The Realm of the Dark Blade

Today we are going old school. I ran across this sword not too long ago, and thought it was another great example of classic medieval sword design. Much like the Black Italian Bastard Sword I posted about a while back. Except that this sword is fairly simple. No gimmicks, no fancy ironwork, just a great sword

Sir William Marshall Sword - Damascus

I think I like this sword for same reasons as the Italian Bastard Sword. It is a simple, straightforward and strong design. Aesthetically, I do not find it as pleasing as the Italian bastard sword is. Perhaps because in straight swords, I tend prefer blades whose width does not change drastically from hilt to tip. In this sword, there is quite a large difference. However what it lacks in aesthetics, it makes up for in simplicity, functionality and contrast.

The blade is of a standard tapered design. Not one of my favorites, but in this case, not too bad. A prominent fuller runs almost the entire length of the dark Damascus steel blade (this comes in both polished steel as well as Damascus), both to increase stiffness and reduce weight. The cross guard is a simple polished bar. Barring my personal issues with the change in width of the blade, it is, overall a great blade.

Sir William Marshall Sword - Polished

The grip is wrapped in black leather, interwoven with black leather strips, I’m betting more to improve traction, and non-slip qualities than for any aesthetic purposes, although it does look quite good. And it is all capped of by a simple polished round pommel.

Simplicity and functionality at it’s best. And even though from a visual standpoint, the Damascus steel blade is a big plus in my book (though the Damascus blade does come at a premium over the regular steel blade version), the fact that it is simply a strong and versatile sword steel makes it more of a functional improvement, than an design one.

This would be for the knight who wanted a sword that just worked. That could be depended upon. And you really couldn’t go wrong with this.

Sir William Marshall Sword – [Hanwei Shop]