The Birth of a blade 2 : Gyldenklo / Goldenclaw

Today, I present to you the blade Gyldenklo, or Goldenclaw as the english version of the name would be.

This wont be a making of post, but a description of the sword and the materials I used for it. Later, I may make a post detailing the steps in making it.

It is the most elaborate blade I have made. It is a short blade similar to a hirscfänger and it is made to look like a 16th - 17th century style sword(my own very free interpretation of this, that is.) Hirschfängers were hunting swords and was traditionally used in perforce hunting were the animal was hunted until it collapsed, or very nearly collapsed, and the leader of the hunt or the guest of honour would then make the kill using a hirshfänger.
I imagine this to be the hirschfänger of some fantasy King hunting small dragons in the woods and mountains surrounding his castle.

This project was actually born from one of my failures (see this post ) A blade that broke During heat treat but was still long enough to be reground into something useful.
A shortsword was the obvious choice.
I chose bronze for the pommel and handguard and a combination of bronze and brass for the scabbards throat and shoe. Most of the metal I left in a fairly rustic finish, in the hope that it will age beautifully.
I will just have to see how that turns out.

I also chose to decorate it with some semiprecious stones, malakite cabochons in this case. I decided on an overall golden/green look. I wanted it to be dragon-like, so I had to get some reptililian-leather

It turns out reptile leather is very expensive, and hard to get, in the size I would need for the scabbard, so I opted for just using it for the handle. I bought a full green tinted lizard skin. app. 40 cm long. It gave more than enough for this sword and with enough left for future projects.

The scabbard is a classic woodcore scabbard (two shells of wood glued and covered in leather) The leather used for the scabbard is thin bookbinders leather. Since it is glued to the wood it doesnt need to be very durable. On the inside the scabbard has a slice of leather. this gives a tighter fit and prevent the blade from falling out of the scabbard. Historically, it was not uncommon to use fur with the fur side in. It would often be saturated with oil and thus also work as a rust-protection.

The Sword is app. 70 cm long and the point of balance is very close to the guard. Its fairly heavy for its short length at around 1 kg, the same weight that a full length sword would have.

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Im EvilHippie, a compulsive creative and jack o' trades. if you want to know more about me, check out my introduction post here

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