The arming sword is the single hand knightly sword: straight double edged blade, simple crossguard, wheel or disc pommel, worn on a belt for three centuries because it worked. Make one from a folded billet and you get the historical shape with a pattern running through the steel, which is the combination this page is built on.
The blades and their fittings
Overall lengths sit at 36, 37 and 38 inches with blades from 30 to 32 inches, which is the historical range rather than a stretched one. Every blade here is forge welded 1095 and 15N20 at 58 to 60 HRC, etched so the layers read along the fuller. The pommels are where they separate: a steel wheel above a knotwork cut ricasso, a Celtic knot wheel over a banded burgundy grip, a brazil nut above an etched knotwork panel, a cast wolf head above a blackened ringed grip, and one carrying a Yggdrasil medallion over a black grip with brass wire bands. Two have brass fittings, including a rune cut guard over an oxblood grip. One is described as pattern welded rather than layered, with a leather wrapped grip and a steel wheel pommel. Scabbards are brown or dark leather, one with a brass throat, and one sword ships with its scabbard and belt together. One carries a rounded display point rather than a sharpened one. Prices run from 469 dollars to 599 dollars.
Pattern, meaning and shape
If the folded steel is new to you, our explanation of Damascus steel covers how the layers form and why the pattern goes all the way through. The world tree on one of these pommels is not a decorative squiggle, and our page on Yggdrasil explains what it held together in the Norse sources. The full single hand range including the plain steel pieces is in arming swords, and everything built on the folded billet is in Damascus swords.
Ransack Viking is a US company based in Chicago, Illinois. These pieces are handmade in the Czech Republic, then imported, inspected and shipped from Chicago. Engraving is done in the US after arrival: text 19 dollars, symbol 39 dollars, family crest 49 dollars.
Free US shipping
On most pieces. Heavier and oversized ones carry a flat charge.
Hand Forged
Heated, hammered and ground by hand.
Engraving available
Names, dates or Norse runes on most pieces.
