Mr. Oakeshott's Sword

[cornelistromp]

Originally Posted by Ed

Sort of. What it means is that something that is depicted must, necessarily, have been around for a while. Might be a year, might be a decade. Appearance in art can only tell you that the thing existed prior to the date of the art.

Of course, if a person appears all decked out in his finery in a portrait you can reasonably assume that what you see is a reasonably accurate representation of that person and his possessions at that time. But that is a trivial observation. What it tells you is that the technology to create the weave of the cloth that he is wearing must have been developed before that date. It tells you that the form of a weapon was around for some period of time prior to the depiction of it in the piece. It tells you nothing about when those things were first developed, only that they were there then. And it certainly does not provide a definitive date of a form of an object, only that that form was in existence when the art was created. That is why you often see the phrase "Before such and such a date" in museum identification cards.

That is what I mean by terminus ante quem:

"Terminus post quem ("limit after which", often abbreviated to TPQ[1]) and terminus ante quem ("limit before which") specify the known limits of dating for events. A terminus post quem is the earliest time the event may have happened, and a terminus ante quem is the latest. An event may well have both a terminus post quem and a terminus ante quem, in which case the limits of the possible range of dates are known at both ends, but many events have just one or the other. Similarly, terminus ad quem ("limit to which") is the latest possible date of a non-punctual event (period, era, etc.), while terminus a quo ("limit from which") is the earliest."

I noticed you copy-paste Wikipedia;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminus_post_quem


This is what Norman published about this, in rapier and the small sword.
it is often argued that painters were very slap dash and unreliable over details. at least as far as sword hilts are concerned, my impression is that the painters whose work I have used here are not unreliable. In any case they are not likely to paint hilts prophetically, showing a type which would be developed a decade later. their work can be used at least as a terminus post quem.

terminus post quem, so the earliest possible date, of course!
can we limit this in time?
I believe that the time between the manufacture of a weapon and a painting where the weapon is depicted can be expressed in years and not in decades.
developments in arms were subjected to fashion and followed in rapid succession.

if we go back to the sword under discussion, your sword, we have to bridge at least a 100 years. based on the Hilt/pommel type in art and the dating of Oakeshott.
this is however, very unlikely.

it is more likely That Oakeshott was 100 years too early with his dating, based on the knowledge in the period of his publishing, the 60'ties.
This assumption is strengthened by the fact that no examples of ring guards can be found from the 15th century, no physical examples and not in art.

furthermore, the period indicated by Norman for this type of hilt-11, 1520-1600, is based on several sources, multiple dated paintings, dated examples in museums and Publications. This gives an accurate picture of the period in which this type of hilt has been used.
This combined with the time period of the pommel, 1470-1585, gives a clue to the dating of the sword under discussion. see #14

best,
Jasper