Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post - Weapons of the Chinese Green Standard Army

Philip · 7th May 2017, 02:38 AM

From empirical observation, I note that most blades from the late Ming to mid-Qing seem to hover between 6 - 7 mm thickness at the forte (not counting the tunkou or sleeve at the base of some of them). This is assuming that they haven't been polished or ground down to remove deep pitting sometime in the past as is the case with a lot of stuff coming onto the market.

Forte thicknesses in this range seem to be prevalent in a large number of other types of cut-and-thrust blades as well. We could chalk up this surprising consistency to functional parameters -- given a specific material (steel), a set of functional parameters (such as point of balance, rigidity, resilience and the need to absorb lateral stresses especially near the hilt), one could expect an optimum in terms of distal dimensions at the forte which different cultures.

Thicknesses would tend to increase if more rigidity and stability were needed for longer weapons, or if there were other requirements for weight distribution in shorter ones. Re the latter, we've both observed a particular pattern of later (early 19th) Qing military sabers which are around 9-10 mm thick at the forte, as are some civilian "ox-tail" sabers. There are some shorter Indian talwars which have similar distal dimensions. This would call out for a deeper look at the fencing techniques and deployment situations for these particular weapons to explain their design characteristics since their distal profile .

7th May 2017, 02:38 AM	#6
Philip Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: California Posts: 1,036	blade thicknesses From empirical observation, I note that most blades from the late Ming to mid-Qing seem to hover between 6 - 7 mm thickness at the forte (not counting the tunkou or sleeve at the base of some of them). This is assuming that they haven't been polished or ground down to remove deep pitting sometime in the past as is the case with a lot of stuff coming onto the market. Forte thicknesses in this range seem to be prevalent in a large number of other types of cut-and-thrust blades as well. We could chalk up this surprising consistency to functional parameters -- given a specific material (steel), a set of functional parameters (such as point of balance, rigidity, resilience and the need to absorb lateral stresses especially near the hilt), one could expect an optimum in terms of distal dimensions at the forte which different cultures. Thicknesses would tend to increase if more rigidity and stability were needed for longer weapons, or if there were other requirements for weight distribution in shorter ones. Re the latter, we've both observed a particular pattern of later (early 19th) Qing military sabers which are around 9-10 mm thick at the forte, as are some civilian "ox-tail" sabers. There are some shorter Indian talwars which have similar distal dimensions. This would call out for a deeper look at the fencing techniques and deployment situations for these particular weapons to explain their design characteristics since their distal profile .