frankish swords in the "pagan north" cannot be attributed to plunder, I am sure.

The Norse were great traders, and had links with many lands, and I'm sure a middle-man could be found,... so many swords could possibly come indirectly into the Nordic lands

Do I see a glimmer of light at the end of this somewhat depressing tunnel?

You wrote;

[Boris Td]

This is not the first time i hear about this. Here is a quote from a book i have been reading (Swords of the Viking Age by Ian Peirce)

" The sword under examination is a Petersen type L and it has been stated so much in the past that this is an English hilt type. It is true that few examples have been found in the British Isle and England, in particular, but not as many as in Norway. Jan Petersen list fourteen in his sword Register and they are spread over a wide area of find places It is of mid ninth to mid tenth century.

Occasionally perhaps even more frequently, and especially in the light of new data, we should be open to adjusting our thoughts and opinion on certain topics. I, therefore, believe that we must now consider Petersen type L as Viking (Scandinavian type hilt frequently found (and therefore likely popular) in England

[A. Marzé]

Wouldn't the attached sword from Russia be considered a type L? The decorative style does not appear to be Anglo-Saxon, but rather overtly Scandinavian.