Talk:Bladesmith

message: Since Japanese forging techniques (tempering, folding, differing hardness, cross lamination, etc) comes from China, I've added brief descriptions of Chinese and Korean swords. Also removed parts of Norse swords. It is also highly unlikely that a sword would have an iron core with a steel outer jacket.
Intranetusa (talk) 10:49, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the addition of Chinese and Korean sections.  I disagree that swords would not have iron cores with tool steel contact surfaces -- this type of construction makes sense and is described in several books as being used by both Norse and Japanese swordcrafters - I will spend some time tonight to find some citations by page number. Kazrian (talk) 21:52, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, the Japanese/Chinese/Korean sword smith uses a soft 'steel' core with a hard 'steel' jacket. I just don't see why they would use iron when they could take that iron and create much more durable steel. Intranetusa (talk) 00:51, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I cannot speak of oriental swords, but a common practice in the west was for the body of a blade to be made of wrought iron with a strip of steel welded along the cutting edge, or for a layer steel to be sandwiched between two layers of iron.  An iron core with steel surface (as opposed to cutting edges) sounds improbable.  I have seen a typology of knives according to the materials in their cross-section, but do not know a reference for this.  In the west, steel was a difficult material to produce, and much more expensive than iron; accordingly, it was only used where necessary.  For this purpose, there is probably little difference between knives, scythes and swords.  Peterkingiron (talk) 18:45, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Japanese techniques stem from Chinese/Korean, Norse swords

message: I have edited the following bits, for clarity and accuracy;
1. The term "Damascus" is not incorrect in referring to pattern welded material. The term "Damascus" and "Damascened" are used to refer to various techniques and materials. None are incorrect. 
2. Norse swords- The "Norse" people were not well known for their production of swords, so much as for their use of them. I have provided rudimentary citations from very key sources. I'm sorry if my citation technique is a little rusty.
3. Cast pewter arrowheads- Where are the records of cast pewter arrowheads? This subsection is largely an irrelevance. I recognize that people might need to be set straight about cast arrowheads, but is the swordsmith section the place for it? I haven't removed it, but I have removed reference to pewter arrowheads, for which there is no evidence, either in this article or in the archaeological record.
Concerning this article being garbage- it isn't. It's good that this stuff is getting on Wikipedia, and nobody is going to get it right the first time, all the time. More power to those who make the effort.Bhasmanath
: 1. "Damascus" is incorrect in that our modern "Damascus steel" is not the same as the Damascus steel of the Middle Ages;  I do agree though that in present day "Damascus" has become sort of an accepted lingo for pattern-welded.  With that in mind, I added a sentence that just states that modern Damascus is not the same as the stuff from the Middle Ages to avoid creating confusion.
: 2. Not sure about this "Norse were not known for production of swords" concept; I had a citation there stating that Norse people had advanced swordsmithing techniques.  As your citation is based on a sword archaeology book and mine on a bladesmithing book, I'll defer to the historic one, but I would really like to see at least one more collaborating source on that point. Kazrian (talk) 18:13, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edits 

message: I also removed the reference to the term "Damascus" being inaccurate in pertaining to pattern welded material. The India/Middle Eastern section needs a lot of work, but it's not reaslly my forte, so I'll leave it to some other pedant.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bhasmanath (talk • contribs) 00:57, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  and a bit more 

message: I cut the following, it can be added after it's rewritten and sourced properly:
For instance, in the beginning of Conan the Barbarian, Conan's father, upon forging his sword, quenches the orange-hot blade in snow.  In truth, this action would probably crack the blade.  Sub-zero quenches (that is, quenching a blade at forging temperature in a medium that is extremely cold, such as snow or liquid nitrogen) are useful for newer alloys, such as stainless steel, but most other high-carbon steels must be quenched in some sort of oil or a brine solution to avoid cracking or warpage.
Another incorrect example of bladesmithing is presented in the movie Highlander III: The Final Dimension. Connor Macleod breaks his Masamune katana and must re-forge it using a block of steel left by the sword's original maker.  Some feel that it is implied that he 'fills in the cracks' of his sword blade due to the short amount of time in which he repairs his sword and the difficult shape of the steel block he uses as his material.  However, realistically, in order for his blade to be full strength, he would need to completely remake the blade from scratch, and reset it into the handle. There is no way to 'fill in the cracks' of a broken blade with new steel short of forge-welding, and a forge-weld in the middle of a blade like the Masamune would arguably decrease its strength considerably.  It is possible, however, that the movie intended for Connor to have re-forged his sword blade from scratch, as his actual smithing is vague in the movie context.
:While the statements may indeed be accurate, WP has veered away from including every reference to a subject in popular culture in articles.  Accordingly, I consider it undeirable that any (or mcuh of this text should be retored to the article.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:25, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed.  I'm having a similar problem on the Carlos Hathcock article.  Weirdos keep inserting every reference of a sniper shooting another sniper through a scope into that article.--Mike - Μολὼν λαβέ 07:24, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I originally included the Conan portion in the article to clear up popular bladesmithing misconceptions; it probably doesn't belong here anymore but perhaps it should be placed in a separate "Bladesmithing in popular culture" type of article that could include those references, otherwise the information will be lost.  I do think it is important to clear up popular culture misconceptions in some way, whether it be here or in a related article. Kazrian (talk) 18:47, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Trimmed unsourced 

message: this section just seems like someones snobbery here theres no mention of what the misconceptions are or anything like that 81.147.139.156 (talk) 12:39, 30 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The article contains a detailed description of how blades are made.  The depiction in Lord of the Rings of the reforging of a sword certainly does not represent what would have had to be done.  This is not snobbery: it is the result of a lack of research by the film-makers.  Peterkingiron (talk) 16:49, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the point is there is no list of actual myths, which gives the appearance, that the author is just being snobbish and calling someone wrong, without providing any info. you know nothing about fixing magic swords :) 71.194.44.209 (talk) 04:25, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

text: No, I do not believe we need this. This article's lead paragraph links to forge, where the essential nature of forging is promptly and clearly described. Until a source appears for "sometimes confused with casting" the section should be removed. __Just plain Bill (talk) 13:44, 4 October 2014 (UTC)

text: ... and it's gone. (Ignore confusing edit summary— there was an unsaved null edit involved.) __ Just plain Bill (talk) 20:25, 16 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: misconceptions - movies

message: Do we need this?  Does anyone seriously confuse casting and forging in this way? Especially drop forging vs. "droplet"?  Andy Dingley (talk) 12:54, 4 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: No, I do not believe we need this. This article's lead paragraph links to forge, where the essential nature of forging is promptly and clearly described. Until a source appears for "sometimes confused with casting" the section should be removed. __Just plain Bill (talk) 13:44, 4 October 2014 (UTC)

text: ... and it's gone. (Ignore confusing edit summary— there was an unsaved null edit involved.) __ Just plain Bill (talk) 20:25, 16 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Bladesmith#Drop_forging_misconception|Drop forging misconception]] 

message: Great bit, just great... saying that the Germanic people borrowed the method of pattern welding from the Romans... To begin with, the Romans had borrowed it from the Celts in the first place, along with the technology for chainmail and other metallurgy bits... and to boot the Germans had been close neighbours to the Celts for centurie, since it was them who pushed them West and repopulated the vacated areas (which is why so many Ancient Celtic sites, starting with Halstatt and La Tène, are currently in Germanic population area)... so, in the absence of reliable sources on the subject, and that means most Greek and Roman historians are out since they tend to see the barbarians as borrowing culture from them, I strongly doubt the Germanic peoples even needed Roman mediation to learn metallugical advances from the Celts.--Svartalf (talk) 22:36, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Germanic smiths 

message: Is the term "Bladesmith" a modern term for a certain type of knife making practice? From my reading of this article and the talk page I get the sense that the term is used to distinguish between the practice of making knives from stock material and making knives through hot working (the same way the term "terrestrial television" was invented after the fact once satellite television began being used). If this is the case, does it make sense for this article to focus so heavily on the historical practice of bladesmithing (e.g. the bladesmiths of ancient Japan) when historically these practices would just have been referred to as knife making? Instead, in my view it would make more sense for the article to focus on the modern practice of the craft.
BirdmanOfHorseradish (talk) 03:26, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Historical usage of the term "Bladesmith"