The rapier was the principal civilian sidearm throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Designed for cut-and-thrust fencing of progressively complex techniques, the rapier is characterized by a double-edged blade with an acute point and an elaborate guard for the hand. The guards, usually of iron or steel, were subject to a variety of embellishment. They were engraved, chiseled, gilded, damascened, and encrusted in gold and silver in keeping with fashionable styles.
Unless otherwise noted, the materials, attributions, and dating given here refer to the hilts. Rapier blades, invariably of steel, bear a variety of maker’s marks denoting their origin in the two principal centers of blademaking, Toledo in Spain and Solingen in Germany.
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Title:Rapier
Date:ca. 1540
Geography:Solingen
Culture:probably French; blade, German, Solingen
Medium:Steel, gold
Dimensions:L. 44 1/2 in. (113 cm); W. 9 in. (22.9 cm); Wt. 2 lb. 12 oz. (1247.4 g)
Classification:Swords
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1904
Accession Number:04.3.6
[Louis Carrand, Lyon and Paris, by 1873–86; sold to Spitzer]; [Frédéric Spitzer, Paris, 1886–d. 1890; his estate, 1890–95; Armes et armures faisant partie de la collection Spitzer, Georges Petit, Paris, June 10-14, 1895, no. 183, for Fr. 55,000, to Dino]; Charles Maurice Camille de Talleyrand-Périgord, Duc de Dino, Paris (1895–1904; sold to MMA).
Paris. Esplanade des Invalides. "Exposition Rétrospective Militaire du Ministère de la Guerre en 1889," May 6–October 31, 1889.
Cochin, Charles Nicolas, II. Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, desseins, estampes, bronzes, terres cuites, laques, porcelaines de différentes sortes, montées & non montées, meubles curieux, bijoux, minéraux, cristallisations, madrepores, coquilles & autres curiosités, qui composent le. Paris, February 18, 1771. no. 950 ("une longue & forte épée Espagnole la garde, la branche & le plombeau orné de deux bustes de femmes adossées, sont d'acier damasquiné en or, la poignée en acier & cuivre doré.").
Bonnaffé, Edmond. Le Musée Spitzer. Paris: Imprimerie de l'art, 1890. p. 31 (ex coll. Carrand; acquired from Carrand fils in 1886).
Spitzer, Frédéric. "Armes et Armures." In La Collection Spitzer: Antiquité--Moyen-Âge--Renaissance. Vol. VI. Paris: Maison Quantin, 1892. no. 119, pl. XXX.
Galerie Georges Petit. Catalogue des Armes et Armures Faisant Partie de la Collection Spitzer. Paris: Galerie Georges Petit, June 10–14 1895. no. 183, ill.
di Quaregna, Luigi Avogadro. Armeria Antica e Moderna de S.M. il Re d'Italia in Torino. Vol. 3. Turin, 1898. pl. 187.
Cosson, Charles Alexander. Le Cabinet d'Armes de Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord, Duc de Dino. Paris: E. Rouveyre, 1901. p. 57, no. F. 10, pl. 14 (called: Epee, Italian [or French]).
North, A. R. E. "Pseudo-Renaissance Sword-Hilts: Two Nineteenth-Century Italian Forgeries." Apollo (February 1991), pp. 104–5 (similar hilts as this one, is said to be Italian, 19th c.).
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