Rapiers and balancing them

[DavidEvans]

This is a bit of an odd ball querry based on a webpage that I've seen and a copy of a swiss german book that I flicked through! The webpage displays the measurements of a number of rapiers from 1580 to 1620 ish, from acros Europe that show a deliberate effort made by the makers to balance the rapier on a point about 22% of the length of the whole rapier from the pommel to the point. The book showed picture of balancing scales and pommels of similar shapes but different weights. The implication is that the guard was fitted to a blade, attached to the scale and then balanced by trying different pommels until the rapier reached the correct point.
Has anyone seen anything else that would answer/add to this querry?

[Stuart McDermid]

Hi David,

I find the 22% to be pretty much smack on now that I have had a look at a couple of my swords. It seems to me that whena rapier balances at this point, the point stays on line when you move from carte to terza and back again.

The feel of a rapier blade is absolutely cruicial to accurate rapier fencing which is why I think all these "practice blades" not to mention the use of schlagers etc to be really quite amusing.

With some decent armour, a rabbit blunt and a fencing mask, one can fight pretty close to full contact with a replica blunt rapier.
Cheers,
Stu.
Just my .02
Stu.

[DavidEvans]

Thanks for that. I just checked the reference online, which is
http://www.musketeer.org/Garrick/Blade_spec_article.html.

Have a look

[Brian Hunt]

22%, interesting. thanks for the tip.

Brian Hunt.

[Guest]

Yup - sounds exactly right. I went through the specs on 9 replica rapiers that I and friends of mine have (and use to spar with) and they all fall within a range of 19.5% to 22.5% of the overall length.

Cheers,
Jon Barber

[George Turner]

If you set them up so that the point does't move as your shift your hand, then you'll see somewhat similar balance points. If you control the point on the blade that doesn't shift, you'll get slight variations in balance point depending on how much mass is up around the area of the quillons. Extra mass in this area will mean the balance point is slightly further back that a rapier with a lighter guard area, while still having the same point control.

Or you could just test the rapier like Sir Richard Burton reports was done in the tower of London, and keep adding pommel mass till the point swings as slowly as a swinging pendulum that's the same length as the blade. Renaissance physics is fun!