Munich town guard swords
 

Hi,

I'm looking for stats on this type of sword; legths, weights, PoBs, blade thickness, distal tampering etc.

If you have any info, or just pictures, of particular pieces that you can/want to share, please do so here.

Much appreciated!

Obviously, that was supposed to say distal tapering.

Darijian, this is an intriguing sword, and while I have heard of the Munich town guard before, not yet reaching for my books, can you say more on the nature of this group, and might you share any research you have done so far.
I am sure some of the guys here can offer more detail, but I am curious where you are as far as information , and more on your interest in this unit.

Welcome, thank you for joining us here!

Best regards,
Jim

I think stats and the detail you seek is plentiful in all the advertising on these swords being reproduced by several of the major firms, in fact it is difficult to find such data online without considerable material on these commercial versions.

As I noted, these swords for the Munich Town Guard are of understandable interest with the rarity of authentic examples. Apparantly many of the number of these were deaccessed from their static holdings in Bavaria many years ago, and most of them are in various museums now with occasional examples at auction.

The hilt on these is of the form shown in "The Rapier and the Smallsword" by AVB Norman (1980) Hilt #57, identified as being of 1585-1640 . These seem significantly produced by Wolfgang Stantler (crowned vertical 'ST' stamp at ricasso), though others sometimes have 'TS' initials (either Wilhem or Clemens Tesche). This is interesting as Tesche's were Solingen makers and some references seem to think these were all made in Munich.
Some have a Munich arsenal stamp, 'HZ'.

In Wallace Collection (Mann, 1962) example A612 discusses these type hilts and their makers with cross references to other related data in this resource.

Hopefully this might provide informational sources for readers here beyond the commercial material concerning the many reproductions offered online.

Some of the stats of the Wallace collection sword may be found here along with a discussion of this type of sword:
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?p=142023

And here are some stats from the Higgins Armoury's example.
http://www.higgins-collection.org/artifacts/2005.02

POB and distal taper are not usually something museums bother with. However, you may be able to find the information that you're after by searching HEMA, WMA, and ARMA sites. ARMA would probably be your best bet.

Hope this is of some help.

--ElJay

The Army Museum in Stockholm has one.

https://digitaltmuseum.se/0110244174...s=10&count=674

If I'm to translate the interesting bits, it was given to the museum by a colonel Theodor Jakobsson, who is to have bought it form the Bayerisches army museum in Dresden in the twenties.

Somewhat remarkable is that the museum associates it with Pappenheim's cavalry.

Total length 99cm, blade 77.5cm, weight 1410g. Maximum blade width 54mm. The ricasso is 65mm long, tapering from 28mm where it transitions into the blade to 19mm at the hilt. Both sides of the ricasso stamped with a crowned S over T, and the inside also stamped with a crowned H Z.

Theodor Jakobsson couldn't habe bought this piece in Dresden because the Bavarian Army Museum was in the 1920s situated in the Bavarian city of Munic, not in the Saxon city of Dresden.
By the way: These swords of the Munic city guard are known as "Standler Rapiers".
corrado26

Excellent input Corrado, thank you!
Interesting note to the colloquially used term 'Stantler rapiers' for these Munich town guard swords. It seems that the Munich produced examples were made by that maker (see my post #4).....and it was long popularly held apparently that these were 'all' made in Munich...however it seems some Solingen examples produced as well.

Checking the page again it says Münich ("Bayerisches Armeemuseum i München."). Where I got Dresden from, well, maybe best to not even ask.

For Information:
The Bavarian Army Museum today is situated in the city of Ingolstadt about 150 km north of Munich.
corrado26