I confess that i need a hand with something and i would like if some of you guys could help.

as some of you may know my "Opa"(grandfather) just recently passed away.

I would like to commemorate his passing by firing up my forge and forging a sword to honor his memory and his heritage.

he is of german,polish,austrian,hungarian, decent. i say this because he honestly had no idea what area he lived in, the orphanage he was put in was burnt to the ground and the area he fled to was always under new management from week to week.

so i would like to take one of my few remaining blade blanks (see specs at end of poast) and modify it to become a sword and german, austrian, or polish man would be proud to own.

any ideas that i could reforge this blade into (without pattern welding.... my skills are too rusty for that) are welcome and i will poast progress on a separate thread as i make headway on the sword.
forging will begin in about 2 weeks after transfer of my shop if fully complete (of just enough for me to work with).

specs for the blade blank are;

total length- 43"
tang lenght- 10"
blade lenght- 33"
blade width at base of tang- 2"
blade width 1/3 of the way down the blade- 1-6/8"
blade width 2/3 of the way down the blade- 1-6/8"
blade width 3" from the tip of the sword- 1-1/2"

thank you for taking the time to read this guys (and gals)
Naythan.

You should make a hussar saber.

Bauernwehr or Rugger=compact, practical and ubiquitous in that region. Also, lots of great designs to choose from. You could get a large example and the typical by-knives out of your blank.

thank you for your suggestions guys.

however i must confess that a saber or a rugger do not seam to fit this blade blank, i could make about 4 Ruggers out of this blade blank and it would pain me every time i cut the blank (however i must confess that i must try forging one soon.
a saber is certainly a good idea that i will try but i have a pattern welded blank (or at least i hope i still have it after i move :D ) and i think i will use that for a winter project.

i want to make a sword that would fit the shear mass of this sword blank. since the time i have made this thread i have remembered a story that my grandfather told me about one of the places he stayed at during his youth. he told me that at a vineyard that he worked at the owner has a sword mounted on the wall. when i asked him what it looked like he told me that it was old and rusted, it had a long handel and a long blade and it came to a needle point at the end of the blade.

given this description i have decided it could possibly be anything from a Oakeshott type XIII to a type XVIIIA or E
so i guess my next question is what blade style of those 3 is more german?

Did he told you about some places where he lived? A town a village, anything? There is a chance he lived in Transylvania (well forget about Bram Stoker's Dracula, it's a real place, I live there).
In this region they used mostly sabers, but take a look at Hunyadi János and his swords:
I strongly recommend this article. Did you know why the noon bell tolls?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hunyadi
I like his mustache too :)

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Ozsváth

thank you for the artical it was a very interesting read and thank you as well of the pictures.
i think i have a place to add to my trip to europe that im planing :D Romania looks like it would be a very great place to live in if you have a few PM me about your countery.

ok back on topic XD

i know that he was origanaly left in an orphanage in a village neer numberg. i say left because thats what he said to me. all he knows is that his parents were fleeing germany and said they would come back for him when they found a safe place for him. needless to say they never came back. he was pulled out of the orphanage at a young age and drafted into the german navy after the fleet was decimated. when the war endid he was captured by a contingent of solders and placed into the care of who he thinks was a canadian as the man (who spoke very little german) kepts on saying thins about hims home countery of kanada, and a game that they played on the ice with sticks and a puck. after the war his canadian solder/wardin relesed him apawn learning of his age (14) somewhere in northern germany. from the stores hes told me over the years he has been to spain, italy, Germany, austria, Hungery, poland, as well as britan. as for Romania i do not know if he was ever there but my grandfather was a drifer when he lived in the post war europe.it is posible he went there and did not know it.

but i do know that he got a job in northern france doing naval work of some kind and from there i know he got on an old boat that was doing farry work to england and canada and he eventualy earned a tiket to canada and immagrated to ontario shortly after ariving in halafax.

Romania is a nice country for tourists, but not so nice to live there. It has great potential, with lots of mountains and forests and many medieval castles, but unfortunately it's one of the poorest countries in Europe due to bad mentality and corruption.

Well, Nürnberg is in Germany, Bavaria to be more specific. In this case something teutonic or a zweihander will be more appropriate.

Life back than wasn't so easy like these days. My grandfather fought in WWII on the axis side. He was a russian POW for 4 long years. 90% of his company never came back from Russia. They died from exhaustion, diseases, malnutriton and due to atrocities.
Too bad he passed away 2 years ago at the age of 84. May he rest in peace, it was a great loss for my family.

ok some good news to report.. and some bad... my shops been moved successfully (thanks to keeping things simple) and i've somewhat got things in order.

I wanted to use up all the fuel in my older propane tank before i ordered my new 100lb tank (that hopefully should be in by next week) so i decided to start work on the memorial sword. i decided that i would go with a type IVc according to Bruhn-Hoffmeyer http://www.myArmoury.com/feature_hoffmeyer.html (it would be the top one or the two in the group portrayed) with a fishtail pommel and a gothic styled cross guard that i haven't designd yet (haven't gotten that far yet :lol: ) i managed to get the blade to the rough grinding point (will poast pics tomorrow when i find my cammer ) unfortunately i did not get very many ( if any) pics of during forging (i don't think you guys would aprecheate seeing me covered with sweat).

i couldn't find the blade blank that i wanted to use so i had to use what i call a blank of a blank. what i mean is that this blade was forged from a square rod that i had forged from a bench press bar. i managed to get a picture of the bar before i got too involved with it. and i also got a picture of the sword when i finished the rough grinding and blade shaping 12 hours later... all in all today was a productive day, i dont think ive managed to get this far on a sword befor in one day. its almost like this sword wants to be forge into this shape. i do know one thing though...... im gunna be sore in the morning

poast ya guys some pics tomorrow.

p.s. could be late in the day since i got a lot of running around to do.

ok as promised heres the photos and a little description the blade is 34 inches in length, the tang is about 10.5 inches in lenght, blade thickness is about 3/8" at part of the tang and 1/4 3" before the tip. forging from the blank was done in less then a day with just a 4lb sledge and tongs as well as my trusty propane forge (that is now outa fuel and in need of repair)
i know some of you aren't going to believe that i forged this in a day but believe me i did. grinding it to the state that you see it in now only took about 30-45min.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/40133770@N04/492...otostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40133770@N04/492...otostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40133770@N04/492...otostream/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/40133770@N04/492...otostream/

Right now i'm onto filing and then polishing (however i have to find the box that i put my files and emery cloth into XD) i've started forging of the fishtail pommel and guard.. however then i ran outa fuel, so now i play the wait game as i upgrade my shop, finish unpacking, and file my day away

Nythan Goron,

I would recommend one of the swords of war that were of German origin, the Sword of War. This is an Oakeshott Type XIIa or XIIIa which your blank should be able to approximate. It souds as if our grandfather came from an area that probably was part of the old Austo Hungarian Empire that was disolved after WWI. Anyway it is just an idea and the other ideas sound good also. I am sorry to hear about your grandfather passing away.

Regards,

Harry