The blades in this collection are the shapes Norse men and women actually carried: seaxes with the broken back spine, matched langseax pairs, Viking styled belt and hunting knives, and Norse marked daggers, cleavers and kitchen blades. Every one is made by hand in the Czech Republic by workshops that still forge, harden and grind the old way, then inspected and dispatched from the Ransack Viking warehouse in Memphis, Tennessee. Blades are 1095 high carbon steel or Damascus forge welded from 1095 and 15N20. Handles run to rosewood, olive wood, camel bone, buffalo horn, micarta, stacked leather and cord wrap, and almost every knife ships in a fitted leather sheath. Engraving is done in the United States after the knives arrive and before they go out, so a name, a date or a line of Elder Futhark runes can go on the blade or the handle. Free US shipping, a lifetime warranty against defects, 7 day returns.
Viking Knife History
Nearly everyone in the Viking Age owned a knife. The sword was rare and expensive and the axe was common, but the knife was universal, and the archaeology bears that out: small single edged blades turn up in graves of every rank, in farmsteads, in trading towns and in the wrecks of ships. The word behind most of them is seax, a family name rather than one design, covering everything from a three inch paring blade to the langseax, a fighting knife with more than twenty inches of edge.
The metal came out of the ground the hard way. Bog iron was gathered from marshes, smelted in small clay bloomery furnaces and hammered clean of slag, which left a soft and uneven material. Smiths worked around that limitation rather than fighting it. A body of wrought iron carried a strip of harder, higher carbon steel forge welded along the cutting edge, and on the better pieces the back of the blade was pattern welded from twisted rods, giving the herringbone and chevron figuring that later collectors would call Damascus. The Seax of Beagnoth, pulled out of the Thames in 1857, carries both: pattern welded panels, and the only complete Anglo Saxon runic alphabet known on a blade, with its owner’s name spelled out beside it.
Carry was horizontal. A seax sat across the front of the belt in a sheath stitched along its top edge, blade upward, hilt where the right hand fell. That is a working position rather than a fighting one, and it tells you what the knife was mostly for: cutting food, trimming leather, shaping wood, splitting rope, gutting fish. Fighting was the last job on the list, though the langseax did it well enough that Frankish writers ended up naming a whole people after the blade.
Norse knives were working tools first, and the piece on the seax shows how far that single pattern stretched, from the table to the boat. If the profiles here are unfamiliar, our guide to blade shapes explains what each grind is good at.
36 pieces in this collection
Free US shipping
On every order, no minimum.
Hand Forged
Heated, hammered and ground by hand.
Engraving available
Names, dates or Norse runes on most pieces.
Ships from Memphis
Inspected and dispatched from our Tennessee warehouse. No import duty, no customs delay on US orders.
Viking Knives
Mosaicsax Hand Forged Damascus Viking Seax Knife with Mosaic Bone Handle and Brass Bolster & Leather Sheath | Norse Collector Gift | RK-1029
Price range: $149.00 through $199.00
What Makes a Knife a Viking Knife
Three things, and none of them is decoration. A single edge with a thick flat spine, because Viking Age steel was expensive and a blade that carries its mass on the back is stronger for the same cost. A tang that runs the full length of the grip, peened over a pommel plate or a simple end cap, because a hidden stub tang breaks the first time you baton it. And a plain handle with no crossguard, straight or slightly waisted, stopped by a bolster or by the swell of the grip itself. That is why an honest seax profile looks so unfussy next to a modern hunter.
Everything past that is regional taste and date. Runes, knotwork, a Valknut or a raven head etched into the flat are things we offer because customers ask for them, and they were done in period too, just not on every blade. For the archaeology behind the shapes, read the history of the Viking seax.
The Seax and Its Variants
Seax is the umbrella term, and it is worth knowing the sub shapes before you buy, because they handle very differently. The dedicated pieces live in the Viking seax collection, and the seax buyer's guide walks through sizing in more detail.
Broken Back Seax
The one most people picture. The spine runs straight out of the handle, then drops at a hard angle to meet a straight edge at the point. It is a late Viking Age and Anglo Saxon pattern, it puts real weight behind the tip, and the long flat edge is excellent on a cutting board or a piece of leather. Most of ours run around 12 to 15 inches overall.
Straight Back Seax
Spine dead straight to a shallow point, edge curving gently up to meet it. Older than the broken back and more common in Scandinavia proper. It is the easier of the two to sharpen freehand and the better one for carving, since the tip stays low and controllable.
Langseax
The short sword end of the family, twenty inches of blade and upward, carried by men who expected trouble. Today it is bought for reenactment, wall display and collections rather than camp work, and we carry it as matched pairs with fitted scabbards.
Small Belt Seax
Four to six inches of blade, worn horizontally, used for food and everything else. Historically this was the most common knife in the Norse world by a wide margin, and it is still the one people actually keep on a belt.
The Everyday Utility Knife
Not every blade in here is a seax, and that is historically honest. A Norse household ran on plain utility knives: short, single edged, wood or bone handled, resharpened until the blade was a sliver. The Celtic and Odin pattern utility knives follow that idea in a modern working size, and so do the Viking styled belt and hunting knives. If you mainly want a blade for game and field work rather than a period shape, the hunting knives and the Damascus skinner knives are built for it, and a deep bellied skinner will take a hide off faster than any seax will.
There was no Norse folding knife. Folders are a later development, so if you want something that closes into a pocket in the same steel, look at the folding pocket knives and treat it as a modern piece rather than a reproduction.
Blade Shapes and What They Do
Geometry decides more about how a knife feels in the hand than the steel does. A straight edge with a flat grind slices and carves. A deep belly rolls through hide. A clip point trades edge length for a fast low tip. The knife blade shapes guide covers the full set, but the profiles you will meet in this collection are the broken back, the straight back, the clip point on the Viking styled bowie knives, the symmetrical two edged blades in the dagger knives, and the tall flat edge of the Norse marked cleavers, which sit alongside the rest of the chef knives if you want a kitchen set rather than a single blade.
The Steel
Two grades, no others. Plain blades are 1095 high carbon steel, heat treated to 54 to 58 HRC. That is a hard working edge that takes a fine finish on a stone and comes back quickly when it dulls. It is also carbon steel, so it will darken with use and it will rust if you put it away wet.
Damascus blades are forge welded from 1095 and 15N20 and hardened to 58 to 60 HRC. The 15N20 stays bright through the etch while the 1095 goes dark, which is what produces the pattern. That pattern runs through the billet, so it survives sharpening instead of wearing off the way a printed finish does. There is a fuller explanation in what is Damascus steel. Both grades want the same care.
Handles
Rosewood and olive wood are the traditional choices and the most forgiving in the hand. Camel bone and buffalo horn are the display materials, dense, cool to hold, and figured differently on every piece. Stacked leather washers and cord wrap give the most grip when your hands are wet, which is why they turn up on the working models. Micarta is modern rather than period, and it is here because it is close to indestructible. Brass bolsters appear on most of the seaxes, and they are structural as well as ornamental, taking shock that would otherwise land on the front of the scale.
Sheaths and Carry
Almost every knife here ships with a leather sheath, most of them vegetable tanned cowhide, hand stitched. The seax sheaths follow the period pattern where the shape allows, stitched along the spine edge for horizontal belt carry, which keeps the hilt where your hand falls and keeps the blade out of the way when you sit down. Leather is the right thing to carry a knife in and the wrong thing to store one in, because it holds moisture against the steel. Between uses, keep the knife out of the sheath, in a drawer or on a rack.
Sharpening and Care
1095 and Damascus sharpen the same way, since Damascus is 1095 with company. Work a medium stone at roughly 20 degrees per side until a burr forms along the whole edge, move to a fine stone, then strop the burr off. If you touch a blade up often enough you will only ever need the strop. Our guide to sharpening a knife with a whetstone has the full method.
After use, wipe the blade, dry it properly, and put a light film of mineral or camellia oil on the steel. Blood, fruit acid and salt water will all mark carbon steel within hours. A grey patina is not damage and plenty of owners force one deliberately. Orange rust is damage, and it lifts off with a cork and a little oil if you catch it before it pits.
How to Choose a Viking Knife
Start with what the knife is for. For belt carry and everyday cutting, take a small or mid size seax in 1095 on wood or stacked leather. For camp and bushcraft, go for the thicker spined broken back models, again in 1095, because you will be sharpening it in the field and you want steel that answers to a pocket stone. For display, reenactment or a gift, the Damascus blades and the bone and horn handles are what people put on a wall, and the langseax pairs are the statement piece. A knife and an axe together is the historically correct kit, so if you are building rather than buying one blade, look at the Viking axes as well.
Viking Knives FAQ
What is a Viking knife called?
A seax, sometimes written sax or scramasax. The word covers the whole family of single edged Norse and Germanic blades, from a small belt knife up to the langseax at over twenty inches. There is no separate Old Norse term for a Viking knife, because it was simply the knife everybody had.
Were Viking knives single edged or double edged?
Single edged, almost without exception. Two edged blades in the Norse world were swords and the occasional dagger. If you want a symmetrical double edged profile, the dagger knives are the right collection.
Are these real Viking knives or reproductions?
Reproductions, hand forged from Viking Age and Anglo Saxon patterns. Blade profile, tang construction and sheath style follow the period rather than copying one specific artefact. Nothing here is an antique, and nothing is cast or stamped.
Are Viking knives any good for bushcraft?
A mid size broken back or straight back seax in 1095 is a genuinely capable camp knife. The thick spine takes a baton, the long flat edge carves and preps food, and there is no complicated grind to ruin when you sharpen it on a stone beside a fire. It gives up some finesse to a purpose built modern bushcraft knife and gets it back in durability.
Is a Viking knife legal to carry?
Knife law in the United States is set by state and often by city, particularly around fixed blade length and concealed carry. Check your own state and municipal rules before you carry any fixed blade. We ship to all fifty states, and knowing local law is the buyer's responsibility.
Do they arrive sharp?
Yes. Every blade is ground and sharpened by hand in the workshop, then inspected in Memphis before it ships, so it arrives cutting.
Can I have runes engraved on the blade?
Yes. Engraving is done in the United States after the knives arrive from the Czech Republic and before they go out, so a name, a date or a line of Elder Futhark can go on the blade flat or the handle. See custom engraving for what fits where.
How long does delivery take?
Orders are inspected and dispatched from Memphis, TN within 1 to 2 weeks, with US delivery typically taking a further 3 to 7 business days. US shipping is free, returns are accepted within 7 days, and every knife carries a lifetime warranty against defects.
