Lengths of historic 2-handed sword handles

[Chris Ouellet]

I don't have Oakshott's book easily at hand any longer (in the process of a move) and I was wondering if people could help me out.

What is the historic lengths of two-handed English sword handles?
That is the distance from the cross to the pommel I'm interested in.

The issue I have is recently holding some wasters the hands actually touch when gripping the handle - there's little to no space or leverage between the hands.
Some images have a good gap, others do not - what's the historically accurate lengths?
This dramatically affects use in my opinion.

[Curt Dunham]

You might check the Albion site to get a feel.

[s_taillebois]

A bit obscure, but in the old James Burke "Connections" series he had a scene near the tomb of King Henry 5th. In it he holds the sword which apparently belongs to the king, might be worth checking.

Also English tomb effigies might be worth a check.

[Adam Bodorics]

Sorry, but in this case, Albion swords won't help. Simply because we are different. There's a sword I made - it's intended to be a single-handed sword, but for a rather big guy. It can be grabbed comfortably with two hands by a bit-smaller-than-average guy. The same big guy has a bastard sword, which can only be grabbed with hands touching - by him, I can grab it with a rather nice gap between my hands.
...
You should rather check period sources... you'll see a great variation of relative grip sizes, so I'd say that it's a matter of personal taste.

[Chris Ouellet]

Thanks guys, that's interesting. Now for a more general question:
Do any texts (not just English) describe the position of the hands and fingers on the handle?
There are many different possible grips, some more effective than others that I know of in asian arts.

[LafayetteCCurtis]

As far as I remember, the manuals that talk specifically about hand position are rapier manuals--di Grassi and Thibault, perhaps? When it comes to the longsword and other two-handed swords, it almost seems that you're supposed to experiment to find a gripping method that suits you best, since I haven't heard of any prescriptive passages about methods for gripping it. Of course, it's possible that I may have missed something since I'm not yet that widely read with regards to the minutiae of the art.

[Jaron Bernstein]

Thanks guys, that's interesting. Now for a more general question:
Do any texts (not just English) describe the position of the hands and fingers on the handle?
There are many different possible grips, some more effective than others that I know of in asian arts.

Most definitely. Get a copy of Meyer and just study the hand positions in the woodcuts. There is a wealth of material just in the pictures, much less the text.

[Ken Dietiker]

What is the historic lengths of two-handed English sword handles?
That is the distance from the cross to the pommel I'm interested in.

I know it's not English in origin, but you might want to check out what Vadi had to say about the length of handle and cross. Very interesting because he uses the terms "span" and "fingers", which agrees with what Adam suggests, it's not just a preference but perhaps based on each individual's size of hand, etc. No "specific" lengths mentioned.