Notes on Some Cool Swords, Part 1

From the great blades of history to the magical ones of martial fiction, every good sword has a story

As the title and logo of this newsletter might presage, I’m pretty into swords. I like having a lot of bladed weaponry around for some complex psychosexual and individual reasons that date back way into my preteen years, nigh two decades ago, because I am old. Part of this has to do with a years-long obsession with Lord of the Rings, and the fact that the first writing I did for any audience was, in fact, Lord of the Rings fanfiction. (I’m not going to link you to it, but somewhere, still on the Internet, are 52 stories I wrote between the ages of 11 and 14, mostly about versions of preteen me joining the Fellowship.) I got my first dagger at fourteen, at a Lord of the Rings convention my extremely patient father accompanied me to, but didn’t build up a collection of swords until much later, when I was writing my book about online Nazis and got a few pretty gnarly death threats and my boyfriend at the time bought me a big-ass sword and, holding it, I felt calmer and safer than I had in months.

Anduril

Since then the sword thing has kind of ballooned, which is thoroughly impractical since at the moment I live in a small furnished room; the swords are mostly relegated to my closet, although a few hang on my wall, carefully positioned away from the head of the bed so as not to have an Damocletian and inadvertently tragic situation. (Speaking of inadvertently tragic situations, I’m a little worried about what happens if I bring a first date I don’t know well back to said sword-festooned room, but things have been pretty deserted on that front because I am extremely fucking bad at dating during a pandemic.) 

Three of my broadswords, including Anduril in the middle

Hello.

Anyway, swords, to my mind, are quite cool, and I’m learning some Daoist techniques with weighted plastic practice blades so I can actually use the ones I have (hello, I’m the weird nerd swinging a fake sword in the park). Every good sword has a story, too, whether it’s the great blades of history, the unearthed treasures of archaeology, or the many swords of martial fiction across time. So because this is my unspeakably self-indulgent jawn, I’ll occasionally prattle on about some swords I find magnificent.

I have a very specific aesthetic when it comes to swords, and, stemming from that burning little nubbin of high fantasy obsession linked inextricably to my early sexual development, I have a marked Western bias towards European-style broadswords. However, there are equally redoubtable and gorgeous and richly storied swords from outside the European continent (shoutout to Japan!), and in future installments of this periodic feature I’ll be sure to remedy the imbalance. Without further ado, though, here’s a few words about swords that are cool, in ranked order.

1. Anduril

This is more a question of sentimentality than any particular feature of the blade itself; I own a (janky Wish.com) replica, and it’s a long, sharp reminder of my passionate teenage love for its wielder, Aragorn (as discussed in the introductory column.) It also has the minimum requirements for a truly great blade: a whole backstory (FORGED FROM THE SHARDS OF NARSIL, THE SWORD THAT WAS SHATTERED IN THE INITIAL CONFLICT WITH SAURON, NOW REDEEMED BY ITS NEW BEARER!), a sick fuller to catch enemy blood, and also runes. You gotta have runes. Its nickname is “The Flame of the West,” which, to be honest, in recent years has started to have some icky white-supremacisty connotations for me, but you can’t beat the runic inscription: “I am Andúril who was Narsil, the sword of Elendil. Let the thralls of Mordor flee me.” Thralls are always fleeing me, so I deeply relate, you know?

10/10, would let young Viggo Mortensen run me through with it

2. The Szczerbiec of Boleslaus the Brave

First of all, it’s pronounced “shcherbets.” Like sherbets, but deadlier! This is a cool and legendary sword that is currently housed in the Wawel Royal Castle in Krakow, Poland; it’s the only preserved part of the Polish medieval crown jewels, and was used for centuries, between the 1300s and 1700s, in the coronation of Polish kings. The name means “The Jagged Sword” (although it is not in fact jagged) because of a legend that King Boleslaus the Brave of Poland (reign 992-1025), having been given the sword by an angel, struck the blade against the Golden Gate of Kyiv while invading that city. (The actual invasion is real, the angel and notch in doubt.) Apparently, Boleslaus was trying to clean up after his son-in-law Sviatopolk Vladimirovich I “The Accursed,” who had murdered his brothers Gleb, Boris, and Sviatoslav in an attempt to gain absolute power over Kievan Rus. Sviatopolk The Accursed was later defeated by an unmurdered brother of his, and was probably slain himself while in exile on the steppes. But at any rate, Szczerbiec really kicked the ass of a gate. Eastern European history is a rich tapestry!

Also, the sword was taken out of the country for its own protection during World War II and spent several decades in a bank in Ottawa before being repatriated. And the designs on the pommel are truly intricate, with stuff like the winged ox of Saint Luke and the Eagle of Saint John. It has a bunch of inscriptions, but the coolest one is “This figure extends to the love of kings and dukes and the wrath of judges.”

It’s been adopted as a symbol by Polish ultranationalists and also banned in Ukraine (due to the whole “kicking the city of Kyiv’s ass” thing) but I try not to let dickheads ruin a good sword. And this is a cool sword. I think we can agree on that.

 7/10, points docked for contemporary white nationalist use and past aid of a kinslayer

Szczerbiec on display in its castle.

3. Durendal

Yes, this may sound like another Lord of the Rings sword — and that’s no coincidence, as Tolkien was a philologist and knew his European history exceedingly well. But it’s not! This predates any consonant-heavy elvish nonsense by a thousand years or so. Durendal is the sword of the titular hero of The Song of Roland, the 11th-century epic about a Frankish war hero fighting in Spain under Charlemagne. It’s a very long poem, and I cannot overemphasize how many swords there are in it, this being a battle epic squarely from the era of swords (ballistic weapons were pretty primitive at that point — the arbalest, a particularly vicious long-range crossbow, was new technology at this point, and the epic was written four centuries before the primitive gun called the arquebus was even a thing). 

The poem retrofits a lot of history – to quote the preface of John O’Hagan’s translation (which contains the words “peerless glaive” a lot): 

“By the latter part of the eleventh century, when the form of the "Song of Roland" which we possess was probably composed, the historical germ of the story had almost disappeared under the mass of legendary accretion. Charlemagne, who was a man of thirty-six at the time of the actual Roncesvaux incident, has become in the poem an old man with a flowing white beard, credited with endless conquests; the Basques have disappeared, and the Saracens have taken their place; the defeat is accounted for by the invention of the treachery of Ganelon; the expedition of 777-778 has become a campaign of seven years; Roland is made the nephew of Charlemagne, leader of the twelve peers, and is provided with a faithful friend Oliver, and betrothed, Alda.” 

Roland’s actual historical name was the slightly less sonorous Hruodlandus. The poem transmutes a feud with the Basques into a Christian epic of war against Muslims, and adoration of Christ through battle. Roland dies by blowing his ivory horn for help so hard it bursts his temples. A lot of claims are made about his sword, Durendal, in the poem, chiefly that it is harder than stone — a desperate, dying Roland somewhat comically tries very hard to shatter it on rock so it will not fall into pagan hands, only to find out that it is impossible to break. It also contains one of Saint Peter’s teeth, Saint Basil’s blood, the hair of Saint Denis and a fragment of the Virgin Mary’s raiment, possibly in a secret hair-teeth-and-blood compartment in the pommel, although this is not specified. Anyway, here are some of the coolest lines about swords from The Song of Roland, from an 1885 translation by one Léonce Rabillon:

“Nay, I will deal hard blows with Durendal,
This my good sword now girt unto my side
Whose blade you'll see all reeking with red blood.”

“A man should suffer hurt for his good lord,
Endure great cold or scorching heat, and give
Even to his flesh and blood—Strike with your lance,
And I with Durendal, my trusty sword,
Carle's gift. If here I die, may he who wins
It, say:—'Twas once the sword of a brave knight.”

“Fifteen good blows
It dealt, then broke and fell; now his good sword,
Loved Durendal, he draws, spurs on his steed
'Gainst Chernubles, splits his bright helm adorned
With gems; one blow cleaves through mail-cap and skull,
Cutting both eyes and visage in two parts,
And the white hauberk with its close-linked mail;
Down to the body's fork, the saddle all
Of beaten gold, still deeper goes the sword,
Cuts through the courser's chine, nor seeks the joint.
Upon the verdant grass fall dead both knight
And steed.”

RIP Roland, who blew himself to death. Your sword was truly baller.

Here’s a statue of Roland in Bremen, Germany, with his Durendal and kind of a cheeky expression. Yeah, we’re still talking about you a thousand years after you died, and that’s pretty cool.

Durendal: 6/10 for the poem’s weird fixation on pagan blood, 10/10 for being completely unshatterable

4. Excalibur

We’re not going to talk much about Excalibur, because frankly, you know the deal. It’s Britain’s equivalent to Durendal — a legendary and very religious sword enshrined in epic poem and legend — but frankly it’s overexposed to my mind, a real diva. Despite my Tolkien love, I resent the Brit-centrism of high fantasy in general; there is life outside that weird, TERF-y island. Excalibur is innocent of these critiques, but even so, I’m just gonna say I’m giving it a …

4/10. Still an iconic sword, I’ll give it that.

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5. Fujairah Fort Sword

OK, here is my least favorite sword. Bear with me, because I just discovered it and I really hate it. The largest sword in the world, as certified in the Guinness Book of World Records, is in the United Arab Emirates and it is 14.93 meters (around 48 feet) long. It was commissioned in 2011 by Shaikh Mohammed Bin Hamad, the Crown Prince of Fujairah, who is apparently very into Guinness World Records involving swords and has also won the record for largest youla (an Emirati dance featuring swords) and sponsored the world’s highest sword throw. That’s actually pretty cool: the swordsman in question, Hazza Sulaiman Al Shehhi, managed to throw his sword 69 feet in the air in 2010, at the age of 18. Here’s a picture of that as a palate cleanser:

You go, Hazza.

Anyway, back to this sword I have a bone to pick with. First of all, it’s in the middle of a traffic circle (roundabout). Apparently, Fujairah is “the emirate of roundabouts,” according to Gulf News. At least King Arthur’s sword was stuck in a stone. What am I supposed to say about a sword stuck in a traffic circle? That is the least romantic place I can think of to put a sword. Also, it is ugly as SIN. If you are going to create a fifty-foot sword, at least give it some swagger, a little dictatorial flair, encrust it in gems, give it a funky runnel, etc. This looks like a cable antenna or some kind of weird metal traffic cone, it’s not even sharp, it needs to be measured by crane, and frankly, I’m pretty disappointed. (This isn’t a dig at Emirati swords in general, they are beautiful, the youla is a really cool dance that I wish I could participate in, and khanjar daggers originating in Oman but popular throughout the Emirates are absolutely breathtaking). Anyway. Look at this piece of shit:

1/10 and I’m only awarding the point because I admire the Crown Prince’s commitment to sword world records.

HONORABLE MENTION:

Apparently there’s an absolutely honking enormous sword — entitled the “World’s Largest Sword” but shamefully neglected by Guinness, an organization that has a long history of cozying up to autocrats — somewhere in Tennessee. This contender for the World’s Largest Sword title was housed for a time in the former National Knife Museum in Sevierville, TN (the museum was part of a still-extant store called Smokey Mountain Knife Works). Unlike the execrable example above, this giant blade has some style. Its designer is a guy named Brian Wilhoite, who still makes knives for Smokey Mountain Knife Works. Brian hasn’t responded to my requests for comment so I don’t know the precise measurements. (I don’t usually ask strange men “How big is it?” but in this case I think it’s justified.) Still, one can surmise that it is pretty big given how huge it is compared to some dudes in this picture on Flickr. (Brian commented and was like, “it’s cool that you’re all talking about my sword.” OF COURSE WE ARE TALKING ABOUT YOUR SWORD, BRIAN, IT’S GIGANTIC.) There’s an astounding lack of information about this enormous sword online, practically nothing in fact, but to me it’s symbolic nonetheless. I’m not much of a patriot (in fact, the term has been poisoned for me by its ubiquity in white-nationalist circles), and I don’t have much faith in American values or its central, hyper-capitalist Dream. Nonetheless something about Brian’s story tickles that dormant and oft-scorned vein in my thinking. The American Dream is not having to be a crown prince with control of an apparently near-infinite supply of traffic circles to make a huge fucking sword. But just to make it because you can. And for a brief and golden period, display it in the National Knife Museum until the museum gets dissolved in 2014. But people will still review your Bowie knives on YouTube. That’s the dream, guys, making knives in the center of a bellicose and decaying empire. And Brian’s living it.