The Scythe as a weapon.

[Peter Hudson]

Originally Posted by Interested Party

Very, very interesting. I wish I had this information 30 years ago. A weapon would need a very soft temper for this technique. From what the gentleman said in the video the technique also seemed to work harden the edge a bit. For cloth armor it would create a very effective cutting edge. It seems to be a very frugal practice in that it does not remove very much metal for the initial sharpening.

Thanks for the thread.

Thank you for your post...Indeed I was completely amazed by these little gadgets making up the set of wheel jigs and the very basic technique that puts a razor edge on Scythes. This video went even further by using a aluminium rod to finally remove any burrs on the edge. This is a simple piece of easy to operate engineering that puts a superb edge on a Scythe ... and is really used on only one face of the blade. I would describe the edge as a hammered and pushed hollow edge.

My main interest in seeing this technique is related to Swords of Shotley Bridge and the conundrum of Hollow Blade production through a supposed 17th C tool brought there by a Swedish engineer/Industrial Spy... Reinhold Angerstein... but which largely seemed to be a fictional item until it was rediscovered by one of our Forum members and who wrote the book on Shotley Bridge Swords...SEE for example Swords of Shotley Bridge at Library by ...His Name on Forum is urbanspaceman.