[J.Arthur Loose]

I still have to write up my latest excursion... from a tiny village in the Western Fjords to Oslo, and then Reykjavik. I had the chance to see the National Historical Museum in Oslo, where there are more Viking swords than you can shake a stick at. There were also a number of langsaxes on display... and photographs do not do them justice. I was able to glean some good information off of a couple including pattern development, stack construction, hollow grinding of the spine and best of all, kukri curve noticeable on more than a couple. I think a few of us here have also experienced this occurence!

Sorry for the out of focus picture, but it is the only one of this grouping that I took with my old digital camera:



Here is a close-up of a langseax with a three bar stack twist with a hollow ground spine. Note the pattern and kukri curve:



I'll be making one similar in shape, but with a four-core interrupted twist, offset on either side... i.e. when you turn the blade over, the twisted sections are replaced by straight sections and vice versa. It will be handled like the one with the close-up above. Here's the billet, taken with my nice, new custom white balance camera :



I'm going to go forge this puppy right now, so maybe there will be pictures this evening...

This post has been edited by J.Arthur Loose: 21 April 2008 - 01:47 PM

[Sam Salvati]

Very nice J! Cannot wait to se eit done!

[Richard Furrer]

J
Got any more of the second one on the right?

What about the Varangian guard bringing back the idea from Constantinople/Turkey? How far back does the Yataghan go anyway?..to the Greek Kopis and earlier I would think, but....

Ric

[David D.]

Ah those photos are so amazing!!!...


Thanks so much for sharing! inspiration is at a high for me now!

Cant wait to see the finished long seax!

[Leif S]

I love that museum! I try to go there everytime I'm in Oslo! Did you go to the Viking Ship Museum?

[richard sexstone]

I think that was worth missing Ashokan this year EH?

[J.Arthur Loose]

Here's the update... I forged this last week but haven't had a chance to post it. I'll be forging it out more today. I did hit one snag... my tempering oven is too short! I'll have to cap this one at about 28" and use the proceeds to make a new tempering rig...



Ric: Alas, I did not get any better pics of that sword...

Richard: Yeah, it was worth missing Ashokan, but I'm getting annoyed that I have to miss it every single year.

Leif: The Ship Museum was amazing!

[Adlai Stein]

Jol,
I was wondering if it's really a hollow grind or a fuller going all the way back to the spine. The appearance shouldn't be much different but the conservation of valuable steel would. Any opinions?

[Bob Ouellette]

Jól I can't wait to see how it comes out. Should be awesome.

[J.Arthur Loose]

Adlai Stein, on Oct 18 2007, 04:08 PM, said:

Jol,
I was wondering if it's really a hollow grind or a fuller going all the way back to the spine. The appearance shouldn't be much different but the conservation of valuable steel would. Any opinions?

Yup, it sure is, as was this one:



I don't think the issue is conservation of steel, as it's probably hollow-ground on a stone rather than forged in that shallow.

I don't actually think I will end up doing the hollow-ground spine on this one... as I realize that I really want to keep the pattern as close to its current state as it is, and on that last piece, pictured above, I actually ground further into the pattern than I wanted to... next time I'll put the pattern I want on the *inside* and hollow grind down into it.

So. This guy's going to be most likely flat-ground.

This post has been edited by J.Arthur Loose: 18 October 2007 - 11:14 AM

[J.Arthur Loose]

Here it is, forged and cooling for the grind...



She gained about 3" length and 1/2" width.

Back, as they say, to the grind...

This post has been edited by J.Arthur Loose: 04 January 2008 - 04:43 PM

[J.Arthur Loose]

Well, here's the blade:


Here's the hilt pieces in steel:



...And here's the pieces damascened, assembled and ready for design work:



The silver is held mechanically by raised stitches in the steel and sweat soldered for extra measure. Some further shaping will take place. There will be niello inlay and twisted wire in the pommel lobe grooves etc... The walnut handle will also get a silver twisted wire wrap. As for the pommel shape, some suggested Petersen type H, but then I was reading De Norsk Vikingesverd and came across one peculiar little piece that caught my fancy. Scroll down and you'll see it. Anyway. Onward!

This post has been edited by J.Arthur Loose: 03 January 2008 - 07:24 PM

[Sam Salvati]

Nice work J, coming along great that pattern is gorgeous!

[brian brush]

J., That is a nice looking blade. I would love to see an up close picture of the blade. Maybe a few to show off the twist. And the picture of you by the ship is awesome as well. I feel like heading over to Iceland now.

Richard,
Odds are good that the kukri curve wasn't inspired by the yataghan. I believe the yataghan arrived on the scene far too late to be what inspired the curve that J and others have noted in some langseaxes. I've seen some pictures of early seaxes, (B.C) which were similar. I'll try to find the link. The 'kukri curve' is fairly widespread, and bronze age blades with similar characteristics have been found from Egypt to China.

Over on Sword Forum International, Jeroen Zuiderwijk posted a link to an article about what was thought to be a Roman falcata found in the Netherlands. http://forums.swordf...ghlight=falcata

Here is another link to a post on myArmoury.com which is fairly informative about the falcata/kopis/kukri lineage. http://www.myarmoury...ghlight=falcata

I have a hard time deciding if I favor the falcata over the langseax. J., I'll be watching this thread with interest.

This post has been edited by brian brush: 04 January 2008 - 07:18 AM

[Jeff Pringle]

Very nice!
Sweat-soldering silver all the way around those hilt parts must have been fun, even with the stitches - looks like it came out awesome.
How thin was the sheet you used?
Looking forward to the niello!

[J.Arthur Loose]

Jeff Pringle, on Jan 4 2008, 03:34 PM, said:

Sweat-soldering silver all the way around those hilt parts must have been fun, even with the stitches - looks like it came out awesome.
How thin was the sheet you used?
Looking forward to the niello!

Thanks Jeff... the sheet was about 12-14 ga. With the pommel I actually dipped the steel piece in wax and cast the result. It was the only way I could figure to avoid overlaps on a shape like that.

I'm excited to be getting back into the niello myself!

There's a sword from Das Archäologische Landesmuseum in Schleswig with silver overlay on steel / iron that has a five-lobe pommel & gold handle fittings that serves as inspiration here, but all I have is a postcard. No images on the web as of yet that I can find...

[GEzell]

Really glad to see progress being made on this one. One doesn't see alot of these single edge viking pieces being made.

Considering the fuller, and it's influence on the pattern...
I've begun to notice that on the patternwelded sax blades, the fullers often follow the shape of the steel pattern moreso than the shape of the blade, leading me to speculate that the fullers were placed in such a way as to expose the star pattern along the centre of the fuller (or each fuller, in the case of multiples). This is assuming the fullers were ground or scraped in, not forged, which may not always have been the case. It leads me to believe you are not the first to be concerned with this detail, the ancient smiths were taking this into account also.

Looking forward to this one, keep us posted on the progress.

[Alan Longmire]

Awesome. The silver sounds pretty thick, but I guess that makes it easier to get deep enough engraving to hold the niello without exposing the steel beneath. I have GOT to try that one of these days...

[Mitch Rokicki]

Wow!!! That is just incredible to the point of disbelief!
- Mitch

[Adlai Stein]

Freakin Amazing as always.