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There was a video, I don't remember who the host was but it was a STEM educator, who picked up a medieval sword at a museum (with permission) and remarked at how light it was. Since then I've internally thought about how unrealistic so much of everything is. Of course it needs to be light, just like everything in modern day. They lug it around the countryside, swing it, etc. Heavy swords just don't make sense.

I recommend to go to a medieval fair, there you can touch and handle melee weapons freely to get an idea how they feel. I remember that I once handled a parade sword which had a very thick and ornate blade, my arms were hurting immediately. Then the guy handed me his own short sword which was used in the fighting demonstrations and it was literally like picking up a can of beans: much lighter weight than expected and I couldn't feel at all the "length" of the blade when I swung it around - it was perfectly balanced in the hand.

Medieval fair weapons still tend to be heavier than historical weapons because they (at least most of the ones that are handed to the public) are blunt.

And because they use crap alloys and their forging technique is crap. Customer demand drives the quality of the product. A thousand years ago, the customer demanded lightweight, durable, sharp tools, in order to survive their profession. Today, they just want something that looks and feels cool. (For comparison: a Renn Faire sword sells for $200, and a traditionally-made Japanese sword costs as much as a car)

That doesn't track because it doesn't need to be thick to be blunt. It doesn't need to be steel if it's just for decoration, either.

Surely taking a sharp sword and blunting its edge yields a safe weapon of similar weight, right? Are they purposely making them more massive?

They not only have a blunt edge but also a blunt tip. To appreciably blunt the tip while keeping the same length you have to add more metal to the tip.

Depends on how blunt. With momentum behind it you can overcome a lot of bluntness so you want it even more blunt...

In fairness, that misconception doesn’t just spring from imagination. Prop weapons generally are heavy, because they need to be thick to have blunt edges.

It depends what your prop is aiming to simulate.

$10 halloween costume prop? Hollow plastic, super light.

Training weapon for self defence against knife attacks? Solid plastic, several times the thickness of a real knife, probably bright blue.

Olympic fencing weapons, which simulate duelling? Pretty light, you only need a light touch to score a point and bending is desirable.

Live Action Role Play where they want to whack each other, but not hard? Anime cosplay? They mostly go for foam-covered plastic which is kinda light, but they're often thick and also they often simulate unrealistically large weapons, so they can end up kinda heavy.

Ornamental/replica things that are just for show? Could go either way. You could make an extra-light sword out of aluminium, or an extra-heavy ornate dagger out of pewter. Less steel means a lower material and shipping cost - but a bit more heft that feels realistic to buyers might get you better product reviews.

Apparently some HEMA/renaissance fair folk wear full suits of metal armour, metal longswords that are blunt-but-authentically-weighted, then try to whack each other pretty hard? Looks like concussion city to me.

Just to add, some martial arts groups use Aluminum training blades to train with They are used to get users mentally prepared to be hit with a blade....being hit with a blunt metal blade hurts, but its ultimately better than being hit by a sharp steel one and gets you used to the mentality that you will be hit so how do you make it so it is less painful (or life threatening when you do get hit for real)

https://takknife.com/collections/keen-edge-aluminum-training...

I got a suit of chainmail at one point to possibly wear for Halloween/Renn fairs etc. It was heavy! I could not stand it for longer than about an hour, it was a real workout. Certainly made me gain new respect for all the stereotypical medieval knights wearing full metal armor suits.

Like replica swords, replica armour is also often too heavy. Especially maille (the correct term for chainmail). Proper maille has the rings riveted closed so you can use thin rings. Many cheap replicas use bent (butted) rings. They need to be thicker so they don't bend open.

I have a full hauberk which goes to my knees with long sleeves. It weighs 6-ish kilo. Add a kilo for the coif. A decently made late medieval full plate armour is maybe 15-ish kilo complete with helmet. The heaviest armours are probably late 14th century armours. They are essentially an almost full plate over a (partial or full) maille hauberk. Some are maybe 25 kilo. That's still a lot less than the 40 or so kilo that modern soldiers lug around.

Huh, wonder if you could turn that into a fitness fad for runners. Improve safety against attackers, get a better cardio workout.

Forget Under Armour. Let’s go for Over Armor.

Some SCA groups do use real weapons. They're completely nuts. And great fun to drink with...

I don't think something needs to be thick and heavy to be blunt, I've used (and I think many people have) blunt kitchen knives and sharp kitchen knives and without inspecting the blade edge I think it's very hard to tell. Sharpening a knife or sword also doesn't really change much in its weight from my layman knowledge.

"Blunt" in a stage fighting or practice sparring context is completely different from blunt in a kitchen context. You are still swinging these swords are very near full speed at another human being. In a stage context, they might be wearing very minimal protective gear. You blunt kitchen knife will cut through meat just fine if you overhand swing it down.

For example, here's a practice sword that has 1/16th in (1.6mm!) thick edges: https://www.reliks.com/functional-european-swords/practical-...

With the degree of difference in edge thickness, you can probably see how the cross section of a sword (and therefore its weight) will vary substantially, especially if you keep the maximum thickness about the same.

It's absolutely possible to craft these types of swords that are both safe and well approximate the real shapes and weights and handling of a "real" sword. But it's also easy to just... go for look and safety to try to save money.

Thanks for the insider knowledge!

Blunt kitchen knife is pretty sharp sword tho. I know as I got cut with a training sword - it was significantly more blunt then what you would call blunt kitchen knife.

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I think some of these misconceptions appear in popular media predating the reenactment scene. Mark Twain in particular is guilty of it. Connecticut Yankee has a bunch of stuff like knights needing cranes to get on their horses and whatnot. The whole book is about how crude and simple minded medieval people were.

Prop weapons can be made of plastic.

they can be, but they were not as being recanted above. Prop weapons can be made of aerogel too but im not making a lame point about it.

You imagine you’ve held prop weapons

Here is Adam Savage picking up swords and making similar remarks:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJypHnsEn8o

Maybe that is what you saw.

Article has a minor misconception, D&D sword weights include the scabbard which mostly brings them in line with historical weapons.

The ‘large’ weapons are excessively heavy, but players can be a lot stronger than actual humans.

Have to remember that average human is 10 on usual scale in these games. And any character using any type of weapon getting bonus from strength has at minimum 12 or most likely 16 or above stat. Which means they are lot stronger that average.

But the part where my character can carry 300 pounds of inventory while fighting is legit, right?

True, but your weapons still need to be light to be able to carry the 20 wheels of cheese you'll be eating mid-fight to heal up because you can't be bothered to learn alchemy.

The myth of the heavy sword is a stupid one, and I was convinced that it had died out a long time ago. I'm not sure who still believes otherwise? DnD's weights are hardly a reference, as those weights are important for the mechanics of the game, not for historical accuracy.

The comments regarding Game of Thrones blurb don't make much sense either. At no point in that quote does Syrio claim that Westerosi swords are unreasonably heavy or that knights are clumsy. But a knight in full plate with a longsword is certainly much less agile than someone with a rapier and no armour.

Syrio literally says that knight's swordsmanship is "hacking and hammering":

“Just so. Now we will begin the dance. Remember, child, this is not the iron dance of Westeros we are learning, the knight’s dance, hacking and hammering, no. This is the bravo’s dance, the water dance, swift and sudden. All men are made of water, do you know this? When you pierce them, the water leaks out and they die.” He took a step backward, raised his own wooden blade. “Now you will try to strike me.”

Which is a direct reference to the myth of heavy and unweildy longsword.

Whether George Martin himself believes the myth or merely made Syrio misinformed, is anybody's guess.

Also, no, knight in full plate with a longsword is not certainly much less agile than someone with a rapier and no armor. He will be somewhat less agile... if the level of training is equal... but neither longsword nor armor are so heavy that they will significantly limit agility.

Main issue with full suit of plate is actually overheating and tiring out sooner due to added weight and insulation (and possibly restricted breathing depending on the helmet).

That sounds more like GRRM is writing Syrio as saying their swordfighting is inelegant, not that the weapons themselves are heavy. From what I understand, there was often a lot of hacking and hammering to get through the armor, even if the weapons were light. From here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-sword

> Half-sword is used for leverage advantage when wrestling with the sword, as well as for delivering a more accurate and powerful thrust. Both of these are critical when fighting in plate armour because a slice or a cleaving blow from a sword is virtually useless against iron or steel plate.

That is not hacking and hammering, though - not even close. What it in fact describes is grabbing the sword by the blade in order to achieve fine control, with the goal of thrusting through gaps in armor.

> But a knight in full plate with a longsword is certainly much less agile than someone with a rapier and no armour.

No, that's not really true either.

IIRC a full set of plate armour weighs about 60lbs. How is that not going to make you less agile (no matter how well made)? And yes, I understand the old trope about knights lumbering around, not being able to get up if they fell over and not being about to mount a horse is all garbage. And that 60lbs is roughly what a modern combat soldier carries. But it is still 60lbs!

> How is that not going to make you less agile (no matter how well made)?

Because the weight is distributed and carefully balanced and the parts are fitted to the wearer's body. It does in fact matter how it's made, it's not a backpack.

I admit I could have put more effort into my response, but at this point you're not going to spend 30 seconds to even look it up?

Here is a video of people doing cartwheels in full plate armor. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzTwBQniLSc

The difference in agility seems marginal if it exists at all. I would certainly advise anyone, if they ever had to bet their life on it, to assume a fully armored foe is not inhibited in their agility. Maybe crawl into a very tight space if you must.

60 pounds would be low for a modern soldier - it's gotten up to 120 pounds or more in recent wars:

https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/research/a25644619...

A huge number of people are 60lbs or more overweight and they still get around fairly well.

'get around fairly well' != 'agile'

;0)

A huge number of people are 60lbs or more overweight and are still very agile, too. It's silly to keep picking this fight this way.

Perhaps we don't agree on what 'agile' means.

Then you should define what it means to you. I've given enough in my other reply.

A decent well made plate armour is a lot less than than. 15-ish kilo, so 30-ish lbs?

If you are in the UK there are 2 incredible collections of ancient and medieval weapons and armour. The Royal Armoury (Leeds) and The Wallace Collection (London). Both are well worth a visit. Some of the armour is a work of art. I heard that NASA studied some of the late medieval armour to get ideas about how to articulate space suits (citation required).

Now let's tackle the similar misconception about armor weight: this myth got so absurd that some still believe knights actually had to be hoisted up with cranes onto on their horses. Whereas in the real world, I've seen people doing backflips in full plate.

Absolutely, see for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-bnM5SuQkI

The horse isn't going to like that mounting method if the knight has spurs on.

Henry VIII (in his younger, athletic days) could leap into the saddle in full armour without using the stirrups, and was very proud of it.

In his later days though... he might have needed that crane ;)

Bill Gates (in his younger, athletic days) could leap over an office chair from a standing position without touching the back of the chair, and was very proud of it.

Supreme leader played golf this weekend and got 17 hole-in-ones.

Remind me who history is written by.

The losers. The winners are too busy governing to give a shit. https://scholars-stage.org/history-is-written-by-the-losers/

While that article is very interesting, I'm not sure its main argument is actually correct, at least not in the wide, general way it is made.

For example, the article says that if Churchill had not been thrown out of power at the end of WW II, his history of that war would never have been written. I'm not sure that's actually true--Churchill had done plenty of writing before that and probably would have found time to write such a history later on anyway. But even if it's true, it doesn't mean that we would be without any history of WW II if Churchill had remained in power. There are plenty of other histories of that war, including ones which take very different viewpoints from Churchill's.

But even leaving that aside: yes, Churchill "lost" in the sense that his party lost the election in 1945. But that does not make Churchill a loser in WW II itself, nor does it make his history of that war a history written by a loser. Indeed, his history of WW II, as far as I can tell, says nothing about his loss of the Prime Ministership or the party that defeated him. It talks about his own leadership during the war, which, at least as far as keeping Britain from being conquered and reclaiming Western Europe was concerned, was a victory, not a loss.

The example of Thucydides also isn't as simple as the article makes it out to be. Yes, Thucydides was originally an Athenian and fought on the Athenian side, i.e., the side that would eventually lose, in the Peloponnesian War. But Thucydides was exiled from Athens long before that war ended and Athens fell from power--and where did he settle? In the Peloponnese, i.e., in the domain of Sparta. In other words, he wasn't writing his history of the war as a losing Athenian. Sure, his portrayal of people he personally interacted with, particularly people he lost battles to, is going to reflect his own interests, but that's not the same as the entire history being a history written by a loser.

Even the article's main example, Sima Qian, isn't that simple. The article makes it seem like Sima Qian's history was mainly about the emperor who had him castrated. But his history actually covered more than two thousand years. Whatever is in it regarding that one emperor is only a small part of the whole. (And it's arguable that Sima Qian didn't even end up as a loser in the Chinese court of his own time; after being released from prison he had a highly paid job as a palace eunuch.)

from the article:

> We say that history is written by the winners. That is sometimes true.

I wonder if this misconception comes from jousting armour, which could be about twice as heavy as battle armour, combined with out-of-shape knights.

A lot of these historical inaccuracies can be traced back to the Victorians. Horns on viking helmets, highlanders wearing tartan etc. I wouldn't be surprised if they invented this one too.

Also wasn't it shown in a black and white film of one Shakespeare's plays (Henry V?).

One convenience for mounting horses that jousting fields commonly employed was a high-tech device called stairs. And if there weren't any stairs, well that's what squires are for.

A knight in plate was carrying a similar amount to a fully laden modern soldier (about 60lbs). On the plus side, the armour's weight is more evenly distributed (a modern soldier has most of it on their back). On the minus side, the knights legs are more encumbered, which makes walking harder and running a lot harder.

A knight actually beats a soldier (who is carrying a similar weight and 10 years his junior) across an obstacle course in this short film 'Obstacle Run in Armour': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAzI1UvlQqw

My working weight for weighted pull-ups right now is more than a full set of plate weighed.

Honestly, I doubt that a Strength 20 D&D barbarian cares about the wrong weight of his Greataxe, given that they can probably deadlift a horse. Their player probably does care that the chosen implement of murderous doom looks cooler than a plain Daneaxe…

One problem that D&D and videogames have, is that weight in lbs is a pretty poor simulation of the burden involved. The sheer bulk or lack of proper carrying opportunities seems factored in a bit into several RPGs, even those where you can carry 111 spears in your backpack.

The (vastly underrated) tabletop RPG RuneQuest once ditched "lbs" and went with a more abstracted "encumbrance" (ENC) statistic. And of course lots of videogames plus several tabletop games go with a slot- or grid-based inventory as a main or secondary source of being overburdened.

Weapon weights and similar issues (too short rapiers, non-existant back scabbards) seem to be the "not every weapon is a AR-15/mind your trigger discipline" of the HEMA crowd.

Related, the new edition of Pathfinder ditched weight in lbs and picked up a system of encumberance called bulk, I think, better represents real objects a bit more than just plain weight

> even those where you can carry 111 spears in your backpack.

That's what magic items like the Efficient Quiver are for. :-)

Ah, Runequest! Happy memories.

The interesting modern flipside to this is that people very consistently underestimate the weight of firearms.

And how does ammo add up. Cartridge weight of 7.62×39mm is about 16 grams, one magazine is 30 rounds. Meaning more than half a kilo per each. Or with 3-4 magazines 2 kilos.

Parade / decorative weapons being heavy and that translating into thinking all weapons from then were like that makes sense, these are the ones that will have been kept around as heirlooms, whereas the practical ones will have been recycled with very few exceptions.

D&D characters are super-humans that "level-up" who have to use heavy weapons to fight against monsters with tough hides and natural armor. There is no such magic on Terra.

BIg swords weren't made to cut down an enemy in half. They were made to bring down a knight riding a horse.

You didn't club it, but bashed it down with a swing.

Also, the Middle Ages weren't as dirty as you think, the British wrote a Black Legend about them. The 20th century movies didn't help neither. I'm not talking about Monty Python, but the supossedly serious dramas set on that era.

For instance, I'm pretty sure the 13-14th centuries were completely different to the 8th or 9th ones in technology, development and culture.

This thinking school was almost in the Enlightenment era, but we can perfectly place it at the end of the Middle Ages as the kickstart of the modern rights born in the Enlightenment:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_of_Salamanca

And, of course, before these there were the Italians and the Humanist movement.

I suspect that the huge 2 handed swords favoured by the Landsknecht, were intended to intimidate people into not laughing at their clothing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landsknecht

Serious answer: They are for opening up blocks of pike men. You use the 2 handed swords to destroy the pikes and/or push them aside, then send your guys with short swords into the gap to destroy the pike block from the inside.

In Spain the big swords were called mandobles, they were used kinda like a maneuvereable spear with a far better angle cover to bash/defend.

Also maybe to crush down infantries under a rush.

Early Middle Ages were probably a point in history where Europeans were at their highest level in terms of overall health and quality of life.

Antiquity and Renaissance were both overcrowded, urbanized, with bad living conditions and worse food.

>Early Middle Ages were probably a point in history where Europeans were at their highest level in terms of overall health and quality of life.

No antibiotics, modern sanitation, internet, refrigeration orcentral heating, not much education, massive infant mortality and no way to travel faster than a horse. I don't see how that equates a high quality of life.

Would you swap places with them - given that you are far more likely to be a serf than an aristocrat?

"No antibiotics" - true "Modern sanitation" - only really necessary in cities. But 90% of populace lived in the countryside. My grandparents did just fine without any kind of modern sanitation. "Internet" - true, but also irrelevant for quality of life. "refrigeration" - completely unnecessary when you have fresh food. "central heating" - completely unnecessary as medieval houses weren't massive and could be heated just fine with a fireplace "not much education" - true... to an extent. "massive infant mortality" - true, but if you didn't survive infancy, you wouldn't worry about living in Middle Ages, would you? "no way to travel faster to a horse" - so not having something completely useless is relevant for quality of life?

All and all, your objections a) completely miss the point and b) are kinda weird.

So would you swap places?

I don't know. I'm used to life as is, but I wouldn't be hurt if places got swapped.

Food? Bread and cheap legumes and vegetables, if any. Meat was for the rich.

That is why I specified Early Middle Ages. Not much serfdom during that time, and there was a lot of food to go around due to low population density - and that included meat, and yes, even for the peasants.

Also, you are wrong. Meat stews were not just eaten, but the mainstay of the medieval peasants diet: https://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2019/may/medieval-peasant-die...

At the other end, I wonder what the minimum weight would be for an impact (as opposed to edged) weapon to be able to reliably damage an unarmored opponent.

The old prison favorite of a lock in a a sock can very easily be fatal & probably weights 1/4 to 1/2 of a pound. I once reforged a ball peen hammer into a 1 handed warhammer. It was either a 12 or 16 ounce head, so quite light, really too light to get full power. It was shocking how much adding 6 inches to the handle increased the power. The spike end would easily do 1.5 to 2 inches through plate steel(maybe 3/16 or 1/8 inch) & even the sharp(90 degree) corners of the hammer head would pierce that plate if the strike wasn't flush and peel it back can opener style a half inch. It really takes very little mass to break bone provided you can get good speed, a relatively hard small impact point, and no armor/padding in the way. Skulls, hands, forearms, and shins are very vulnerable.

Well, a sling can whip a small stone hard enough to do serious damage. Otherwise, look into the cosh / blackjack / billy club style clubs. Light enough to swing at a high speed, small enough to hide under loose clothing, with just enough weight at the end to cause deep impact trauma.

Anything too light means that the force is dispersed in soft tissue, leaving surface bruises. That added inertia of some extra weight at the end causes the energy of the swing to transfer deeper to bone.

I doubt you'll get a scientifically derived number of any certainty, but I'd hazard a guess at two pounds or so at a minimum, and that would need some careful aim to be debilitating.