Late Medieval Dagger Sheaths

[AlexOstacchini]

Hi all, here is a group of recently finished late medieval dagger sheaths (and daggers). I will keep the focus on the sheaths here as that is the leather part. There is very little to go off in terms of original pieces, though plenty of illustrated sources and other examples of leatherwork from the same period, which for these is around 1450 to early 1500s or thereabouts. Weirdly there are hundreds of surviving knife sheaths but not many for daggers that I am aware of. I completed a batch of smaller domestic and utility knives not long ago and will post about these separately as the process is a bit different, but for now here are some bigger pieces.   

 

The construction of these is all leather, without a wooden core as you would expect for a sword scabbard, and are made from two layers of veg tan. The inner layer is 2mm and has the grain side facing inwards, and any risers are then glued over that so they end up sandwiched between the two layers. The outer layer is then moulded from 1.5mm, I mark out the pattern borders and draw the design while it is in place, then take it off and tool it flat. A lot of medieval leather carving techniques are very similar to the floral carving done today, with the equivalents of petal lifters and bar grounders and decorative knife cuts. Funnily enough I have noticed a lot of other makers for this kind of thing find swivel knives uncomfortable to use. I learnt carving by practicing Western style patterns so am very used to mine and find the techniques adapt perfectly. Anachronistic maybe for medieval things but +1 for the swivel knife from me, I think they are great.

The multi pocketed hunting set is done by making three individual sheaths, tacking them together with a few stitches top and bottom, then moulding a single piece over all three. 

There are a few different stitches used here and sadly no pictures of the back, but most are a box stitched with the holes going through the edges of the leather rather than out the back, which keeps things nice and neat and flat. All the seams run centrally down the back, rather than around the edge like modern knife sheaths.

 

One of the daggers (the red handled quillon dagger) also has a leather grip. This was done by moulding and gluing 1mm veg tan around a wooden handle, and binding it with cord as it dried. When it has set the cord is removed, leaving the texture imprinted on the grip. This is quite a well known method for sword handles, but I have not seen it used elsewhere, so may be of interest to anyone not involved in the historical scene as I am sure it could be applied nicely to bag handles etc.  

 

The fittings are custom made for each sheath and in this case are steel, formed from sheet and silver soldered. If anyone is interested in the daggers themselves I am of course happy to give details, but thought the leather side was more appropriate for here!

Anyway I hope you like them

 

 

 

 

 

 

[alfredleatherworks]

That is some stunning work! Thank you for sharing!

[akguy59]

Those sheaths are absolutely beautiful. Very impressive work. 

[chuck123wapati]

Definitely not tools made for the common folks of the day. Those are incredible!

[Dwight]

My best looking dagger compared to that lot would be considered a common shank

Good looking work all around

May God bless,

Dwight