Medieval Misconceptions: the TRUE origin of the KNIFE SWORD - Messer

before we begin this episode I just want to let you guys know of the first official shadow versity meet-and-greet well you can finally meet hang out and have a bit of fun it's specifically on the 14th of July at the Abbey medieval festival in kabocha Queensland I'm actually going to be there on both days of the festival so that's the 13th and the 14th though the official meet-and-greet is on the 14th now like I said it is in Australia so apologies to all my international viewers love you heaps maybe we'll try and organize something internationally in the future but this in and of itself is actually a big step to try and organize and set up and some people if you mentioned that they're intending on flying over to make it to the event which is just phenomenal and if you can it'll be even more fun if you can dress up in medieval clothing or armor or something like that there are certain rules about swords so check out the actual rules of the event on their webpage at the meet-and-greet I'll be filming a live chat adversity episode which will be uploaded to the channel but there'll be cool fun competitions like the best matriculation 's warcry who can do the best sword flourish with a lap sword and the best drawer and CV of a sword from my back scabbard as well prizes will be really cool high quality LARP swords at a historically accurate valued at $200 as well so general prizes or heaps of fun there'll be a Q&A and also heaps opportunities to take a picture with me if you see me around the event or at the mean green itself and then on top of all this it is an awesome medieval festival as well tickets are available now I'll put a link in the description hope to see you there if you can make it as gonna be awesome the arbiters greatings i'm chad and i want to address a myth a misconception that's unfortunately still fairly prominent within our community and just general understanding about swords now I have addressed this before but it's a part three in my full series on the fashion and Meza so it kind of gets lost in that series and only people who are really into this subject we generally want to watch a five-part series and it's an older video so a lot of my newer viewers haven't even seen it so it really requires its own dedicated video because like I said this myth is still getting around and what is this well its regards to a pretty cool sword and the sword is known as the Messer so the Messer is a German word that simply means knife but it applies to a sword and so when you're being particularly technical trying to identify this sword a one-handed one you can identify as a Lang's Messer and the two-handed one you can identify as the Craig's Messer or grosse Messer so why do these swords bear a name that effectively translates to knife well it's specifically about the way their hilt is constructed because the hilt is constructed like a knife is generally constructed so normal sword construction thin Tang that runs through the actual handle and then pummel connecting it sanding it all together whereas with a knife the Tang is usually as wide as they handle and instead of going through the actual handle you have two halves this is actually speaking generally because there are other ways in which Messer handles have been constructed that don't always have the sandwich method where you have half a handle and half a handle riveted on either side with kind of like a pummel cap at the end not like a full-fledged pummel but and off and then what is also very common on messes is a Nagl which just means nail it's a side kind of quilling really small which just pokes off the side of the sword Lang's messes and Craig's gross messes became quite popular in late medieval Germany even though Germany as a country didn't really exist that timeloss the Holy Roman Empire and was more a collection of fairly independent states even though there was a more overarching Authority that didn't have huge amounts of sway but anyway I won't go into the actual political Dee tales of this time period maybe you be interested in its own video I want to focus on the sword right now so the mystery is how did this sword come about why was developed and become so distinctively its own thing separate to other types of sword with its very distinct handle construction and the myth this is the incorrect idea that gets promoted quite a lot and I think YouTube has actually done quite a bit of harm it's really hard but anyway in perpetuating this myth and it's the idea that swords were outlawed in late medieval Germany and I know German is not real Jeremy I'm just gonna say that ok for our own understanding layman's terms ok they say swords were outlawed and they say to circumvent that law specifically that would make sword the way a knife is made because under some supposed charters in the law that a sword was defined by how they were made and that was the strict definition and the lower-class wasn't allowed them but the law class to circumvent it would have this swords made like a knife and then when pulled ups like sorry governor it's a knife not a sword and when you just think about it logically it doesn't make sense because any person with heart to brain cells would look at this and know no it's a sword you idiot I saw it is more classically defined by length not the way they're made but why do they call it a knife why is this sword called a knife then and so there's some weed thing going on and a much better theory has arisen as to explain this but first let me debunked this idea of circumventing the not being allowed to carry a sword thing and it comes to the fact that in late medieval Germany it was actually the opposite in most instances not in every instance but in most instances far from it being illegal for the common citizen to own and carry a sword it was a legal requirement for them to do so the exact opposite and yes I have a direct reference for this as well it is the book called the martial ethic of early modern Germany I hope I'm getting that right all right I got one word wrong it was the marshal ethic in early modern Germany civic duty and the right to bear arms it's actually a really well researched book it's great ok and when you say early modern Germany is looking at specifically the 1400s to the 1700s okay and the 1400s that is direct bang right where the late medieval period is for us so he lists several sources from this period explaining where it was a legal requirement to carry a sword he does mention two cities where it was illegal to carry a sword and that those laws don't seem to be actively enforced okay now as to the broader context of the legality of carrying swords throughout the medieval period I'm going to be making a whole dedicated video on that subject not just focusing on Germany itself because it's an interesting thing and what is the real answer here for the common person versus the lord the higher-ups and things the officials and so for the broader discussion wait for that video if it's already out I'll link it in card description and stuff but from the time this video is published you just gonna have to wait a couple of days now I have read word for word what is actually in the book describing this but to save time I will link it in the description below and suffice to say it was a legal requirement to only carry a sword in late medieval Germany that very place where the missile was prominent and so the idea that commoners weren't allowed to carry sort so they made him like Knights to go around the law is completely incorrect it's a contradiction on what actually was happening and again it's worth reading because the book is great and goes into interesting details about the culture around bearing arms in this period and that it was actually like a penalty if you were you know guilty of lawlessness for some reason like wife-beating or any number of reasons you the sword would be taken you would lose the right and privilege to carry a sword okay but it was a general provision allotted to every male and male split because it between cities there was always slight differences suffering but only two cities specifically outlawed it completely so then why is this sword called a knife and wireless developed the way it was well the best theory that I actually think is closest to being accurate was shared to me by who is basically the foremost authority on single edged medieval swords even a bit later in the medieval period of stuff james holmes lee okay he literally or is literally writing the book on the subject and he is developing thing called the Elmslie typology i announced that in my for 3-4 part video series and even did a graphic you know the only typology and stuff as a free resource to everyone so again there's far more complexity and sophistication around the notion of the common are being allowed or disallowed to carry swords and the the actual restrictive method that was generally put in place was not ever on how it was constructed but in the length of the blade okay and so if you go to what like only these two cities we go to one of these two cities in Germany itself where sword carrying was restricted it wasn't completely outlawed ah again I'll talk about this more in my dedicated video and in a lot of instances you were allowed to carry a sword but when you weren't it was by length okay length of blade so if you put out no no it's really a knife is like I don't care if you've made it however you want it's that it passes that you know restricted length of weapons and whatever so you're not allowed to carry it and they wouldn't be now to carry it so again why with these swords made like knives and called knives James Helmsley his idea which I again I think is really really interesting is the idea around guilds okay so guilds you could kind of look at them as a very early type of unionization okay between different craftsmen and stuff but this wasn't really to get better wages from wherever your employer wasn't stuff like that it was almost like developing small monopolies and stuff but also I stand up Authority all right if you could be a member of the guild that meant your craft where it was if you are part of the carpentry guild and everything and it's hard to define exactly how many guilds there were but I have like found coat of arms and you know its town halls and of all these guilds and everything like that and it seems to be almost one for every single dedicated craft and what does seem quite evident is that there was a specific knife makers guild and sword makers guild okay now what's interesting if you're a specific member of one of these guilds I mean do you have the stamp of authority the guild approve your work so people knew where if you went to this you know person or member of the guild your products were of the right quality standard I don't have to pay a certain amount to the guilds as well but it does a lot of give-and-take because by doing this if you ever went became sick okay and you remember the guild the guild or helped take care of you because you couldn't work in a wage or anything all not a wait because if you're a craftsman you'll be earning your own money based on the things you are producing and selling yourself but anyway if you became sick the guild would actually help take care of you and provide for you financially and so you got better so there was a lot of you know give-and-take in regards to go you have to pay some back but they took care of you stand we'll call it and all those things and they also interestingly regulated the amount of craftsmen who practiced a certain craft within a city to make sure demand and quality was always at the right level which is a bit shady a bit of you know trying to artificially create a monopoly on a certain market but hey people are people and if they can find ways of making greater profit and helping themselves out and they don't think it's too dishonest as kind of sauce video now sorry guilds right but what's interesting is when you have two guilds that are very similar to one another because all right the difference between a knife and sword what is the difference between a knife and sword okay is that a length well it seems like one of the ways in which they defined the difference between a knife and sword was actually the way the hilt was constructed and somewhere someone might have missed a specific length requirement because what is a really big knife okay if you ever you know something that's this big is that is that a short sword or is it in life the crossover is really really gray and so someone was specifically now down no you cannot make a knife this big well what if you make it like half a centimeter shorter and you're like what is the difference I've but and then when you keep doing that and you get too short you're trying to restrict the knife make isn't actually making legitimate knives in the same way if you you know you know how to make it you know larger this all these things and you say sort I'm allowed to be so short but okay what if you went one centimeter over it becomes so great be really hard to find specific lengths so kind of makes sense that defining the length between a knife and a sword became quite gray and with the restriction in carrying weapons they didn't really care between knife and sort they just said anything knife or sword over this length you weren't allowed and so that restriction would apply if it was made like a knife or made like a sword regardless but in regards to the actual actual definitions of what it is for the craftsman very very gray and so it turns out that craftsman seems to have started to try and poach some of the their customers from the sword makers by making really large knives with the hilt constructions of nice and according to their charters in their guild and everything that was a knife it was not legally classified as a sword so they could still make them and if that is the case it makes sense that the knife anchors go just there slowly just seeing how far can they push the envelope making really really big knives and when people start to make an objection they have less grants to really say it's a sword because how you know smoking us or getting how big can a knife get and so at one point it seems like the sword makers guild kind of had the idea or impression there's this speculation but it seems to be fairly valid and if you can't beat them join them okay you're making swords we can't get array for you but we know how to make really good sword blades so what if we make these blades sell them to you and you can help them finish them in whatever way you want and sorry James Ansley has shared with me some Messer blades right that he because he has studied them in the museum and stuff like that that actually have manufacturing marks or you know identification things I was able to find that the blade was actually made in Italy okay by one of the more famous and prominent sword maker groups in Italy and then that was shipped to Germany and these knife makers got them and then halted them the souls as messes and so this is an instance where the sword makers were making the blades of selling them to the knife makers perhaps this might be a reason why the sword makers didn't kick up such a fuss about if you're making swords we'll just so you saw blades as well because they are they have a way to sell in a market they couldn't before they can sold things to the knife makers guilds even though I think it's a real selling sauce or anything but if you can't beat them join them so quite interesting best theory that I've found so far and it also makes sense why you would call a sword a knife because when I think it has to be a knife but it's just really really long knife and even if a.length regardless if you go into a specific city where you weren't allowed to carry him you wouldn't be a tower carry him because it doesn't matter how it's made its life so in summary the idea that carrying swords were illegal for the common person in late medieval Germany completely incorrect okay that's not the reason why the missile was developed or came about became so prominent not at all now let's get that in the water and of course the reasons why we believe it was developed best running theory so I wanted to clear that up hope you enjoy thank you for watching and of course I'll be see you again so until that time [Music]

Channel: Shadiversity

Views: 296,762

Keywords: sword, swords, messer, langmesser, kriegsmesser, grosse messer, falchion, medieval, middle ages, history, historical, hema, historical european martial arts, weapon, weapons, guild, elmslie typology, origin, blade, maker, skyrim, game of thrones, lord of the rings, dnd, dungeons and dragons, d&d, rpg, fantasy, top 10, top ten, knight, knight's, greatsword, longsword, curved, two handed, swordfight, swordfighting, katana, samurai

Id: vlWvLRxen4s

Length: 14min 41sec (881 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 12 2019