How It's Made -- myArmoury.com

Michael R. Mann · Posted: Wed 27 Jun, 2012 2:50 pm Post subject:

The price of a polished handmade blade of a sword is about 20.000 US$ (and of course above). The blacksmith needs about one week to produce such a blade.
So the industrial manufactured swords are rather cheap. But I think the term "hand-made" is in such cases not the correct term because it implies that the whole sword is manfactured manually, and this includes also the work of a blacksmith.
But I doubt that such industrial manufactured swords are really comparable with a handmade sword.

Here is a link to a video that shows an austrian blacksmith, who lives in GB (Glastonburry), as he produced a authentic celtic sword: http://www.prosieben.de/videokatalog/Gesellsc...88364.html

Eric Meulemans · Industry Professional

Daniel Wallace · Posted: Sat 30 Jun, 2012 3:09 pm Post subject:

Because these things have little to do with HOW it is made, but everything to do with WHO makes it.

i believe that statement sums up the idea of one being better than the other. there can be flaws in either method, it depends on the entity creating the work.

there was a show on a long time back. a blade smith made a traditional kantana the truly traditional way, a second smith used modern tools to make the same thing. the traditional smith took months to create his sword. starting from the smelting process extracting the correct iron ore - building the sword with all the proper ways that it was done in the 14th century. the modern smith used a steel blank for his sword, cut it out with a die - ground its edge - heat treated using modern tools to measure temperature. the only thing he seemed to be doing was moving the blade from machine to machine.

the end result for both smiths was relatively the same by look and performance. the only difference was time - craftsmanship and construction. and yeah the traditional sword was 10 times more valuable. BUT, heres a catch 22 for anything to be mass produced. if you took the value of each machine the modern smith used to make his sword it cost that modern smith more to produce his one sword than it does for the traditional smith. for the modern smith to turn a profit - he has to mass produce his product. and he can control the price of his product based on how many he decides to produce.

i'm starting to get into economics and i did pretty poorly in that class, but what i'm attempting to state is that just because a blade is mass produced that doesn't take away from its value. in the same way i'm also sadly pointing out that just because its hand made also doesn't mean its better quality. it's going to come down to what you as a consumer prefer. although anything made with more hands on is more highly valued because we're losing so many craftsman that have the skill that we now turn to a machine to do for us.

Julian Reynolds · Posted: Sat 30 Jun, 2012 3:33 pm Post subject:

Call me old-fashioned (please, do) but I like to pick up a sword and see that spot where the maker burped/farted/sneezed and hit it a little too hard/skidded across it with a file/pressed too hard on the grind and left the evidence that it was made by a human being and not a machine that cannot burp/fart/sneeze.

Every original sword I have ever seen or handled in a collection or museum has shown me that evidence of humanity, and to see it in a sword that I own is, in my eyes, crucial to its 'authenticity'.

That said, it needs to be a good sword in the first place, and not something bashed together in a garage by an ape.......