Did people who used swords in history ever do stupid shit with them in camp like trying to cut wood with them and/or damaging the blade?
Did people who used swords in history ever do stupid shit with them in camp like trying to cut wood with them and/or damaging the blade?
>Were grunts always retarded?
You'd have to be an idiot to bet on "No" being the answer.
Imagine how bad things got in the depths of the 30 Years War, when it was packs of feral retards leading press-ganged boys, their forcibly prostituted mothers, and other random trash recruited under threat of murder.
>press-ganged boys
They didn’t need to press-gang soldiers.They were on of the few people that were getting paid and they could loot.
They were mercenaries (except the Swedish, who were kinda press ganged). Most of what those “armies” were doing was desperately chasing a payday
imagine thinking your average grunt would own a sword
They fucking did.
Things change depending on the historical period and the region of the world you're talking about. In the later middle ages swords would be very common among both infantry and crossbowmen. Once sword makers started grinding blades instead of forging them to completion they became pretty affordable for the average guy.
Furthermore, it has always depended on what you're getting, are you getting some mastercrafted blade made to your specifications, or are you just buying something off the rack? Is it brand new, or is it something that was looted off the corpse of a dead mercenary and then sold in a lot of other weapons to some merchant?
Here's Matt Easton briefly mentioning some stuff he's read in court documents and wills. Prices varied a lot and swords often survived long enough to change hands multiple times.
>court documents and wills
things only the top 0.01% of history would have
average soldiers and people on the street did not have swords. stop getting history from capeshit and youtube.
>top 0.01% of history
What the fuck does this even mean? The records he read off are from the 1400s. As I said, time period matters. Is it really necessary for me to point out that the Romans had standardized kit over 2000 years ago and every single infantryman was armed with a sword?
This was a fucking requirement, not a luxury. A roman legionary in 50 BC showing up for formation without his Gladius would be treated like a modern soldier saying "Sarge, I can't find my rifle."
There are times and places where swords were less common, but claiming that they were always Gucci gear and common soldiers rarely ever had them throughout history is just retarded.
Yes, your average infantryman was only marginally smarter 1000 years ago
Believe the golf club owes its invention to Scottish knights hacking and chipping (No pun intended) their swords up.
That's retarded lol. Golf came from Scotland but they did not play it with swords.
No, people weren’t retards back then like they are now.
People in history didn't really use swords outside of priests and ceremonial officers.
Soldiers had polearms, spears, axes, etc. Yes they messed around like dudes always have.
Nothing worse than the retard at the other end of the pendulum
Yes and then they were punished for damaging their weapon to instil good order and discipline.
Super cute girlies
>lust-provoking question
>irrelevant, time-wasting image
Ancient roman spears at one point had a rounded end so soldiers wouldnt lean on them. For most of history being a soldier was basically being a Fallout Raider without the drugs, and you existed to raid other people while stopping their raids against your people. Modern disciplined militaries that ARENT just violent thugs in a giant gang is a relatively new phenomenon
>Ancient roman spears at one point had a rounded end so soldiers wouldnt lean on them
source?
his ass.
He's talking about the concept of picketing. Wood cut with the grain under a lens looks like a bundle of straws which can collect water and rot. There are many historical ways to smoosh the straw's ends closed like picket fencing (the shape on top is this smooshed zone). Rounding a tool handle does that too. It prevents rot.
All that fancy shit in victorian housing was not decorative, it was mechanical and functional. The fact that is was beautiful was just a bonus.
Greatly depends on the time and place
For example 19th century cavalrymen did all sort of abuse like cutting brushes, roasting sosages speared on sabres etc.
Ar the same time period people contacted with warrior cultures using swords: North Africa, Caucasus, India reported that swords had sacred status and great care. Never used outside combat, first thing warriors did in the camp it taking swords out checking and honning edge once again. These cultures also had autistic traditions about drawing sword (like if you draw yo mean to strike and never draw without reason to not offend others), not touching others swords etc.
>For example 19th century cavalrymen did all sort of abuse like cutting brushes, roasting sosages speared on sabres etc.
>Ar the same time period people contacted with warrior cultures using swords: North Africa, Caucasus, India reported that swords had sacred status and great care. Never used outside combat, first thing warriors did in the camp it taking swords out checking and honning edge once again.
A British officer wrote home in amazment after seeing Indians using swords to effortless swipe heads and arms off enemies, and learned it was because they actually sharpened their swords, unlike the Brits.
Another one was a French or German colonel that got very upset when he found out the enemy were sharpening their swords before a battle because that level of lethality and damage was dishonorable/disrespectful and ungentlemanly
Someone's been trolling you bro
fuck your gonna make me dig for it. okay
>“The tulwar is a fearful weapon in skilful hands. It is very much curved from the centre up, broad, well tempered, and keen as a razor. The scabbard is always wood or leather, as a metal one would dull the edge. Its shape not being adapted for thrusting, the point is never used, but a drawing cut invariably given, to assist which the grip is small and the handle narrow, lest it might turn in the hand. The natives are generally much more skilful in its use than our men, and sometimes wield it with an effect too terrible to be believed except by those who have witnessed it. I have several times seen a hand lopped away clean from the wrist, or a head cut off by a single blow.”
>—Peter Parley, 1869.
>“He had a narrow escape; a matchlock was levelled directly at his face when a ressaldar made a cut at it with his sword, severing the barrel at a blow.”
>—Telegraph and Courier, 1857.
>“Whoever is struck on the head by these Indian blades is cleft to the waist; and if the cut is on the body, he is divided into two parts.”
>—Ma’asir ul-Umara e Timuriyah, 1780.
the last one is from a memoir of Mughal officers that conquered India before the Brits
there's a bunch more on this page, sources check out
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=20954#post_message_194058
The secret wasn't the Indian steel it was the scabbards. Brits used steel scabbards which ruined the edge and clicked on things, instead of wood. It was the MIC scandal equivalent of the time.
>A British officer wrote home in amazment after seeing Indians using swords to effortless swipe heads and arms off enemies
So did the British use their swords more as blunt weapons, like cavalry sabres were used in the Civil War?
>whytpipol don be sharpening dey swords
swords were all but ceremonial at that point for brits, while indians were still using them as primaries.
This is historically attested you know. (Maybe not to the point where someone complained about the enemy sharpening their swords... that sounds like typical english propaganda of how the french are scared of their swords.) And it was at a time when swords were very much battlefield weapons.
>swords were all but ceremonial at that point
not remotely, they were standard cavalry and infantry weapons and used as such.
after the French went to 100% thrusting swords in the late 1800s, the last combat-ready swords of Britain and the US were patterned on colichmardes with no true edge.
Dueling was banned from the armed forces in 1844 but it would be another 50 years before it died out completely
in middle ages most grunts were not sporting swords - those were for rich people - later, especially when they become just accessory they were surely abused.
>in middle ages most grunts were not sporting swords - those were for rich people
In the middle age in Europe every soldier was supposed to have sword as addition for other main weapon (lance, polearm, bow, crossbow etc).
no. a full steel sword has no second use. only rich people had them or paid door guards leased them.
back in the day the bow or spear was the only clear choice for grunt work. if one of them had a blade like weapon. he was rich or made an improvised weapon of lower grade metal. was like a long dagger maybe or farm tool grinded into a shortsword.would be iron or whatever.
You lindybeige cultists should neck yourselves.
>did people do absolutely retarded shit to expensive and rare weapons
No.
I don't want to start a new thread so I'll ask here, would denim jeans be effective as lightweight yet sturdy legwear under platemail?
*plate instead of mail i meant
Not knowledgable on the matter BUT
They used gambeson underneath the plate which is like a thick jacket that stops blunt trauma or at least helps, as well as act as spaced armor. Denim jeans are practically plastic wrap compared to gambeson. I think some medieval bros wore multiple layers of gambeson, bros really wanted to live
Frontier gold sifters used to layer their jeans both for padding and to give them more time before their pants completely wore out at the knees
Oh i didn't mean like your normal everyday pair of jeans that are too soft i meant a pair of rugged workwear jeans
A gambeson is like wearing ten pairs of pants at once anon.
Yes.
Chausses (pants) worn under armour could be padded, but there is also sources that grieves were worn over just single layer chausses.
>During the English Civil Wars, General George Monck recommended that foot soldiers carry "a good stiff tuck, not very long" because they often broke regular swords by using them to chop firewood.
One of my great-great-etc-grandfathers captained a ship hunting pirates off the Barbary Coast and at some point sent a pair of swords he'd captured as battle trophies back home to his kids with a letter saying (among other things) "do excuse the marks on the blades as we have been using them in lieu of a spit to roast goat over the fire".
Yes. While swords as a whole were always rare (only about 10% of a military force would be in a position that allowed then the role or rank to carry a sword of any kind), people do stupid shit.
I was reading a story about the civil war wherein an NCO was gifted a sword in the very early months of the war. It was an Ames sword, which was the biggest sword maker in the entire US and outfited the bulk of all state militias. He used it as a chicken roasting spit, tried to grab the sword by the brass grip while drunk, burned his hands, and dropped the chicken in the fire.
Nah probably not. Like seriously probably not once in history ever. Never.
Imagine being a mercenary with your drunken companions stumbling upon these two
If they were desperate sure, but most of the time they had some kind of hand tools as they were as important as shoes.
Some of the traditional knives used to make sushi are clearly based on (broken) samurai swords.
Helmets doubled as woks.
https://m.youtube.com/shorts/x_5s0SOZrzM
Surely it happened in particular amongst nobles or soldiers that were provided swords by governments.
Low income soldiers that had to buy their own equipment were obviously very careful about it.