The Falchion or Malchus, the rarest medieval sword

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Salaams Swordfish! I note that you have a Malchus in one of the pictures with dots down the backblade... Very interesting.

Regards Ibrahiim al Balooshi.

[Jim McDougall]

Absolutely brilliant work Susi!!!!
While your excellent typology and survey of these intriguing medieval swords gives us perfect understanding of these, I was reminded of the first time I heard the term 'malchus' used to describe them in 2009 with Jasper's post which I brought back up.

I wanted to add some information on where this term came from.
Apparantly the term 'malchus' was used by Herbert Seitz (1965) in his "Blankwaffen" in describing these medieval falchions, and I am not certain whether he coined the term or drew from other material. The term refers to the 'sword of St. Peter' , a religious relic held in the Poznan Archdiocesal Museum in Poland, and held to be the weapon used by Simon Peter when he cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest when Jesus was arrested in Gethsemane. The servants name was Malchus, and the sword, though described in 1609 as being a Roman gladius, in form it has the same kind of dramatically widened blade as these medieval falchions.
The Italian storta having the 'clipped tip' resembling the 'Thorpe falchion' falls into the collective 'malchus' group with the falchion term.

It is unclear whether the sword in Poznan is actually of the period suggested by tradition or whether it is a medieval production of the 14th c. as believed by Marian Glosek the authority on Polish swords.

All best regards,
Jim

[broadaxe]

Excellent! Probably my preferred medieval weapon.
It seems that no. 11b, 12, 12a & 13 are all alike (well, 13 has a point) and I'm very happy to see a surviving example. Apparently a peasant class weapon, being pretty simple to make and lacking a guard nor a pommel. Similar to the Italian Beidana that had been used into later times.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Salaams all~ There is a monumental thread full of detail and drawings etc called Help pls. on 15th-17th C. cutlass & scimitar of 2009 which although it ended rather badly is otherwise very interesting. Well worth serious research. Easy to find by typing in Falchion on search Regards Ibrahiim al Balooshi.

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Ibrahiim al Balooshi

Salaams all~ There is a monumental thread full of detail and drawings etc called Help pls. on 15th-17th C. cutlass & scimitar of 2009 which although it ended rather badly is otherwise very interesting. Well worth serious research. Easy to find by typing in Falchion on search Regards Ibrahiim al Balooshi.

Thank you so much Ibrahiim for the reference to this thread, with which the description 'ended badly' beautifully and with diplomatic demeanor describes the terminus of that thread. This was indeed a magnificent and informative discussion which was entirely destroyed by the inability of two members (no longer participating) to consider the topics at hand more important than themselves. This was a great discourse revealing outstanding details on the topics and became an unfortunate textbook example of how poor choice of words in rebuttal as well as personally oriented retort led to the loss of what was an important course of discussion, much to the misfortune of all others involved.

The material prior to this was as noted, extremely important and interesting with application to this subject on the falchion and related weapons.

Susi, the compliments I assure you are more than well deserved! .
I was trying to post a photo which I had found under 'St.Peters sword' in Wikipedia but computer malfunction apparantly took it out. I had found this originally when the original 'malchus sword' topic came up, and discovered this sword and the 'malchus' were one in the same.

Thank you Jasper for adding the illustrations, and as always for your outstanding and knowledgeable contributions which truly add such detail in understanding more on these weapons.

All the best,
Jim

[Jim McDougall]

Just wanted to add a note concerning the use of the 'malchus' term, which as I had mentioned earlier I had seen as noted by Jasper, in Herbert Seitz' "Blankwaffen" (1965), but was unclear if it had been in use earlier.
I discovered apparantly it was in use as early as 1885, when described in "Schools and Masters of Fence" by Egerton Castle on p.229, "...malchus was the name often given to a short, broad and straight bladed sword, synonomous with braquemar, in remembrance of Malchus, who had, according to the Gospel, his ear cut off by St.Peter presumably with an instrument of this kind".
The illustration (plate VI, #4) shows a medieval broadsword, short blade which is straight and not with this falchion type blade at all, with the 'crab claw' type hilt with downturned quillons seen on various medieval swords.
It is interesting to see yet another case of terms and classification semantics which repeatedly plague serious arms scholarship in discovering the progression in development of these historic weapons.

[cornelistromp]

@Susi
re: Nurnberg sword
I believe it is the GNM in Nuremberg.

@All
re: castillon
there is a wonderful article published in the catalog of the London A & A fair 2012;
Additional notes on the swords of castillon by Clive Thomas.
herein are the different types of castillon swords classified and described in way a only Clive can do.
This is "a must have" for the sword enthusiasts.
The Falchion of the Royal Armouries in Leeds is also shown here.


best,

[Swordfish]

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

Absolutely brilliant work Susi!!!!
While your excellent typology and survey of these intriguing medieval swords gives us perfect understanding of these, I was reminded of the first time I heard the term 'malchus' used to describe them in 2009 with Jasper's post which I brought back up.

I wanted to add some information on where this term came from.
Apparantly the term 'malchus' was used by Herbert Seitz (1965) in his "Blankwaffen" in describing these medieval falchions, and I am not certain whether he coined the term or drew from other material. The term refers to the 'sword of St. Peter' , a religious relic held in the Poznan Archdiocesal Museum in Poland, and held to be the weapon used by Simon Peter when he cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest when Jesus was arrested in Gethsemane. The servants name was Malchus, and the sword, though described in 1609 as being a Roman gladius, in form it has the same kind of dramatically widened blade as these medieval falchions.
The Italian storta having the 'clipped tip' resembling the 'Thorpe falchion' falls into the collective 'malchus' group with the falchion term.

It is unclear whether the sword in Poznan is actually of the period suggested by tradition or whether it is a medieval production of the 14th c. as believed by Marian Glosek the authority on Polish swords.

All best regards,
Jim

Thanks all for the kind compliments!

Dear Jim, I must confess that I never heard of the sword in Poznan. Do you have a photo of it?

Regards
Susi

[cornelistromp]

st Peter's sword in Poznan's cathedral.

another interesting falchion outof the castillon hoard, one from the klingenmuseum in Solingen and one from nurnberg museum.

best,

[Swordfish]

Very interesting photos. Thank you very much. I didn`t knew that the Castillon hoard contained a falchion. The Nurenberg Falchion, is it in the Germanic National Museum? I have not seen it there during my last visit. Or is it in another Museum?

Regards