Sword Hilts

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Róisín

Weaponsmith
Grandmaster Knight
What are the common (and not-so-common) ways to wrap a sword hilt that you know of?

I was pondering how much I hate wire-wrapped hilts (they just feel wrong to me, like chewing tinfoil or rubbing cottonballs), when I remembered a mention in a Jack Whyte book about using shark skin, which was supposed to keep its grip, even when slick with blood, and then I recalled this velvet-wrapped beauty I saw in the Bayerisches Armeemuseum in Ingolstadt, Germany labelled 'München um 1600"STANTLER ME FECIT"'



So now I'm curious as to what other materials and techniques were used for grips.

I also want to know if "ME FECIT" means in German what it looks like in English. :wink:
 
Wood can serve as a base or the grip itself. Leather over wood, plain or with some wire wraps underneath to create ridges. Wire wrapping. Cord and other cloth coverings were also used. Various kinds of bone. Sometimes the whole hilt was metal though this was more common with bronze and early iron swords, AFAIK.
 
It depends on the style and location largely.  Japanese swords would often be wrapped in ray skin or shark skin, while Scandinavian would be me more likely to be solid wood or solid metal.  Roman blades tended to be wood, and greek was often just poured bronze.  As has been said, cording, cloth and leather were also used to make a good solid grip.
 
Turkish kilijs often have hilts made of rhino horn and many Indian talwars have hilts made of solid steel:



 
Feanaro, you have the script "Cannot find a good Vom Tag Avatar." It might help if you weren't using sketches from the ITALIANS. :wink:

As to Ray Skin, it was used in Europe as a covering, but leather seems to be the most common.
 
Taka said:
It depends on the style and location largely.  Japanese swords would often be wrapped in ray skin or shark skin, while Scandinavian would be me more likely to be solid wood or solid metal.  Roman blades tended to be wood, and greek was often just poured bronze.  As has been said, cording, cloth and leather were also used to make a good solid grip.

Many Roman swords had bone hilts.

As for wrapping, I've never done it myself.
 
Voutare said:
Taka said:
It depends on the style and location largely.  Japanese swords would often be wrapped in ray skin or shark skin, while Scandinavian would be me more likely to be solid wood or solid metal.  Roman blades tended to be wood, and greek was often just poured bronze.  As has been said, cording, cloth and leather were also used to make a good solid grip.

Many Roman swords had bone hilts.

As for wrapping, I've never done it myself.

You also find things like silver, horn, and ivory, though by all standards roman swords tended to be fairly utilitarian and I can imagine that if bone was utilized it woudl have been because it was cheaper and more easily available.


a-2005-sword%20(4).JPG

London%20(35).JPG

Vindonissa-0610%20(3).JPG

milit-gladii-Nim.jpg


If you note, the handles are extremely utilitarian, little to no decoration.  While this doesn't hold true for scabard, the handle and hilt were first and foremost for protection and grip, and only utilized for decoration as an afterthought.  Even those made of exotic substances (silver in the top photo and ivory in the bottom one) follows that same stark design.  The biggest problem with saying that many came from bone is that bone survives far better than wood or any other less sturdy material that the handles and hilts may have been constructed from and so the widest assortment of blades are just that. . . blades without hilt or handle to see what material it was made of.

 
Rathyr said:
Where I live we use Styrofoam and duct-tape.

Yup, same here.  I would actually go so far as to say that future historians will consider duct-tape among man's greatest inventions... maybe not.
 
Well, by the time it gets to them, it'll probably be all gummed up and nasty, so they won't know what to make of it. And do you really think there won't be duct tape in the future (oh the horror)?
 
James said:
Well, by the time it gets to them, it'll probably be all gummed up and nasty, so they won't know what to make of it. And do you really think there won't be duct tape in the future (oh the horror)?

Got something against it, friend?  :razz:
 
Oh, hell no. It's my favorite type of tape, along with electrical and masking. I much prefer metal, but it isn't a great fastening agent.
 
There're some pics that can help. May be...

                                                                                                               
                  1                                                          2                                                          3                                                          4                                                          5                                                          6

1)  copper wire, two different thicknesses ; gendarmerie sword ; France, model 1880.
2)  casted aluminium  :!: ; North Africa style short dagger ; France  :?:, contemporary.
3)  yak horn ; kurkri ; Nepal, unknown period.
4)  horn ; dagger ; North Africa, cotemporary.
5)  bone ; dagger ; North Africa :?: Djebbel :?:, unknown period.
6)  serpent skin and leather, underwork aparently made with leather or cloth tape ; sword ; Africa, unknown period.

Viollet-le-Duc described a lot of swords with full details. A lot of materials were used for the hilts.

Personaly I used cord for my LARP sword...
 
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