British Basket-Hilted Swords: A Typology of Basket-Type Sword Hilts

The phrase basket-type hilts refers to a large group of hilts which provide a degree of protection to the hand and wrist. Basket-hilted swords have featured prominently among British military edged weapons over the past five centuries, from the Wars of the Roses in the mid fifteenth century to the period immediately after the second Boer War of the early twentieth century. In setting out to give a full account of the hilt type, and the many variants within it, the first necessity has been to provide an appropriate terminology to employ in cataloguing and describing individual examples. The book, well illustrated with 100 black and white illustrations, falls into several parts, dealing successively with general aspects of various hilt types and discussion of typological methodology, the three major groups of basket-hilted swords, the diverse group of incomplete basket hilts, "mortuary" hilts, and hilts closely related to "mortuary" hilts. CYRIL MAZANSKY's expertise in British military swords grew out of his interest in aspects of British military history. His large collection of British military swords may be seen at Brown University, donated by the author.