1,000 years on, perils of fake Viking swords are revealed

[Adsos Letter]

Source: Guardian UK

It must have been an appalling moment when a Viking realised he had paid two cows for a fake designer sword; a clash of blade on blade in battle would have led to his sword, still sharp enough to slice through bone, shattering like glass.

"You really didn't want to have that happen," said Dr Alan Williams, an archaeometallurgist and consultant to the Wallace Collection, the London museum which has one of the best assemblies of ancient weapons in the world. He and Tony Fry, a senior researcher at the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington, south-west London, have solved a riddle that the Viking swordsmiths may have sensed but didn't quite understand.

Some Viking swords were among the best ever made, still fearsome weapons after a millennium. The legendary swords found at Viking sites across northern Europe bear the maker's name, Ulfberht, in raised letters at the hilt end. Puzzlingly, so do the worst ones, found in fragments on battle sites or in graves.

The Vikings would have found it impossible to tell the difference when they bought a newly forged sword: both would have looked identical, and had razor sharp blades. The difference would have only emerged in use, often fatally.



Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/dec/27/archaeology-vikings-sword

[Veritas_et_Aequitas]

1. And they say bootlegging doesn't ruin lives.

[Adsos Letter]

2. !

:rofl:

It must have been quite disconcerting...

[Posteritatis]

3. "Archaeometallurgist?" Now I have cool-career-title envy

Archaeology gets all the fun stuff.

[Adsos Letter]

4. I wanted to be one SO BAD when I was a kid....

...it was the trip to Wupatki that did it to me... :D

[Historic NY]

5. Designer fakes..........sheesh..

not even made in China or Hong Kong.

[xchrom]

6. wow -- now that's very interesting.

will Renascence fairs keep up with this new info?

[undeterred]

7. So there were designer copycats even back in the day...

[MrSlayer]

8. And poor Ulfberht, with no legal recourse.

Probably had to suffer the unjust wrath of several warrior's next of kin. Cheap knock offs.

[Codeine]

9. Heard he went berserk. nt

[IDemo]

10. When you have Billy Mays bellowing in your face about what a great sword this is,

Of course you're going to buy one. And get a beautiful scabbard and the sharpener at NO EXTRA COST!

[Jack_DeLeon]

11. Reminds me of this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7e77oXjFkIs

Its not good to use cheap swords.