Sometmes swords, especially shortswords, are used "edge up" though. This is seen In both Japanese and N American traditional fighting, for instance; it is a style often recommended for its thrusting (with the blade cut up thru the body after penetration, ideally to the abdominal cavity, with the blade being dragged up to penetrate the diaphragm, ideally ideally, the tip is then angled up into the heart and/or lungs (elephants, you are not alone). This was popularly taught in N America in C 19, and traditionally (maybe still, but I don't know) the penalties were heavier for edge-up criminal stabbings in Japan. I am also intrigued by knucklebowed swords in European art, some of it old, depicted (usually in the sheath, dang it!) with forward-curved blades, when I don't see sabre-hilted yatagans (in Europe; just saw a couple from India; call 'em sossun patta if you want)?....this is seen more in art for children; are children's artists more distant from real violence/weapons? Could it be a deliberate absurdity meant to somehow Bowlderize the prince's sword at the grand ball (etc.), and that like the fox-sized horse literary situation Stephen Gould told us of, came to be the standard?.............dunno; one of those odd strands hanging from the tattered tapestry of world cutlery......
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