Shotley Bridge swordmakers

[urbanspaceman]

Here is the portrait in question, save anyone chasing the link (thank-you by the way Peter).

[Jim McDougall]

With regard to artistic license, this is a very valid consideration with respect to the viability of classifying and identifying swords from portraits and artwork.
Radboud has brought up most salient points, and while in many cases, the swords represented in portraits may indeed be reliable. However reading through the late Nick Norman's introduction to "The Rapier and Smallsword 1460-1820"(1980), he notes the caveats involved in using these sources as final categorization and dating of forms.

The intention of art is not only to carry out an accurate representation of a subject, but to convey other aspects that promote more subjective reactions.

This painting of Thomas Wentworth, First Earl of Stratford, was painted by the famed Sir Anthony van Dyck, who was the painter for Charles I in 1632.
Van Dyck, was well known not only for his art, but popularization of his recognizable beard style, which became de riguer among English cavaliers and indeed Charles I himself. Interestingly we see likenesses of these in figures on many swords of the period, including the familiar 'mortuary hilts'.

As far as I can find in Norman there is no direct match to the hilt of the sword seen in this painting, however p.129 (fig. 27) there is an Italian rapier of mid 16th c. with a somewhat similar pommel. Here I would note that Van Dyck had been studying in Genoa for some time before returning to England in 1632.

This rapier depicted has the similar high relief oblong pommel seen on earlier rapier hilts, as mentioned many Italian, as well as the long quillon arms of these rapiers. Here the similarity ends as there is no knuckleguard, nor the other guard bars typically seen on the more developed hilt systems.
Thus, while seemingly this appears to be an Italian style rapier, as yet not positively identified, it seems likely the image was based on those forms.
Whether or not an actual sword was worn and drawn from, we cannot know for sure.

What is interesting though is that Charles I, a Stuart, had strong ties to Italy
of course, and Italian influences important. While at this time of the painting (1633) the dish hilt and lighter transitional rapiers were in vogue, this form of more traditional 16th century rapier, mostly Italian, would well represent the profound inclinations to those swords would have presumed a stately presence to the figure.

While these details are in of course different light from the discussion in post #330, they are still relevant to the context of the swords and climate of the English court in the 1630s, and Hounslow period.

[urbanspaceman]

We went down the wrong road:
the portrait is of 1st Earl of Strafford (a supporter of Charles 1st) who was executed at Tower Hill in 1641.
His son, the 2nd Earl (died 1695) was a good friend of James 2nd and he owned the Shotley Bridge sword which passed to his nephew Thomas Watson (1693 - 1750) who had the caskets made.
There is a better image of the 1st earl portrait which looks like the original; the portrait inserted earlier in this thread has been over-painted adding a dog and moving the helmet; see attached.
The sword now looks like a Pappenheimer to me but I am uncertain. Nice tournament armour.

[Jim McDougall]

Well noted Keith, now that I see the shells it does look like a Pappenheimer.
Norman speaks to the often practiced 'overpainting', not to mention later 'restorations'. It really does set the mind to wondering just how much license did come into play.

[Peter Hudson]

The association of this individual with the fortunes and subsequent downfall of Catholics and thus the eventual outcome of The Jacobites are mysterious indeed.

Popular feeling ran very high against the Earl, and the King, though he had assured Strafford that his life should be spared, abandoned him when it came to the point, and on the 10th signed the commission for giving the royal assent to the Bill. The Earl was beheaded on Tower Hill, 12th May 1641, and met his death with dignity and composure. He was 48 years of age. In private life the Earl of Strafford was a devoted husband and father, a true friend and a man of high cultivation and feeling. Many of his faults of temper arose from his shattered health, the result of agonizing accessions of inherited gout. His personal habits were naturally simple, but to sustain the honour of the King "before the eyes of a wild and rude people," he maintained almost regal magnificence, with a retinue of fifty servants and a body-guard of one hundred horse splendidly mounted and accoutred. The ruins of a princely mansion, begun by him, but never completed, may still be seen near Naas. In fact further research reveals 1633-1640
Thomas Wentworth (Black Tom) Earl of Strafford and Lord Deputy of Ireland builds his great house at Jigginstown, it would be an Irish Residence for Charles I, but alas Wentworth is recalled to London and loses his head before the roof goes on his great house. He was long known in the traditions of the Irish peasantry as "Black Tom."
Peter Hudson.

[Jim McDougall]

Interesting stuff on the complexities of Great Britain in this period, and as noted Thomas Wentworth was sent to rule in Ireland in 1633 by Charles I. While he is noted as being of admirable being in this context, his sobriquet "Black Tom" was from the Irish subjects for not only his despotic rule, but his dark demeanor and insistent wearing of somber Puritan clothing.

IMO, the style of the sword in the 'pappenheimer' manner likely comes from the profound Dutch influences brought to England in these times. The German blade makers ostensibly from Solingen were actually recruited in Holland for the Hounslow enterprise. This indirectly of course set the stage for the later Shotley Bridge venture.

Again, interesting connections, the son of 'Black Tom' (2nd Earl of Strafford) had a Shotley sword passed to his nephew Thomas Watson (1693-1750)
which of course has to do with the 'casket' (s) mentioned by Keith earlier.

Every sword has its own legacy, history and dynamics which present most fascinating perspective on historic events and persons. They are literally icons of history and the most exciting way to study it!

[Triarii]

Short version as the website ate my longer reply.
There are multiple versions of the Strafford portrait, with the Pappenheimer one owned by the NT (after Van Dyke, if I recall correctly) and the other by the NPG (school 0f Van Dyke). The NPG have another with him facing to the right, but it shows the same sword hilt in both. It also appears in Van Dykes full length portrait of Charles I in armour. I suspect that it is therefore a prop supplied by the artist, along with the cuirassier armour. That armour was rarely used in England, with only one regiment and a few troops of horse using it in the ECW, but it usefully displays the martial connections of the sitter, being used even as late as the early C18th.

To be fair to AVB Norman, there are good depictions of eg Irish Hilts in portraits of Colonels Booth, Massey and Hutchinson and a Type 91 hilt in Rembrandts 'Self portrait with Saskia', which can also be seen on contemporary tomb monuments in Bristol and Gloucester cathedrals.