Katzbalgers and Related Landsknecht Swords

[Matus]

Hello,

a similar hilted sword like in Michael's post (single edged Swiss hand and half sword) was sold in the last Fischer auction (417, lot no. 25).

Regards,
Matus

[Matchlock]

Thank you so much, Jasper,


I should have also noticed that the pommel cap is of. ca. 1500, as with a Grosses Messer.
That sign on the blade I would not have read for a Gothic numeral 4.

Thank you as well, Matus, for that Fischer item.


Best,
Michael

[cornelistromp]

Originally Posted by Matchlock

Thank you so much, Jasper,


I should have also noticed that the pommel cap is of. ca. 1500, as with a Grosses Messer.
That sign on the blade I would not have read for a Gothic numeral 4.

Thank you as well, Matus, for that Fischer item.


Best,
Michael

yes, I mentioned it in post 388 as a NON-GOTHIC 4

best,

[Matchlock]

I knew you did but alas I am unable to look at that mark as any shape of the cypher 4, whether Gothic or non-Gothic.

That however seems to be a problem of personal identification on my side.


Best,
m

[cornelistromp]

Originally Posted by Matchlock

I knew you did but alas I am unable to look at that mark as any shape of the cypher 4, whether Gothic or non-Gothic.

That however seems to be a problem of personal identification on my side.


Best,
m

maybe this close up picture helps.

best,

[Matchlock]

That did help indeed, thank you.


I would not call that a classic non-Gothic numeral 4 though.

Most medievalists will agree that the Gothic numeral 4 in its 'typical' version is often misread as the upper half of the cypher 8, which actually is not true. In fact, '4' has only been turned to the right by 90 degrees since the 15th century and turned back to its present position again in the course of the first half of the 16th century.

If you look at it that way, the 'position' of the numeral 4 on the blade of that Katzbalger may well be alright, just not not quite what one would expect 'characteristically' and 'ideally'.

In order to illustrate how much the position of numeral 4 could vary - until the 'modern' version! - during the whole 15th c., I attached the following samples:


1407 (founding table of the Church of the Holy Spirit, Landshut, Bavaria), very unusual!

1436 (hatchment, Swiss National Museum Zurich)

1443 (bone of a mammoth, an inexplicable curiosity in the Gothic period)

1460 (mirrored version of numeral 4, on the crossbow of Ulrich of Württemberg, Metropolitan Museum of Art, N.Y.), unusually mirrored!

1478 (source unknown)

1481 (Old City Hall, Regensburg, Bavaria)

1481 (wrought-iron hackbut barrel, Munich; in my collection, and two nearly identical samples in Oberhaus Castle, Passau, Lower Bavaria):
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...=haquebut+1481

1481 (painting by Michael Wohlgemut), unusually modern!

1499 (Albrecht Dürer, Nuremberg, whose style was extremely 'advanced' in his time, on his portrait of Oswolt Krell)!



As you will see, no absolutely strict rules can be set up for a certain representation.



Best,
m

[Matchlock]

1474 (ratched of a cranequin, Probus sale, Stockholm 8 Nov 2010)

1488 (church in Haimhausen, near Munich, Bavaria)

1499 (painting by Michael Wohlgemut, at the threshold to the Early Modern Age)

1499 (model of a fire engine, Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg)

1493 (epitaph plate, former Figdor colln., Vienna)

1493 (another, from the same source)

1497 (Nuremberg)

1504 (Nuremberg bronze cannon barrel, town museum in Weismain, Bavaria)

1514 (Bülach, Switzerland), old style!

1514 (painting by Lucas Cranach, Dresden), modern style!

1547 (Salzburg, Austria)

1548 (bone plaque on a wheelock arquebus, Tojhusmuseet Copenhagen)

1548 (same gun)

1554 (blade of a Flamberg two-handed sword, town hall museum Stein am Rhein, Switzerland), Gothic style!!!



Once again, a great bandwidth of varieties is documented, and almost any style of representation may have been possible!
In traditional and far-off countries like Switzerland, the obsolete Gothic style prevailed even in the Renaissance epoque until at least the mid-16th c.!



m