China's Legendary Swords

What you didn't get is this. If you wanted quantity, there are other weapons that could do the job. The weapon that can be made the most abundantly and cheaply is the spear, which is why this weapon is the universally found in all cultures as the main weapon. If not the spear, then some other polearm. The most common weapon of the Spartans is the spear, the Qin army the Ji (halberd), later Chinese armies, the Qiang or spear. Go through the list of ancient medieval and ancient armies, and you find spear, pike, lance, halberd. Most common and used weapon of feudal Japan are not katanas but the naginata, which is a form of halberd.

We know the quality of ancient swords, especially of Chinese swords is because that is how they are discovered. Even today, these swords compare favorably to modern ones made by today's swordsmiths. One comment describes older swords having a sense of flexibility that modern made swords don't match. Such swords would only represent a tiny and random fraction of what existed then.

Also what you didn't get is that often kings and especially in China, emperors, also have a personal interest in these weapons. The quality set for swords are often set by imperial decree, in terms of size, weight, handle to blade ratio, metal composition, production technique, etc,. One example is the Qianlong Emperor, who pretty much set the standards for Qing Dynasty swords. Another example is the Shenzong Emperor of the Song Dynasty who laid the specifications and design for the Zhammadao.

And if you think making swords is that laborious, wait until you see how composite bows are constructed, bows that are used by the Mongols, Chinese, all the way to the Egyptians. One Egyptian pharaoh takes personal interest in the making of such bows as he visits the places where craftsmen made such bows so he could try them himself. Composite bows can take past a year to be fully cured (ancient glues are not fast drying then).

If you look at the Qin terra cotta army videos posted in another thread, you will see how the Qin resolves their issues of quality vs. quantity. You can also see they have a no compromise approach to quality. Every weapon is marked with the name of the craftsman plus three other levels of management above, so they know every failure in quality, there is someone who is accountable---severely.

Compared to the swords of Goujian, by the time of the Qin, the swords have lengthened from 54 cm to over a meter long. Even with the vaunted skills of craftsmen like Ganjiang, by the time of the Qin, the level of metallurgy was superior still even for common military jian. In the early Han, there was bronze jian over a meter long. As the sword becomes longer, that has to be matched with corresponding improvements in metallurgy and workmanship. While smaller daggers and short swords can be made cheap, long swords cannot.

But of course, swords are expensive, which is why they go only with the elite soldiers and troops. The main bulk of the Qin army uses polearms, specially the ge, the pi and the qiang.

If I were to say what is the best sword design of all, it would be the Turkic-Mongol sabre, the design of which in the last millennia, spread like wildfire from China to Europe, where today, variants of such remains to be the official celebratory sword of many armed services such as the US Marines. The sabre would have different names and forms, like the Talwar, the Scimitar, the Pulwar, the Saif, the Kilij, the Cutlass, and the Shamshir, as it goes from one country to another. As it travels from one nation to another, it would infuse itself with the swordmaking and metallurgy techniques of the local nation, whether its is the legendary Damascus steel of the Arabs or the Sanmei construction of the Chinese.

Though the sabre would have its variants, its basic form is a one handed pistol like grip, often with a guard, with a thick blade that tends to curve more prominently towards the end.

The innovation of a single edged dao was a major push forward in the effectiveness of shock cavalry, combined with the innovations of the larger breed horses, the saddle and the stirrup. Cavalry like this can rush up to a traditional archer only cavalry with light armor, and hack them down, with decisive results as the Han cavalry did to the Huns.

But later, the descendants of the Huns, would start coming down at the 8th Century, this time brandishing a weapon that makes them equals to superiors in horse mounted shock and melee combat. This is the innovation of what is to become the sabre. The lightness, strength, and the grip of the sword was more optimized for cavalry use than anything before. Traditional daos, which all look like straight edged katana, were found wanting.

Later, this type of sword was a shock in Europe too, the traditional double edged straight sword that you would associate with knights and medieval warfare would undoubtedly be in a disadvantage, leading to the dominance of a single sword design from East to West.


While the transformation did not come overnight, sabres were becoming part of dao design by the Ming Dynasty, and was cemented into Chinese armies---and into Chinese cultural consciousness---by the Qing Dynasty. This was also right about the time when Europe has also started shifting to similar designs.

crobato said:

If I were to say what is the best sword design of all, it would be the Turkic-Mongol sabre, the design of which in the last millennia, spread like wildfire from China to Europe, where today, variants of such remains to be the official celebratory sword of many armed services such as the US Marines. The sabre would have different names and forms, like the Talwar, the Scimitar, the Pulwar, the Saif, the Kilij, the Cutlass, and the Shamshir, as it goes from one country to another. As it travels from one nation to another, it would infuse itself with the swordmaking and metallurgy techniques of the local nation, whether its is the legendary Damascus steel of the Arabs or the Sanmei construction of the Chinese.

Though the sabre would have its variants, its basic form is a one handed pistol like grip, often with a guard, with a thick blade that tends to curve more prominently towards the end.

The innovation of a single edged dao was a major push forward in the effectiveness of shock cavalry, combined with the innovations of the larger breed horses, the saddle and the stirrup. Cavalry like this can rush up to a traditional archer only cavalry with light armor, and hack them down, with decisive results as the Han cavalry did to the Huns.

Click to expand...

crobato, first of all, I am to understand that the Turkic-Mongol cavalry sabre
had a blade that was shaped not unlike that of a parang - is this correct? - ; thus not only sparing the knuckes inadvertent blows but greatly increasing the force of the slash.

Second, I am more or less familiar with the characteristics of Damasucs Steel; I am not so with Sanmei Steel; I presume that like Damascus Steel, it contained an iron core of some form or another, but that is about as far as I can take that. Especially given something that John Keegan wrote about the quality of the steel of the Mongols' swords, basically that the Mongols considered their own steel to be vastly superior to that of their foes; was this steel the same as, or related to, Sanmei Steel? Keegan wrote that the Mongol swords were of such excellent quality that they typically severed limbs with a single stroke. I have puzzled at Keegan's words on the Mongol swords for almost a decade now; I have so far not identified an efficient cause for their superlative qualities.

Sanmei refers to an elaborate construction method where the blade consists of three sandwiched layers of steel. The outer ones consist of hardened steel with a higher carbon content, and the middle one or the core consists of a softer steel. The Chinese pioneered the sandwiched construction of swords even back in 500bc with bronze swords of different alloys with different strengths, the middle core consisting of a softer material. Later this was applied to steel swords and the technique was exported to different places like Japan.

As China shifted from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age around the time of the late Warring States to early Han period, Chinese foundries were already developing the techniques for differential heat treatment using clay. By applying clay in various thickness around the sword as the sword gets heat tempered, you can differ and control the way the heat is applied in different areas of the sword. The harder edge for example can get more heat for example. This technique was later passed to the Koreans and Japanese, though the Chinese would later abandon this to a new process of differential heat treatment.

I should add that the development of blast furnaces by the late Warring States period to the early Han period was decisive in bringing the steel swords early. Another invention was the bellows, so the furnaces can generate heat at much higher temperatures, which is important in heat tempering steel.

After the Han and somewhere before the Tang Dynasty, the Chinese also learned two other new techniques. The first is to take multiple layers of steel then fold and hammer them repeatedly so many times. The second is to add a ridge either in the middle or the back side of the sword.

By the time of the Tang, the Chinese steel sword reached a state of perfection when all these techniques are combined. These were also passed to the Japanese first by importing such swords or giving them as gifts, then by Korean and Chinese swordmakers who immigrated to Japan, especially those that came from the Wu (Go) province.

The Mongols being a migratory society could not have built a semi industrial infrastructure to make their swords without utilizing and combining the techniques of conquered peoples (Han, Turkish, Tungusic, Persian, Tibetan). In ancient and medieval wars, you can always slaughter whole populations, but never craftsmen and blacksmiths along with their families. They are always top priority to be captured and kept alive then assimilated into the conqueror's economy.

crobato said:

The Mongols being a migratory society could not have built a semi industrial infrastructure to make their swords without utilizing and combining the techniques of conquered peoples (Han, Turkish, Tungusic, Persian, Tibetan). In ancient and medieval wars, you can always slaughter whole populations, but never craftsmen and blacksmiths along with their families. They are always top priority to be captured and kept alive then assimilated into the conqueror's economy.

Click to expand...

I understood that the Turks living around the Altai were for quite some time specialists in the working of iron, at least until their defeat and expulsion of the Avars in the 6th Century A.D. I did not know what the source of the Mongols' swords were, although I know that ehtnic Turks often comprised the majority of the "Mongol" and "Tatar" Armies; it would be logical that the Turks provided the former with many of the their edged weapons. From what other sources (conquered peoples) the Mongols and Tatars may have acquired such excellent edged weapons as they possessed, I know only that Genghis removed many of them to, and centralized them in, his capital at Karakorum.

Genghiz Khan defeated both the Xixia (an extinct cousin of the Sino-Tibetan family---extinct thanks to Mr. G. Khan) and the Liao Dynasty (Jurchen as in aka proto-Manchu). Both of these could have provided a more significant manufacturing ability for the swords. The Liao especially, which were descendants of the Jin Dynasty, were heavy armored "knight" cavalry.

The Mongols were mainly archers, and they didn't have as many sword wielders until they began incorporating other peoples into their armies, particularly the Turks, the Jurchens, northern Han and proto-Tibetans (Xixia). Thus, the archery department is left with the Mongols, but the melee cavalry are usually non Mongols.

Video by Scott M. Rodell about Chinese long sword techniques and a little history.

Facinating video, crobato.

In close combat during the Second Sino-Japanese War, how efficient still a weapon for CQB was the modern miadao?