Brasscrest Hand Forged High Carbon Steel Polearm Head | Brass Langet Plates with Twin Steel Straps No Haft Supplied | Reenactment Display Gift | RK-1369

A halberd head with its mounting hardware already fitted, ready to be pinned to a stave and put up. The head is 1095 high carbon steel, mirror polished, with a long axial spike, a deep crescent blade cut away behind both horns and a hooked rear fluke, and it carries brass langet plates riveted at the eye with two long steel straps running down from them. It is a display piece as it stands and a functional weapon head the moment you put a stave through it, which is exactly the state in which most halberd heads change hands between collectors.

Forged, heat treated and finished in our shop in Memphis, Tennessee, hardened and drawn to 54 to 58 HRC. It ships free anywhere in the United States and it can be engraved with Elder Futhark runes or a Viking pattern of your choosing before it leaves the bench.

Specifications

Why the blade has holes cut in it

Look at the crescent and you will see the steel scooped away behind each horn, leaving the edge supported by a much narrower web than the outline suggests. That is not decoration and it is not a saving on material. It is weight management, and on a polearm it is the difference between a head you can bring back for a second stroke and one you cannot.

The reason it works is that a cutting edge takes its load in a very narrow band right behind the bevel. The metal a couple of inches back from the edge, up in the body of the crescent, is carrying almost nothing. Remove it and the blade loses mass without losing strength where strength is needed, and the balance of the whole weapon shifts back toward the hands. Period halberd smiths took this a long way, and some sixteenth century heads are cut into open scrollwork that looks purely ornamental until you weigh one. Ours is cut conservatively, enough to lighten the head and shape the horns without leaving a thin section anywhere that a hard cut would find.

Why 1095 high carbon steel and not stainless

Every plain steel piece in this group is forged from 1095, a simple high carbon steel with roughly one percent carbon and very little else in it. That plainness is the point. A steel with nothing but iron and carbon to argue about moves predictably under the hammer, takes a clean quench, and comes back to a hardness a smith can actually hold to. These are hardened and drawn to 54 to 58 HRC, which is deliberately a touch softer than a kitchen knife. A head that has to survive impact wants to bend and rebound rather than chip, and 1095 in that range absorbs a bad hit instead of losing a piece of itself.

Stainless alloys buy their rust resistance with chromium, and above about thirteen percent that chromium ties up carbon in carbides that make the steel harder to forge and more brittle at the edge. On a small folding knife that trade is fine. On a head that lands with the weight of a haft behind it, it is not. The cost of choosing 1095 is that it will rust if you leave it wet. Wipe it, oil it, and it will outlast you. There is more on that trade in our guide to Damascus versus stainless.

Hafting the head yourself

This is sold as a head, without a haft, which is how most surviving museum pieces come down to us and how most serious reproductions are bought. It gives you the choice of length, timber and finish, and it keeps the shipping sane, because a finished polearm is a six foot parcel. The socket and langets are drilled and dimensioned for a standard haft section, and any hardwood dowel stock or a turned ash stave will take it.

If you are hafting it yourself, use ash or hickory rather than pine, cut the seat a fraction proud and pare it back until the head drives on hard, and pin through the langet holes with soft steel or copper rivets rather than screws. Oil the wood before you fit it, not after. If you would rather we hafted it for you, contact the shop before you order and we will quote the length you want. Wood care is covered in wooden handle care.

Engraving, runes and your own design

Use the rune converter on this page to turn a name, a date or a short phrase into Elder Futhark and we will cut it into the steel or the handle. If you would rather have a Viking pattern than a rune line, choose your own design in the engraving option above the add to cart button and tell us whether it goes on the blade or the handle. Where a piece already carries an engraved design, your chosen engraving replaces it rather than sitting alongside it.

Engraving is cut by hand after the piece is finished and before final oiling, so keep the line short and let it sit where the eye already goes. Names, dates, a line of a poem, a maker mark, a unit or a crew number all work. If you are unsure where a line should sit, send us the text and we will suggest a placement before we cut. Full details and examples are on the engraving page.

Care and sharpening

Carbon steel rusts. That is the only demanding thing about owning it. Wipe the steel down after handling, because fingerprints are salt and moisture and they will etch a bright surface in a week if you let them sit. A thin film of mineral oil, gun oil or paste wax on the metal is enough to keep it stable indoors. If the piece lives on a wall in a room that swings between damp and dry, check it every few months and re oil. Left alone in a garage or a basement it will spot, and once it spots the mark is permanent even after the rust is removed.

The edge is finished sharp from the forge and does not need attention until it stops biting. When it does, a coarse then fine whetstone, kept wet, held at the angle the bevel already carries, will bring it back in a few minutes. Do not take a powered grinder to it. Our guides cover steel care and sharpening with a whetstone in more detail.

Forged in Memphis

This is made in our shop in Memphis, Tennessee. Nothing in this listing is drop shipped from an importer catalogue and nothing is bought in finished and re labelled. The steel is cut, heated, drawn and shaped here, the heat treat is done here, and the fitting and finishing are done here by the same small crew. That is also why the lead time is honest rather than instant. Pieces in stock ship within two to three business days. If yours has to be made, or if you have asked for engraving, allow two to three weeks before it leaves the shop. We will tell you which it is when you order rather than after. Shipping inside the United States is free.

A note on handmade variation

This is hand forged. It is not machine made, not cast and not bulk produced, so what arrives will not be a pixel for pixel copy of the photograph on this page. The grain of the wood, the tone the steel takes from the fire and the oil, the exact run of a pattern, the precise curve of a profile, all of it shifts a little from one piece to the next because each one is worked by hand from natural materials. Two hafts cut from the same board will not read the same. Two etched blades from the same billet will not carry the same swirl.

What does not change is the specification. Dimensions, steel, hardness, fittings and build are the same every time. The character is the part that is yours alone, and it is the reason to buy something forged rather than something stamped.

Frequently asked questions

Is a haft included?

No. This is the head with its brass langet plates and twin steel straps fitted, drilled and ready for through rivets. You supply the stave, which lets you pick the length and the timber and keeps the shipping to a small parcel.

Can it be hung as it is?

Yes, and many buyers do. The straps give it two clean fixing points on a board or a wall, and the mirror polish and brass read well against dark slate or oak. It looks deliberate rather than unfinished.

Can I have runes engraved on it?

Yes. Use the rune converter on this page for Elder Futhark or choose your own Viking pattern. The brass langet plates take the finest line of anything on this piece, and the crescent flat takes the longest one.

Will mine look like the photograph?

The profile, dimensions and fittings will match. Each head is dressed and polished by hand so the sweep of the horns varies slightly, and brass arrives at different brightness depending on how recently it was finished.

What is the difference between this and the socketed halberd head?

The mounting. The socketed head takes a stave into a closed collar. This one clamps a stave between two long straps and is pinned through, which is stronger against twist and easier to fit at home.

How long does shipping take?

Two to three business days if it is in stock, two to three weeks if it is being made or engraved. It ships in an ordinary parcel and shipping inside the United States is free with tracking.

What is in the box

• One hand forged halberd head in 1095 high carbon steel
• Brass langet plates with brass rivets and twin steel straps
• No haft supplied, straps drilled for through rivets
• Care, oiling and hafting notes
• Forged and finished in Memphis, Tennessee

Explore the range

More in halberds, glaives and polearms, poleaxes and viking weapons, and read the guides.