Mughal Dagger
- Dated: 17th century - 18th century
- Culture: North India
- Medium: Jade, steel, gold and cabachon rubies and emeralds
- Measuremenrs: Length: 24.1 cm, blade
- Unknown Artist / Maker
Source & Copyright: The Wallace Collection
The Swept-Hilt Rapier
The name of the rapiers refers only to the sword’s guard, handle, and pommel. For example, types of Renaissance sword hilts include: swept-hilt, shell, half-hilt, cup-hilt, dish-hilt, dueling-hilt, cavalier-hilt, Pappenheimer, mortuary-hilt, basket-hilt, etc.
Swept-hilt is an early Renaissance hilt form designed originally to protect the unarmored hand from cuts more than thrusts, they are made up of finger-rings, side-rings, knuckle-guard, and often a variety other protective bars (back-guards and counter-guards, etc), they are found on many cut & thrust swords and early rapiers The name is actually a Victorian era term and not a istorical one.
The rapier was the first civilian weapon, developing as the use of armor declined. A thrust and cut weapon, the rapier first appeared in the late 1400’s and had its heyday up to the 1600’s. The 1600’s saw the start of the transitional rapier as hilts became smaller and blades were designed more for thrusting and less for cutting.
The cup hilt rapier and Swept Hilt Rapier made their appearances in the early 1650’s in Spain, and enjoyed popularity in Spain and Southern Italy until the early 1700’s. The rapier was often used with a second defensive weapon; daggers, bucklers, and cloaks were the most popular.
While daggers were often decorated “en suite” with their companion rapier, it was by no means unusual to have a “mismatched” set of rapier and dagger. Much lighter than the broadsword of medieval times, the rapier brought about a whole new style of swordplay and a proliferation of fencing schools.
Info source: The ARMA | Swept Hilt Rapier
Dagger and sheath, Dagestani, 1861. (x)
Swept Hilt Rapier, English, ca. 1600. (x)
Dagger owned by Princess Adile Sultana (1825-1898)
Dagger and sheath, Dagestani, 1861. (x)
Weaponry in Movies - Lord of the Rings - Legolas’ Fighting Knives
- Twin blades for twin towers - 9/11
In J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings Trilogy and Peter Jackson’s screen adaptation, Legolas was a Sindarin Elf of the Woodland Realm who became a part of the Fellowship of the Ring. Legolas, son of the King Thranduil of Mirkwood, is a Prince of the Woodland Realm, and also a messenger, and a master Bowman.
In the book, Legolas carries two weapons with him on his journey with the Fellowship. He sports a slender bow of Mirkwood. He prefers to pierce his enemies from afar, but he also carries “at his belt a long white knife” (The Fellowship of the Ring, p314).
However, in the movie adaptation he also carries two knives across his back. The blades are slightly curved and sport an Elven vine design. It appeares that the handles are made of oak and the vine design is gold. The book of the movie stated that the two daggers measure 16 inches blades.
Source: Lord of the Rings Wikia | Sword Direct
Yataghan from the Court of Suleyman the Magnificent
- Workshop of Ahmed Tekelü (possibly Iranian, active Istanbul, ca. 1520–1530)
- Date: circa 1525
- Culture: Turkish, Istanbul
- Medium: Steel, walrus ivory, gold, silver, rubies, turquoise, pearls
- Dimensions: Length overall, 23 3/8 in. (59.3 cm). Length of blade, 18 3/8 in. (46.66 cm)
Exquisite workmanship and lavish use of precious materials distinguish this sword as a princely weapon and exemplifies the opulence and refinement of Ottoman luxury arts. Almost identical to a yatagan (now in the Topkapi Palace, Istanbul) made in 1526–27 by the court jeweler Ahmed Tekel, for the Ottoman sultan Süleyman the Magnificent (r. 1520–66), this sword was undoubtedly made in the same imperial workshop.
The gold incrustation on the blade depicts a combat between a dragon and a phoenix against a background of foliate scrolls. These figures, like the gold-inlaid cloud bands and foliate scrolls on the ivory grips, are Chinese in inspiration, and were probably introduced into Ottoman art through contacts with Persia.
This sword is one of the earliest known yatagans, distinctly Turkish weapons characterized by a double-curved blade and a hilt without a guard. Yatagans were commonplace in Turkey and the Balkans in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and served as sidearms for the elite troops known as janissaries.
Source & Copyright: Metropolitan Museum of Art
Dagger with Zoomorphic Hilt, Indian (Deccan, Bijapur, or Golconda), Second Half of 16th Century
Hilt: copper; cast, chased, gilded, and inlaid with rubies. Blade; steel.
Knife
Date:17th century
Culture:Italian
Phurba (dagger), late 15th century
The ritual dagger (Sanskrit: kila; Tibetan: phurba) is essential to the dispelling of evil and understood as being especially helpful in neutralizing the forces that impede Tantric Buddhist practice. Its origins are ancient, appearing in the Indian Rg Veda as the central blade of the vajra that Indra used to slay the primordial cosmic snake Vritra. Its Sanskrit term, kila, which means peg or stake, was probably linked to Vedic sacrifices. The three-headed Vajrakila Buddha is invoked through meditation on the Vajrakila Tantra, an early Indian text first propagated in Tibet in the eighth century by Padmasambhava, one of the founding masters of Tibetan Buddhism. In this phurba, a half-vajra projects from Vajrakila’s chignon, and a fully elaborated vajra serves as the hilt, below which project boars’ heads. Rock crystal, valued for its purity and ability to transmit light, is a prized material in this context and thus seen as analogous to the Buddha’s dharma and its immutable higher reality. Along with examples in meteoritic iron, rock-crystal phurba are regarded as the most efficacious in the destruction of obstacles to enlightenment.
European Rapier
- Culture: most likely Spanish
- Measurements: blade - 39” in length
Short fullers are stamped “TOMAS EAIALA” just above the guard. Research shows a few bladesmiths with similar names operating out of Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries.
Basket style hilt, with turned floral pattern dual quillions, measuring 8” from tip to tip, a pair of side rings, larger on the right, 2 forearms surrounding the blade and supporting a pair of pierced-through curved plates. Twist pattern wire grip with floral engraved bulb shaped pommel.
Source & Copyright: iCollector
