Large Pictures 2 Chapter 11.3

Spear and lance points from Nydam in the Schleswig museum


Link to text	Source: Photographed at the Landesmuseum Schleswig

A quite good excerpt of the sword types as defined by Elis Behmer


Link to text	Source: Some Polish sword site; can't give details, sorry.

Overview of Staffordshire hoard pommels.


Link to text	Source: By Medievalists.net – March 19, 2014

Some close-ups of the Staffordshire hoard pommels.


Link to text	Source: Internet at large (British museum, Birmingham museum, National Geographic, newspapers, ...)

A very nice Pyramid garnet pommel, displayed in the Stockholm Archaeological Museum.
It is actually the "Hög Edsten" pommel mentioned in the main text.


Link to text	Source: Photographed 2015 in the Stockhol museum

A very involved pommel with different designs on front and back. Seems to be gilded bronze
and was found in Aldbrough; ca. 600 AD - 650 AD.


Link to text	Source: Sorry. Forgot

A rather good pyramid garnet pommel coming up for sale at an auction in Jan 2018.
So for just around 4.000 Euro you couild own such a thing.
Well, not quite. It was sold on Feb, 26th 2019 for £ 13.000.- (about $ 17.000.-)


Link to text	Source: Timeline auction catalogue

This is a drawing of a Niederstotzingen Alamanni grave where three people were buried.
Each person was inhumated with a big sword, a sax, and many smaller items.
And one of the persons was a woman!


Link to text	Source: Old drawing by some Paulsen; shown in many places, e.g. here or in Menghins's book

In the next picture you can "see" the actual content of the graves as displayed in the
Württemberg State Museum, Stuttgart, Germany. What you actually can see
quite clearly (in contrast tot the grave things) is that the museum has succumbed to
the dreaded Keep-things-in-the-dark disease, and you see mostly reflections.


Link to text	Source: Photographed in-situ Dec. 2017

Type 8 and 9 swords according to Behmer. From around 650 - 800.
Behmer says almost nothing to the blades but they are most likely not pattern welded.


Link to text	Source: Internet at large (British museum, Birmingham museum, National Geographic, newspapers, ...)

A pyramid pommel sword from some bog (probably Nydam ).


Link to text	Source: Photographed in the Copenhagen museum

This one is displayed in the National museum in Helsinki, Finland.
Note that it is very similar to the Copenhagen one above.


Link to text	Source: Photographed in the Helsinki museum

This one is displayed in National museum in Rome, Italy. It was found in Grave 1 of the Necropolis of Nocera, Umbra. It appears that the ring has been added later


Link to text	Source: Rome museum

You dont' have to go very far from where I live to find fancy sword hilts including the pommel ring type.
The following pictures were taken from the (500+ page) PhD thesis of Ulrich Lehmann
who did a detailed study (involving fancy technology like X-ray tomography) of some swords from around the 7th / 8th
century and found in Westphalia, North Germany


Left: Found around Krefeld; 520 - 530 AD. Middle: Found around Beckum; 590 – 610 AD. Right: : Found around Dorsten-Lembeck; 730 – 800 AD.
Source: Lehmann thesis

Some pictures from the large hoard of Roman iron from Künzing, Bavaria, Germany. The stuff was most
likely buried after the Alemanni took the Roman fortress there in 259 AD.


Link to text 1	Link to text 2	Link to text 3	Source: Photographed (2014) in the Archäologischen Staatssammlung, München, Germany

Here a few of the pugios displayed in the Archäologische Staatssammlung, München, Germany.


Source: Photographed (2014) in the Archäologischen Staatssammlung, München, Germany

Here are stereo pictures of details in the famous Rococo Church in Ottobeuren, Germany.
Tip: If you can't see it three-dimensionally after some effort (moving your head a bit back and forth, left and right),
print the picture (or transfer them to a picture processing program), cut out one part and move it around a bit while looking.
Start with the two pictures closer together.
If you see two pictures, move one part until both images coincide. The effect is rather spectacular.



Link to text	Source: Photographed (2014) in the Benedictine Abbey Church in Ottobeuren

This sword is shown in the Mainfränkisches Museum, Würzburg, Germany. It was found in the Würzburg area
and dates (presumably) to the 6th century if we go by the Behmer classification. Note that its hilt has silver inlays
("Tauschierungen") and that the well preseved blald shows no obvious traces of pattern welding.

Looking closely a the corroded parts of the tang (see the inset) reveals the all-telling striped bar structure
and we may savely assume that the blade was pattern welded with one or two of the striped bars contuing
into the tang region.


Link to text	Source: Photographed 2014 in the Mainfränkisches Museum, Würzburg, Germany

Details of the three Alemanni swords from Memmingen. Have these blades been made by pattern welding?

The left-hand side blade does not show obvious signs of pattern welding. The cracks indicated might denote
the weld line of striped rods but that is not certain. Nevertheless I would bet that pattern welding was involved.
The middle blade shows the telling-all herringbone pattern in its center and thus "classical" Alemanni pattern
welding. The blade on the right-hand side shows tell-tale marks pattern welding marks only on the second
look. Welding seams between rods can be found (marked by arrows), and even a faint trace of half a herring
bone pattern can be discerned in some small part..


Link to text 1	Link to text 2	Source: Photographed (2014) in the Memmingem town museum.

Here you find large pictures of the four gold-hilt spatha on display in the Württemberg State Museum

The Entringen gold-hilt spatha:


Link to text Source: Photographed 2015 in the Württemberg State Museum, Germany

The first Gültlingen gold-hilt spatha:


Link to text Source: Photographed 2014 in the Württemberg State Museum, Germany

The second Gültlingen gold-hilt spatha:


Link to text Source: Photographed 2014 in the Württemberg State Museum, Germany

The fourth gold-hilt spatha from Pleidelsheim:


Link to text Source: Photographed 2014 in the Württemberg State Museum, Germany

¹⁾	Ulrich Lehmann: "Wurmbunte Klingen. Studien zu Konstruktion, Herstellung und Wertigkeit der frühmittelalterlichen Spatha in Westfalen" Veröffentlichungen der Altertumskommission für westfalen Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe Band 21; herausgegeben von Aurelia Dickers. Aschendorff Verlag 20176

With frame