HEMA Viking Sword

(About): Darksword Armory’s Finest Functional Sword

There are functional battle swords, and then there are Darksword Armory’s HEMA swords. Darksword’s smiths have used the latest and hardiest modern materials, with the most trusted traditional techniques, to hand-forge a series of swords that will stand up to the most brutal punishment on the battlefield. Designed exclusively for practitioners of Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA), Darksword have ensured that their design will stand up to the stringent rules of the “Battle Of The Nations” Historical Medieval Battle (HMB) championship.

A Brutal Blade for Battlefield Bludgeoning

The blade of our HEMA Viking Sword is an instantly recognisable shape, typical of the Carolingian swords that were most coveted by the warlords and warriors of Early Medieval Scandinavia. Ewart Oakeshott, in his landmark work The Sword in the Age of Chivalry, classifies this blade as Type X: it is characterized by a broad, flat blade with a rounded tip and a wide, shallow fuller. Our HEMA Viking Sword captures the essence of these revolutionary new swords, and distills it into a fantastical historically accurate geometry and style. Darksword’s smiths have used 5160 steel, the gold standard of modern blade craft. They have heat-treated with a dual temper, resulting in 60 HRc at the edge and 48-50 HRc at the core. This means that it is an extremely robust blade with the perfect combination of edge-retention, hardness and flex to take all of the rough and tumble of full HEMA use with minimal damage. It has a 2mm rebated edge, and is available with a rounded blunt tip.

A Rock-Solid Hilt for a Firm Foundation

The hilt of our HEMA Viking Sword is a brilliantly faithful copy of the late-Viking hilts that legendary Norwegian archaeologist Jan Petersen classified as Type Æ: immediately recognisable by its short, handsomely flared quillons. The grip is a functional black leather, providing a safe and solid grip in gloves, gauntlets or bare hands. The pommel is a ‘five-lobed’ Viking style. It is made with a traditional full-tang, peened construction: this means it is fully battle-ready – it will stand up to an enormous amount of abuse! Even if you are not a HEMA practitioner, this is a fantastic sword if you intend to use your sword in simulated combat – it is guaranteed against manufacturing defects for a whole year after purchase.

(Curiosity): The Sword Revolution of the 10th-Century

Typical armor in the Viking period was stout cloth and simple tough hide – only an elite would have been able to equip themselves and their households with suits of fine chainmail. Thus, Viking Age swords were configured for cutting, with a significant amount of weight distributed towards the tip. Although the Norse cultures did make their own sword blades, they were often of poor quality, made from inferior local bog iron. The finest blades such as this were manufactured in the Frankish Empire by Frankish and Germanic smiths along the banks of the Upper Rhine. Whilst they began making swords from a combination of pattern-welded iron and hard steel edges, by around the early 10th-century they began experimenting with the type of blade construction that our HEMA Viking Sword is based upon: all-steel blades. These were immensely effective weapons which were likely a step-change in improvement above earlier blades: tempered, heat-treated steel would have made these weapons significantly more resilient, sharper and more wieldy than similar contemporary blades. However, these were not mere choppers: innovations in this period such as the ‘distal taper’ made these swords far more graceful and wieldy than one might assume: swordsmiths began to make the blades narrow in cross-section from hilt to tip, reducing the weight of the blade and distributing its balance closer to the hilt. They seeded the whole heritage of the European sword lineage: from the Norman knightly sword, all the way to the modern rapier.

Two swords are better than one! Here’s another Hema Sword that you’ll love!

Technical Specifications:

• Total Length: 36 inches
• Blade length: 30 inches
• Blade material: 5160 steel
• Guard and pommel material: Mild steel
• Grip material: Leather
• Weight: 2 lbs. 7 oz.