Greetings,

While I am not currently able to afford any custom work (or any work at all for that matter ;) ), I have always wanted a seax. I love swords and I have many swords and various and sundry other weapons on my must-own-before-I-die list, but for some reason I have decided that a seax must be my next purchase. A langseax to be precise. There is just something so....so...sexy about them. I certainly love those Saxons, so I suppose it all fits. Just looking at one makes me want to stand in a shield-wall, slice and/or stab something, and then lick the blade. Mmm. :p

Someday (aka when I am no longer in graduate school) I will get around to finding/purchasing one, and when I do I have very specific ideas about what I want it to look like. I have always been very taken with this style, runes and all:

http://www.myArmoury.com/view.html?features/pic_seax02.jpg

http://1500bc.com/british_museum/07170089.jpg

As for the hilt, I have some ideas, but nothing really specific yet.....like I said, I'm not going to be able to afford anything for a long while yet....

Nevertheless, being the type who likes to plan things waaay in advance (and in order to start saving up), I was wondering if anyone had any ideas of some sources for seaxes (vendors, custom, whatever) that they would like to throw into the mix......just to get me drooling even more over what I can't have yet. :p I don't really have a price range in mind, I'm just looking for quality......and se(a)xy-ness. ;)

I humbly ask all of you sagely warriors because I haven't been able to find too much on my lonesome yet. ;)

Thanks in advance!

~ Shamsi


P.S. I really hope I put this in the correct forum.....

P.P.S. I also hope I haven't already posted something similar to this before.....I have a terrible memory sometimes. :\

Mmm. That one has always been one of my very favorite seaxes. You might also like the looks of this similar one by Jake Powning.

http://www.powning.com/jake/commish/swords10.shtml

Strangely, for being such an extremely cool design, nobody seems very interested in making one except the occasional custom smith.

Mr. Powning's work is amazing.
I especially like his execution of "Grettir's Seax". Sublime. . . . . . .

Good reproduction langsaxes don't exist yet. Part of the reason for that is that information about them is hard to find, so people tend to copy eachother's wrong reconstructions over and over again. If you really want a good reproduction, then you'll have to do a bit of research. As I'm a big fan of saxes and langsaxes, and want to see more proper reproductions, feel free to contact me and I'll email some information I have.

And as for where to have it made, you could comission one from Patrick Barta (http://www.templ.net/english/news.php). I hear he's got a 3 year waiting list now, so it will give you plenty of time to collect money :) But there isn't any place where you could get a more accurate reproduction (if you can provide enough detailed information), and for a better price/quality ratio.

Seaxes are very cool! I'm posting a great example of one done by Eric McHugh of Albion. It doesn't have any runic inlay, but it sure is nice! Another smith to keep in mind is Rob Miller of Castle Keep. He has done some great viking swords lately with really nicely done wood and bone grips. I think that style of grip would translate nicely to a seax.

---

 Attachment: 42.63 KB

Tim beat me to the punch. Eric is going to be makig me a seax sometime over the next few months. It might even get reviewed by one of the myArmoury team.

Take a look at his page over on Albions website. He's made a number of seaxes over the last couple of years,

This one is already sold but it looks really nice: By Antoine Marçal. ( he is a member here )
http://antoinemarcal.wordpress.com/a-vendre-for-sale/ ( scroll down a bit to see the one I mean ).

Site home page: http://antoinemarcal.wordpress.com/

At some point, when you can afford it, he might be a good possibility for a custom seax. :cool:

Thanks for the recommendations, everyone...keep them coming. :)

Yesterday I was at the annual Viking Festival here in (Hafnafjorður) Iceland, and in looking at the vendors, I was reminded of how difficult it is to find good reproduction seaxes (aka something pre-made). I´m glad that there are at least some qualitiy custom smiths out there who can make what I´m looking for (or at least very close to it!).

Patrick Barta does do amazing work, doesn´t he? But all the other people listed seem great as well. I love all the examples that have been posted so far, and Eric and Jake's are especially attractive. I suppose the good thing about being poor* is that I still have a lot of time to work this one out! ;)




* and I am pretty much broke right now. To make matters worse, my wallet with my credit cards was stolen a few days ago when I was up in the north of the country visiting a friend, leaving me here in a foreign country with absolutely NO money whatsoever. Luckily, after six months I have made some very nice friends here, or I'd be screwed right now! :eek:

Paul Binns is pretty well-known for his reproduction saexes/scramasaxes. He makes them in various lengths, with various hilt materials, and can do either blunts (for reenactment) or sharps. I picked up a PB scram on eBay a while back, it's nice looking and would make a decent camp knife.

Lutel makes some nice saexes, a couple longer-bladed ones and a couple 8-9 inchers. Lutels are usually shipped blunt (again, for reenactors) but can be sharpened.

Personally, I really like this pattern-welded langsax by Vince Evans (sadly, it is sold):
[ Linked Image ]

Another one by Vince Evans.
Photos by Blade Gallery

And you can also have a sight to J. Loose's site: http://www.jloose.com/

My friend has a blunted Paul Binns replica of the battersea seax (the one in your pictures) with engraved runes with inlays of copper and silver. Binns made the seax with a handle of elk horn.

It's marvelous.

A seax by Patrick Barta would be great to see! He could certainly execute any type of decoration you are interested in. Some of the seaxes shown in thes thread, though beautiful, are not quite historical it should be noted.

Jeremy

Hi ,

While we are on the subject of historical seax, does anyone has information on the blade construction?
Damascus patterns? I've seen the "typical" composite twists patters, is there any others? sandwich constructions, straight damascus ect?
i'm curious about the handle materials question that Robin asked too...I might have a good and steady supply of sheep horn so...:cool:


Antoine M.

Frankish seax generally looked like this (8th C. Netherlands, conservation report by Ypey), sometimes with a more spear point blade, usually with longer tang:

[ Linked Image ]

When new, they may have looked like this:

http://www.home.earthlink.net/~jlp3/images/3seax1s.jpg

or this:

http://www.home.earthlink.net/~jlp3/images/4seax1s.jpg

Usually in straight layered metal, but sometimes with decorative damascus along the back.
The second blade is a better copy of the artifact, note the upswept joint at the front of the damascus, common in artifacts (but not ubiquitous, of course). Many had two side-by-side bars of twist damascus at the back, so the pattern would slant in the same direction on both sides of the blade.

I like the ones with semi-sword hilts, but they are definitely not the usual seax...
http://www.geheugenvannederland.nl/gvn/search...code=RMO01
(click on photo for a better look)
:D There are no Frankish repros because there are no Frankish reenactors, perhaps the Vikings kidnapped them all... ;)

Decorated sax:
http://www.geheugenvannederland.nl/gvn/search...code=RMO01

Curved sax (not sayin' it was curved when it was forged):
http://www.geheugenvannederland.nl/gvn/search...code=RMO01