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German (Saxon), end of the XVIth century J 189, Musée d'Artillerie, Paris

but it was also, to a large extent, the sword of the upper classes. Though they have the same proportions as those of Landsknecht swords, of which we have spoken (vol. ii, pp. 298, et seqq.), these weapons, with which we are about to deal, only follow a glorified type of the cruciform hilted sword of an earlier era. Some are grand in the splendid proportions of their hilts. This family of swords, as a rule, have swept hilt guards of large and robust proportions, and often short and somewhat heavy blades, the fighting use of which