Modern fencers and students of smallsword play have mentioned the small pas d'ane as perhaps vestigal but that the grip of a smallsword was meant to use pinching between thumb and forefinger for steearge. This has borne out my own ad hoc experiences in manipulating the hilts of quite a few seemingly uncomfortable hilts but rotating the sword 90 degrees puts the tillers of the pas d'ane or indeed none at all in the manner of spadroons at better ease especially with shorter grips. Hard to describe and I am probably not conveying it well. They are not meant to be finger rings, in the sense many suggest.
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non functional pas d'ane ( 18thc size, you will break your finger if you put one through the pas d'ane)
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Thanks also for the additional running wolf marks and considerations. As the mark clearly shows up on blades back to the 14th century (we see these on cruciform types and larger bastards with inlay in latten and gold) more information is certainly better than not enough. The wolf is also regarded in the coat of arms for Passau. I do also have some notes regarding Solihngen and the migration there by the smiths while discontinuing the mark,as its use had been local. There is a somewhat simlar discussion of the wolf recently here. My own thoughts and regard of the uses and variety that turn have no partisan interests implied or inferred.
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=12289
The scabbard a later addition, absolutely.
Cheers
GC
Another earlier discussion elsewhere on the wolf
http://www.swordforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=79247
Old Herman Historica page
http://www.hermann-historica.de/aukt...db=kat49_A.txt
Another as a PS
http://ejmas.com/jwma/articles/2000/...ville_0100.htm
It is undoubtedly Ewart Oakeshott and his writings that influences a great many (including myself) but I am also wide open for other source work while remaining as objective as possible.