HROARR.COM

This image is taken from King Magnus Eriksson's "Landslag" (eng. country law), written about 1350-1430AD.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnus_IV_of_Sweden

http://www.ub.uu.se/en/Collections/Manu ... -Law-Code/

What I find REALLY interesting here, is the detail with the dark "triangles" close to the cross. The discussion regarding using a little piece of leather to protect the hands that was brought up by Dierk (I think) on a few other foras springs to mind...

I feel it makes sense to stick a piece of leather onto your sword to protect your hands. Sure it doesn't protect as much as a larger metal protection would (such as the one on a basket hilt) but it's very easy to just stick a bit of leather onto your sword to turn a couple of more deadly hits into less lethal.

Here are the discussions I mentioned:

http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.php?t=98150

http://www.thearma.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24019

And it was Roland who talked about this, not Dierk.

And the videoclip where he discusses this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8QBr4dTAR0

Interesting! Do you know the context? I mean, was longsword seen as an equal match against sword and buckler in judicial duels?

Unfortunately, I don't know much more about this image. I don't even know if we're seeing a judicial duel or if it is practice. I may order a copy of the cd containing the full manuscript. However, it would be great to find a full transcription in modern Swedish. I'll search a little more...

Here is supposedly a full transcription in old Swedish.

http://sv.wikisource.org/wiki/Magnus_Erikssons_landslag

And here is a digitized copy at Lunds University, that unfortunately has no illustrations.

http://laurentius.ub.lu.se/volumes/Mh_17/

I am unsure of if the illustrations were included in the first version and disappeard in copies or vice versa. Magnus Erikssons laws were replaced in 1442 by "Kristoffer's national law", but both law books appear to have been used side by side. One version of the manuscript that has illustrations is claimed to have been finished in 1430, but it is unclear of when it was initiated.

Btw, there will be free practice (longsword, spear, jogo do pau) today, if any of you guys want to join in and get rid of a little christmas fat...

The original discussion emerged on the MyArmoury forum a while ago. Roland has pointed out several interesting ideas which I also have to agree on. However can't there also be a possibility that the leather chape could have been purely for decorative purposes on some swords?

One of the treads on "rainguards" is found here:
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic ... =rainguard

and a second here:
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic ... =rainguard