European swords, described entry by entry
Twenty-one entries, three sections, one glossary. Each entry answers one question properly rather than twenty questions badly: what a type name means, what the steel was, what happens to a blade left in a damp cupboard.
The register is organised the way the subject actually divides. Typology covers how swords are sorted into families and what those labels do and do not tell you. Steel and forging covers the material, from bloomery iron to modern spring steel, and the heat treatment that decides whether a blade works. Care and collections covers what happens after the sword stops being used: corrosion, storage and where the surviving pieces are kept.
Figures are given as the published ranges for surviving examples, with the source named, because a single confident number is usually a sign that somebody stopped checking.
TYP-01Typology
Ewart Oakeshott sorted medieval European blades by geometry rather than by country or century. His types X to XXII are still the labels on museum cards and auction listings.
TYP-02Typology
Blades of the eighth to eleventh century are broadly alike, so the classifications work on the hilt. Three competing systems are in circulation and museum labels mix them freely.
TYP-03Typology
A longsword is defined by a grip long enough for two hands and a blade balanced for both. Surviving pieces weigh 1.2 to 1.8 kg, not the four kilos of popular imagination.
FRG-01Steel and forging
Rods of different iron and steel welded, twisted and drawn out, so the joins show as a pattern once the surface is etched. A construction method, not an alloy.
FRG-02Steel and forging
Iron melted in a sealed pot, cast as an ingot at 1.0 to 2.0 per cent carbon. The watered pattern comes from carbide bands inside the metal, not from welded layers.
FRG-03Steel and forging
Hard enough to hold an edge, tough enough not to break. The two demands pull against each other and the heat treatment is where they are settled.
CAR-01Care and collections
Almost all damage to old blades happens slowly, in storage, from hands, damp and the wrong materials. Very little of it comes from use.
CAR-02Care and collections
Eleven collections, three blade museums and five archaeological holdings, with what to look for in each and how to read what the label is actually telling you.
TYP-04Typology
The other regulated weapon of the period, documented by guild rolls, town arsenals and surviving prods, and read the same way the register reads blades: object first, source second, interpretation last.
FRG-04Steel and forging
How Australian road projects move from business case to opening, why Melbourne removes level crossings, and what tunnels and desalination plants taught the
CAR-03Care and collections
How to hold a crochet hook, work a first chain, tell single from treble crochet, and read pattern abbreviations without losing your place.
CAR-04Care and collections
A look at how coastal workshops document their practice: plein air painting, local clay ceramics and bench work, as recorded along the Anne Arundel shore.
TYP-05Typology
How Tezuka, Otomo and Shirow built the visual grammar of classic anime and manga, from Astro Boy to Akira, Appleseed and Ghost in the Shell.
FRG-05Steel and forging
A plain reading of thickened tailings, paste and filtered deposition, and the public documents that govern them, for non-specialist readers.
FRG-06Steel and forging
Odisha's Industrial Policy Resolution 2022, the GO SWIFT single-window portal, and the approval timelines and fees that apply to industrial projects in the
FRG-07Steel and forging
How technical textile specification, from fibre to finishing, maps onto the material questions sword makers and students of blades already ask.
CAR-05Care and collections
Reading water, seasons and legal calendars, knots and safety: what sword readers can borrow from American fly fishing and hunting practice.
CAR-06Care and collections
How Finland's forest industry shaped its newspapers, weeklies and reading habits, and where the record of that print culture is kept.
FRG-08Steel and forging
A register note on snack and drink vending as a trade: machine families, site selection, food safety, payments and maintenance, with Dutch practice as the
FRG-09Steel and forging
A plain reference note on industrial storage and handling: racking choices, forklift checks, pedestrian routes, barcode and RFID tracking, and automation.
FRG-10Steel and forging
Hydrogen energy from electrolyser efficiency to pipeline blending: a plain register of figures, safety practice and offtake structures for project holders.
No entry matches this filter.
Every entry follows the same order, which is what makes two of them comparable without reading both from end to end.
Edge care keeps running into geology. A Belgian coticule, an Arkansas novaculite and a Turkish oilstone are not brand names, they are quarried rock, and what they do to an edge follows from the grain size, the binder and the hardness of the bed they were cut from. Those are the same properties a mason reads before choosing a slab, which is why the vocabulary overlaps almost word for word: grain, bedding, hardness, porosity. A reader who wants the mineral side written out plainly can start with how quarried stone is sorted by hardness, grain and porosity, then come back to the honing entries with a clearer idea of why two stones of the same claimed grit do not behave the same way.
Away from the blade, the register notes a reference notebook on American repertory cinema and volunteer film society work, with entries on Double Indemnity, American film noir, cornerstone, on world cinema in revival, and on public screening rights, print and DCP sourcing, and the running of a season.
Where the register turns from steel to the devotional object, the Sacred Object Journal documents missals, rosaries, medals and scapulars, with notes on materials, blessing and the stable storage of inherited pieces.
For a parallel discipline of looking, where material, placement and price are read as evidence rather than verdict, the register points to Ochre Gallery's reading method, an editorial guide to contemporary art between studio, exhibition and market.
For readers who follow how technical records are kept, the pipeline incident data register sets out gas transmission and distribution figures, hazardous liquids, declared causes, integrity management and the 49 CFR parts 190 to 199 framework.
Readers who also follow regulated play will find at Dutch online casino rules a comparative guide to Ksa licensing, Cruks registration, game sheets and withdrawal terms, checked against named operators with source and date.
For the beadwork side of a collection, from seed bead sizing and Swarovski or Miyuki comparisons to thread tests and finish durability, a guide to beadwork and jewellery sets out material sheets and project method in plain terms.
For the host who keeps a table rather than a collection, a separate register covers beer party games and glassware, from Kings Cup rules and glass shapes to counter setup, ice, lighting and seating twelve around one small table.
It does not value objects and it does not authenticate them: both need the piece in the hand and a specialist who carries the liability. It does not cover firearms, and it covers armour only where armour explains a change in blade design, which it does more than once. It stops at about 1800, when the sword becomes a uniform accessory. And it is a reading resource, not a shop.
If you find an error, the correction is welcome at [email protected]. Sources are named in the entries precisely so that they can be checked.