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Jeremy V. Krause
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 Posted: Wed 20 Oct, 2004 6:55 am Post subject: |
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Hello everyone,
Sorry I have not gotten a chance to post in a while. Firstly, I would never confuse my dating, in fact this is a pet peeve of mine- (I actually started a post on this forum some months ago). I did sort of understand that the Duke and Baron could have been dated to as early as 1250 I was just going by what Peter relayed in a post also on this forum regarding the relative dates of the Next Gens.
I should have been more clear in expressing myself regarding the dates I was interested in regarding a hand-and-a-half. Really I want to see one that could be dated 1050-1200, maybe up until 1220. I know I am nit picking but I am currently rigid in my time period. In Records XIII #13 is listed as 1100-1120 I think, I don't have it in front of me.
Oh, and the last thing I wanted to do was hint at any comparison between A&A and Albion- both wonderful companies offering different things. I will purchase from both in the future. . . I hope this clears things up. Jeremy
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R. Laine
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| Posted: Wed 20 Oct, 2004 8:54 am Post subject: |
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| Brian M wrote: | I was under the impression that A&A used a threaded/peened/compression hilt construction (like Albion's First Gen) for all its swords. I don't think this became "historical" until the 18th Century or so. In this construction, either a threaded pommel-nut or a threaded pommel is mated to a threaded tang, which holds the grip and cross on by compression.
I am not trying to run A&A down, because they clearly make a good product and I'm sure that such a construction could stand most any reasonable use. Nevertheless, a more historical (hot peened, non-threaded) construction is a selling point which gravitated me to Albion's NG line in the first place.
Regards,
Brian M |
Actually, there is evidence of threaded pommels from at least 1450, in the Gladiatoria fechtbuch.
Rabbe
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Zach Stambaugh
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| Posted: Wed 20 Oct, 2004 11:42 pm Post subject: cool codex |
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| Felix Wang wrote: | | The evidence clearly indicates that a single-handed sword was sometimes used with both hands. This practice is mentioned in various sagas, which is particularly appropriate for a Gaddhjalt. There are also illustrations of both hands on a single-hand sword; the first one that comes to mind is from the Manesse Codex ( http://www.tempora-nostra.de/index_f_neu.shtml?manesse0-9 thumbnail #111). It seems likely that this technique was used for especially powerful blows, or when a fighter was being extremely aggressive, and didn't worry about his shield. |
Although I personally subscribe to the 'people probably did it when they needed to' theory, I don't find the particular panel from the manesse codex t be compelling. it shows a knight cleaving a great helm ( and its owner). this, to me, seems to be a bit of an artist's 'dramatization'. cleaving thick steel with a sword seems unlikely so the artist probably did it to exaggerate the knight's strength (like Beowulf squeezing off grendel's arm). ... Although; the artist probably did see knights swing swords with two hands for extra power, and that may have given him the idea. so I guess I may have just canceled out my arguement.
PS
How did you find those images? They are very interesting.
It is better to be over careful a hundred times than dead once. --- Mark Twain (give or take a slight misquote)
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Matthew Kelty
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| Posted: Thu 21 Oct, 2004 2:18 pm Post subject: |
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>cleaving thick steel with a sword seems unlikely
Bear in mind that most armours were actually iron, not steel (sometimes case hardened, but not very often), and were actually thinner than you'd imagine. Most impressions of armour thickness is incorrectly based on SCA standards for safety, fabricated with Mild steel, but not neccesarily hardened.
Sure, swords aren't really meant for cleaving Iron plate in any kind of ongoing basis, but it is very easy for a well made steel sword to shear into a 18-22 gauge iron helmet.
There is extensive research on this very topic posted on Arador and in many armouring books.
Matthew
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Alexi Goranov
myArmoury Alumni
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| Posted: Thu 21 Oct, 2004 2:37 pm Post subject: |
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| Matthew Kelty wrote: | >cleaving thick steel with a sword seems unlikely
Bear in mind that most armours were actually iron, not steel (sometimes case hardened, but not very often), and were actually thinner than you'd imagine. Most impressions of armour thickness is incorrectly based on SCA standards for safety, fabricated with Mild steel, but not neccesarily hardened.
Sure, swords aren't really meant for cleaving Iron plate in any kind of ongoing basis, but it is very easy for a well made steel sword to shear into a 18-22 gauge iron helmet.
There is extensive research on this very topic posted on Arador and in many armouring books.
Matthew |
This topic (swords cleaving iron) has been beaten to death, but people still do not agree on the subject!!!
I completely agree with the fact that medieval armour was made of iron and that it was not tempered (or poorly tempered) and that it is thinner (~18-22ga) as compared to many of the modern reproductions.
Still, the force needed to shear through an iron plate (even if it is only 1.8mm thick) is beyond what a sword in hand can deliver. There is research done that supports this hypothesis as well. Read "Head protection in England before the First World War" T. P. Blackburn et al. Neurosurgery, vol 47, No 6. december 2000, 1261-1286.
Yes, a sword blow on the helmet can ring the bell or the wearer but most likely will cut into the helmet even if hit squarely.
There is so much give I find it very hard to believe that the sword will cleave the helmet in half . There is good 2-3 inches of penetration into the helmet on that illustration. It is very hard to believe.
Alexi
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Steve Fabert
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| Posted: Thu 21 Oct, 2004 2:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Matthew Kelty wrote: | >cleaving thick steel with a sword seems unlikely
Bear in mind that most armours were actually iron, not steel (sometimes case hardened, but not very often), and were actually thinner than you'd imagine. Most impressions of armour thickness is incorrectly based on SCA standards for safety, fabricated with Mild steel, but not neccesarily hardened.
Sure, swords aren't really meant for cleaving Iron plate in any kind of ongoing basis, but it is very easy for a well made steel sword to shear into a 18-22 gauge iron helmet.
There is extensive research on this very topic posted on Arador and in many armouring books.
Matthew |
Are you thinking of tests like the ones described here? http://www.thearma.org/Videos/NTCvids/testing...erials.htm
I suspect that a reasonably heavy cutting sword would have done major damage to a simple iron helm, if it could bite rather than being deflected, and did not break. A pound of iron with a very small area of contact can apply a lot of shearing force, whether it is configured as the head of a war hammer, or a small axe, or a sword blade. There's a reason why helm shapes evolved over time. If the older, simpler styles had been immune to damage from swords, it's not likely that helms would have become more pointed and curved over the centuries.
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Matthew Kelty
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| Posted: Thu 21 Oct, 2004 3:18 pm Post subject: |
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Alexi, it appears that your math could be the source of the disbelief... 
GA. Inches mm
22 0.0336 0.8534
20 0.0396 1.0058
18 0.0516 1.3106
Most museum armors sampled fell into the 20-22 gauge range, which is more than half as thin as your '1.8 mm'...
There are also extensive examples of helms and breastplates with solid cuts into them, the one's I have seen have been in the Landeshaus in Graz, but there are more examples I've run across through the years
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Alexi Goranov
myArmoury Alumni
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| Posted: Thu 21 Oct, 2004 6:28 pm Post subject: |
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| Matthew Kelty wrote: | Alexi, it appears that your math could be the source of the disbelief...
GA. Inches mm
22 0.0336 0.8534
20 0.0396 1.0058
18 0.0516 1.3106
Most museum armors sampled fell into the 20-22 gauge range, which is more than half as thin as your '1.8 mm'...
There are also extensive examples of helms and breastplates with solid cuts into them, the one's I have seen have been in the Landeshaus in Graz, but there are more examples I've run across through the years |
How many of the museum plate armour pieces have cuts in them consistent with sword blade?
I have a copy of published measurements of several plate armor pieces that are thicker than 1mm (about 2mm on average) but these are either 15c tournament or 16c munition grade armour. Furthermore, research show that the top of the helmet is much thicker than the other parts (e.g. cheek pieces).
My math is not to blame. The experiments I cite involved 1.9mm wrought iron plate (admittedly this is NOT 18ga). according to the authors (which include David Edge ) this represents low grade munition armor (unspecified reference date). In these SCIENTIFIC experiments , the authors showed that it takes ~270J of a sword blow to defeat padded munition armour plate (this is a simulation). A sword and axe can deliver a force blow of about only 80-130J. In actual testing experiments, a halberd delivering a 190J of force only bent the plate!!!!!!!!!!!!!
These are exacerbated situations. In reality the give and the curvature of the plate armour make it much more resilient.
The ARMA "experiments" also show that a sword only bent a 16ga helmet (and made a barely visible, thin cut). Thinner helmet might just be bent more severely. Again, in these ARMA "experiments" the helmet was siting on a pole with little or no give.
I know in japanese culture helmet cutting is the utmost test of the quality of the blade and the skill of the swordsman. Do not take this too far. European swords are not Japanese swords, nor are the helmet constructions the same (at least as far as I know).
Alexi
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Steve Fabert
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| Posted: Thu 21 Oct, 2004 8:04 pm Post subject: |
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| Alexi Goranov wrote: |
In these SCIENTIFIC experiments , the authors showed that it takes ~270J of a sword blow to defeat padded munition armour plate (this is a simulation). A sword and axe can deliver a force blow of about only 80-130J. In actual testing experiments, a halberd delivering a 190J of force only bent the plate!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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I have not read the study to which you refer, but it sounds as though the analysis of the data is misguided. Total energy is not what matters when you are discussing penetration. It's force per unit of area per unit of time that determines whether a blow will or will not penetrate a target. The same mathematical relationships would hold true of modern ballistics and ancient edged weapons. A slow-moving blow, spread over a wide surface, may not penetrate, while a fast moving missile with a very small area of impact may well penetrate, even if the total energy of the two is equal.
Hit a helm with a hammer and you make a dent, but if you put a sharp nail between the hammer and the helm you make a hole instead, striking with the same energy. If a war hammer with a two pound head can penetrate a helm, then a sword with a two pound blade moving at the same speed can do the same, if the area of contact is equivalent. And that's the catch, getting the edge of the sword to bite and apply its energy over as small an area as the spike of a war hammer. Not an easy thing to achieve with a swinging blade, whether you use one hand or two, but a lot easier if you thrust with a sword point instead.
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Alexi Goranov
myArmoury Alumni
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| Posted: Fri 22 Oct, 2004 8:45 pm Post subject: |
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| Steve Fabert wrote: | | Alexi Goranov wrote: |
In these SCIENTIFIC experiments , the authors showed that it takes ~270J of a sword blow to defeat padded munition armour plate (this is a simulation). A sword and axe can deliver a force blow of about only 80-130J. In actual testing experiments, a halberd delivering a 190J of force only bent the plate!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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I have not read the study to which you refer, but it sounds as though the analysis of the data is misguided. Total energy is not what matters when you are discussing penetration. It's force per unit of area per unit of time that determines whether a blow will or will not penetrate a target. The same mathematical relationships would hold true of modern ballistics and ancient edged weapons. A slow-moving blow, spread over a wide surface, may not penetrate, while a fast moving missile with a very small area of impact may well penetrate, even if the total energy of the two is equal.
Hit a helm with a hammer and you make a dent, but if you put a sharp nail between the hammer and the helm you make a hole instead, striking with the same energy. If a war hammer with a two pound head can penetrate a helm, then a sword with a two pound blade moving at the same speed can do the same, if the area of contact is equivalent. And that's the catch, getting the edge of the sword to bite and apply its energy over as small an area as the spike of a war hammer. Not an easy thing to achieve with a swinging blade, whether you use one hand or two, but a lot easier if you thrust with a sword point instead. |
The study is NOT misguided. It takes less energy for pointed weapons to pierce the iron plate. The study is clear that. The numbers I mention refer to swords cutting/slashing against the plate.
For example it only takes 75J for a bodkin arrow to make 6mm hole in the same plate that the sword cannot defeat with 130J of energy.
The simple point that I am trying to make and corroborate it with some numbers is that swords cannot (and were not meant ) to cut plate armor as sometimes depicted on period art.
I hope that helps.
Alexi
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Felix Wang
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| Posted: Sat 23 Oct, 2004 7:38 pm Post subject: |
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The Manesse Codex is interesting for a number of reasons. The images show a lot of activities, only a fraction of which involve combat. Many other pursuits of the nobility are shown. The images are labeled with various real contemporary people - this is not mythical or magical (except as people overtly believed in magic, etc.). One of the persons is Wolfram von Eschenbach, who wrote Parsifal.
Many of the images show easily recognizable activities - there are a couple of sword and buckler images, for example. Image 62 shows something like a shield-knock from I.33; image 68 is less familiar to me, but looks plausible.
Cutting a helm is a digression from the original subject of this thread. My own opinion is that it was extremely rare but not impossible, roughly comparable to a triple play in baseball. My intent was simplyto show that a two-handed grip of a single-hand sword was known.
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