That was worked in an incredibly impressive way that would have taken hours upon hours to make.
The viking swords were so good that the a German ruler banned the importation of danish blades because the German smiths resented not being able to compete with their quality.
I just found where they got their iron again, I couldn't remember there, most of it was actually bog iron, some of it was smelted from iron deposits and occasionally, they used the iron sand method described above that the Japanese used.
As another side note, normal soldiers did not carry these swords, they would have used either an axe or a spear, and things were generally awful for them. Swords have almost always been reserved for nobles, or the elite warrior classes all throughout history. Unless you were either crazy rich or part of a standing army you would not have used one, with a few exceptions.
The thing about katanas in my opinion is that they are really overhyped thanks to American media. Samurai got really popular with movies like the 7 samurai and more recently with things like the last samurai and kill bill. Frankly, most of what you see about swords on there is blatant bullshit. A katana is made out of steel. It CANNOT cut through a freaking machine gun barrel. It doesn't all of the sudden get magical powers because it's from Japan.
Now that's not to take anything away from them. Good ones are excellent works of art and deadly weapons, only a fool would disagree. The Samurai were exceptional swordsmen as well.
However, as much as tv tells you otherwise the German zweihander or langschwert fighting system was just as advanced, and just as deadly. The cossacks of Russia have been recorded as cutting a man to the saddle with single blows of their sabres, which are fairly light swords. The katana is awesome as an example of the Japanese tradition and is a beautiful thing, but it isn't perfect, not by a long shot.
Now if you follwed that, you should have a fairly basic understanding of the two methods of swordmaking and you can, if you actually get what I wrote, talk some shit about katanas.
So internets, there has been an interesting new development that I thought you might be interested in.
One of my Bosses is had a plumbing problem (toothbrush in the toilet lol) and he was talking to the plumber who was over, and it turns out that the plumber is actually a stonemason and a silversmith who is interested in bladesmithing. This is fortunate because I'm a bladesmith who is interested in learning silversmithing. So I called him up and we talk for a few minutes before he went to his next job and we're meeting next Tuesday for coffee. He doesn't live too far from me and he has a metal/stone working workshop too, complete with roller forge and he's interested in getting a hammer forge to make damascus steel.
Anyways, it would seem that we are birds of a feather when it comes to craftsmanship, so I'm rather excited to meet him. Since I'll probably be moving into an apartment soon I might be able to work with him at his place on projects, which is a huge help too because a lot of metal working things really require at least two people who are decent metal workers, or very expensive machinery.
Comments
That was worked in an incredibly impressive way that would have taken hours upon hours to make.
The viking swords were so good that the a German ruler banned the importation of danish blades because the German smiths resented not being able to compete with their quality.
I just found where they got their iron again, I couldn't remember there, most of it was actually bog iron, some of it was smelted from iron deposits and occasionally, they used the iron sand method described above that the Japanese used.
As another side note, normal soldiers did not carry these swords, they would have used either an axe or a spear, and things were generally awful for them. Swords have almost always been reserved for nobles, or the elite warrior classes all throughout history. Unless you were either crazy rich or part of a standing army you would not have used one, with a few exceptions.
The thing about katanas in my opinion is that they are really overhyped thanks to American media. Samurai got really popular with movies like the 7 samurai and more recently with things like the last samurai and kill bill. Frankly, most of what you see about swords on there is blatant bullshit. A katana is made out of steel. It CANNOT cut through a freaking machine gun barrel. It doesn't all of the sudden get magical powers because it's from Japan.
Now that's not to take anything away from them. Good ones are excellent works of art and deadly weapons, only a fool would disagree. The Samurai were exceptional swordsmen as well.
However, as much as tv tells you otherwise the German zweihander or langschwert fighting system was just as advanced, and just as deadly. The cossacks of Russia have been recorded as cutting a man to the saddle with single blows of their sabres, which are fairly light swords. The katana is awesome as an example of the Japanese tradition and is a beautiful thing, but it isn't perfect, not by a long shot.
Now if you follwed that, you should have a fairly basic understanding of the two methods of swordmaking and you can, if you actually get what I wrote, talk some shit about katanas.
One of my Bosses is had a plumbing problem (toothbrush in the toilet lol) and he was talking to the plumber who was over, and it turns out that the plumber is actually a stonemason and a silversmith who is interested in bladesmithing. This is fortunate because I'm a bladesmith who is interested in learning silversmithing. So I called him up and we talk for a few minutes before he went to his next job and we're meeting next Tuesday for coffee. He doesn't live too far from me and he has a metal/stone working workshop too, complete with roller forge and he's interested in getting a hammer forge to make damascus steel.
Anyways, it would seem that we are birds of a feather when it comes to craftsmanship, so I'm rather excited to meet him. Since I'll probably be moving into an apartment soon I might be able to work with him at his place on projects, which is a huge help too because a lot of metal working things really require at least two people who are decent metal workers, or very expensive machinery.