Victrix, much in kind as to your note that I brought 'the mystery of the blade notch' your attention......here you have notably supported my theory, which I have been trying to prove since my research on this topic began three decades ago. It began in 1994, as I was browsing through Wagner (1967, Prague) and noted these curious notched blades faithfully depicted. These were all on Austrian examples (as often noted mostly cavalry pallasches) but on two sabers of the five examples (as I recall).
Wanting to confirm these were not 'artistic license'., I wrote to the museums holding the examples Wagner drew from to confirm physically that the notches indeed existed. By 1996 (no computer web/online in those days), I had photos of the noted swords, which indeed had the notches. The museum officials mostly subscribed to Wagners theory of 'worsening' the wound.
I know now that did not mean in thrusting, with the the possible/probable restriction of withdrawing the now embedded blade...but actually in the passage you brilliantly highlighted in Wagners text......to provide a barb in the back edge of the blade for a 'back cut' in close quarters melee, where there was no space to properly swing the sword with sufficient impetus, but a tight slash would impair and distract the opponent momentarily to allow for realignment.
By this same token, a most salient entry by RYSAYS (1/Jan/2024) in the 2017 thread (ongoing) has his take on the notch supporting the 'wound' theory, and in this case to the aspects of the duel with sabers.
In the 1836 "Essai sur de duel" by Louis Alfred le Blanc de Chatauvillad, it is noted in the regulations and protocols of dueling, it is forbidden to 'CHIP' the blade of an epee to cause illegitimate cuts in disputes settled by blood.
While the saber is not specifically noted, it may be well presumed that officers of hussars did engage in dueling with sabers ("The Duelists" , 1978, film from the actual accounts of such events in hussars of the French cavalry during Napoleonic period....from the story by Joseph Conrad).
Honor was typically indeed satisfied by the drawing of blood, and to notch a saber blade in this manner would profoundly intimate that the hussar who proudly bore this feature on his blade was indeed, the swaggering duelist known among the colorful reputation of hussars. It would seem that this notion was not something well known of course, and seems to have been around for many years as suggested by the early examples to the War of Spanish Succession (1701).
There are many nuances of unusual practices and superstitious protocols which exist throughout the history of European military spheres, and these understandably are not typically found by the casual student of such history.
There is a scholarly reticence to include such subjective matter in published material on military history. in fact specifics to swords themselves are typically restricted to whether they were curved, straight but little else if mentioned at all.
While this practice of 'notching' seems to have indeed diffused throughout Europe likely along with the 'hussar phenomenon' (as indicated by its incidental occurrence in these cavalry units of other countries) it seems to have phased out. I would guess that its inception was in the Austro-Hungarian sphere with the remarkable attention to swordsmanship which prevailed there.
Whether it was as initially as surmised a feature to incur distracting wounds in close quarters combat, or to ensure a non fatal blooded cut in a duel, the purpose of the 'notch' in my opinion is in this category.
WONDERFUL SABER VICTRIX! and my thanks for posting it to bring this decades old mystery to at least a reasonably plausible solution.
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