Draugmar Hand Forged 51CrV4 Spring Steel Arming Sword with Wide Fuller & Bossed Wheel Pommel | About 38 Inches Overall | Black Leather Grip and Blunt Blade | Training Gift | RK-3027

The plainest sword in this batch and, for a lot of people, the most useful one. A straight cross with no rings, a broad blade with a wide fuller running about two thirds of its length, a wheel pommel with a raised boss at the centre, and a black leather grip closed along a single seam. Nothing on it is there to be looked at.

The wide fuller is the whole character of the blade. It takes metal out of the middle of the flat where it carries almost no load, which leaves a broad cutting blade that still moves like a lighter one. The blade is blunted 51CrV4 spring steel with a flat edge land and a rounded point, and the sword is about 38 inches overall, hand made so it varies a little piece to piece.

If this is the first steel sword you have bought, start with how to buy your first sword and then what is HEMA, because the answer to what you need usually comes out of what your club actually fences. The rest of the shelf is in HEMA arming swords. If this is the first steel you buy, read how to choose your first HEMA sword first.

Specifications

What we can state without guessing. Lengths are approximate because every one is forged and fitted by hand.

The single handed sword in the cut and thrust plays

This is the sword most of the medieval material assumes when it is not talking about the longsword. Fiore dei Liberi gives it a section of its own in the Flower of Battle, one hand and then two on the same blade, and the German tradition treats it through the messer plays and through sword and buckler. It is also the sword that sits in most people’s hands in a reenactment line, which is why it never really goes out of demand.

A plain cross and nothing else means the hand is defended by the blade and by distance, not by ironwork. That sounds like a disadvantage and in sparring it partly is, but it is also the most honest teacher in the range. You cannot get lazy about where your true edge is pointing when there is no ring to catch a sliding point for you.

The cut and thrust plays want a blade that does both. A broad fullered blade like this one carries enough presence through a cut to make a pell ring and still tapers to a point that means something in a thrust. It is the compromise the medieval cutler kept arriving at for four centuries, and it is a good compromise.

A wide fuller, distal taper and what spring steel does here

51CrV4 spring steel hardened to 49 to 52 HRC. Spring steel bends under a hard bind and returns to straight instead of taking a set or snapping, which is the property that keeps a sparring blade alive. Our cutting blades use 1095 high carbon at 54 to 58 HRC, because hardness is what a cutting edge wants, but that same hardness is what breaks a blade when two people put weight on a crossing.

The fuller runs from just below the cross to roughly two thirds of the way up the blade, then stops where the blade narrows towards the point. A fuller is not a blood groove and it never was. It is a stiffening rib run in reverse: taking metal from the centre of the flat leaves the strength at the edges, where bending resistance actually comes from, and it removes weight from the part of the blade you swing furthest.

Alongside it runs the distal taper, the thinning of the blade from hilt to point through its thickness rather than its width. Between the two, this blade keeps the presence of a broad cutter while staying quick enough to change line. Flex here is the medium tier, which is where most clubs want a single handed trainer. The tiers are set out in HEMA sword flex explained.

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 grip. If you would rather have your own design than a rune line, choose your own design in the engraving option above the add to cart button and tell us where it goes. Where a piece already carries an engraved design, your chosen engraving replaces it rather than sitting alongside it. More on the engraving page.

The bossed wheel pommel is made for this. A rune line runs around the flat face outside the boss and reads cleanly, and the wide fuller will take a longer inscription along its length. Tell us which you want and we will lay it out to read with the sword point up.

Handling and balance

One hand, with the wheel pommel sitting against the heel of the palm. The boss gives the pommel a little more depth than a flat wheel, so the sword indexes in the hand and you know where your edge is without looking. The leather seam runs along the back of the grip, away from the fingers, which is where it belongs.

A broad fullered blade has more presence in a cut than the narrow unfullered swords on the same shelf and a slightly slower recovery, which is the trade. Most people settle into that inside one session, and the extra presence is what makes drilling cuts on a pell worth the time. We do not publish a weight or a point of balance, because every one is finished by hand and a printed figure would be a guess dressed up as a specification.

Care

Wipe the blade after every session and run the rag down the inside of the fuller, because a fuller collects the moisture that a flat blade sheds. Mineral or camellia oil on a cloth is all it needs, and doing it after use beats doing it once a month.

Leather grips hold damp. Let the sword dry in open air before it goes into a bag and never store it sealed while it is still wet from a hall. Check the pommel peen every few months by twisting the grip gently, because hand fitted hilts settle in their first season and a loose wheel is felt straight away. The full routine is in the knife care guide.

Made in the Czech Republic

Made by hand in the Czech Republic and imported by Ransack Viking. Nothing here is drop shipped out of an importer catalogue straight to a customer. Every one is checked for hilt tightness, pommel seating and blade straightness at our North Babylon, New York warehouse, and ships from there. Shipping in the United States is free, returns run for seven days, and the lifetime warranty against defects in the forging, the grind, the heat treat and the fittings has no end date and needs no receipt.

The arming swords in this line come off the same bench as the longswords, so the cross section, the peening and the leather work match across the range. Two pieces bought together will read as a set.

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.

On this sword that shows in the width and depth of the fuller, the height of the boss on the pommel and the exact line of the leather seam. The blade profile, the length and the flex tier stay consistent. The rest is the hand of whoever made it.

Frequently asked questions

What does the fuller do

It removes weight from the centre of the flat, where the blade contributes least to stiffness, leaving the strength at the edges. It is a lightening feature, not a blood groove, and it is why a broad blade can still feel quick.

Is this sharp

No. It is a blunt trainer with a flat land of about 3 mm on the edge and a rounded point, made for drill and sparring. Our sharps are sold separately and labelled as cutting swords.

How does it compare with the unfullered arming sword

This one is broader and cuts with more presence. The narrow unfullered sword on the same shelf is stiffer, quicker at the point and better suited to thrusting and buckler work. Neither is the better sword, they are different tools.

Can I use it at an event

Check the ruleset. The Berlin HEMA Cup asks for a spatulated or rolled tip of at least 1.5 cm and this point is rounded rather than spatulated, so a tip protector may be needed. We never claim legality without naming the rules.

Is there a scabbard

No. Nothing in this batch ships with a scabbard.

Can it be personalised

Yes. Elder Futhark runes or your own design, engraved in the United States after arrival. Text and runes are 19 dollars, a symbol 39 dollars, a family crest 49 dollars.

What is in the box

• One Draugmar arming sword, about 38 inches overall
• A light coat of protective oil on the blade for transit
• Care and warranty details for the piece
• Ransack Viking packaging, inspected and shipped from North Babylon, New York

Explore the range

More single handed steel is in HEMA arming swords and HEMA messers. For two hands on the hilt, see feders or the wider arming swords shelf. Everything we have written is collected in the guides hub.

Worth a look beside this

If the fit is not quite right, Mirlaug arming sword, about 37 inches overall, Ashgrimm arming sword, about 37 inches overall, Faskvar arming sword, about 37 inches overall and Elmgarth sidesword, about 41 inches overall cover much the same ground.

Browse the HEMA arming sword category or step up to the HEMA sword hub for the complete set, or start from scratch on the custom sword builder.