I agree, the reference to the photos depicted are a bit confusing, though the 'top' image of the 'very rusty' sword from 'Sandal Castle' which was destroyed in 1646. Apparently this example has a curved blade which is seemingly unusual for a basket hilt, (turcael in Gaelic description).
Blair (1981, from his excellent "The Early Basket Hilt in Britain, from which most of this material is derived), the terminus post quem for this type of basket hilt is set at the 1646 date, however it is well known that these type of hilts was hardly 'old fashioned' by mid 17th century. Hilts of these types while having subtle variations were of fundamentally similar construction much earlier, and dating is somewhat difficult as they were in use over such an extended period.
The Sandal Castle sword is held at Wakefield Museum, the Basing House example is lost, having been stolen from its place of holding.
These early hilt types were known by the terms 'Irish, close or basket' it seems rather interchangeably. Blair specifies that the first recorded use of the 'basket hilt' term was in Shakespeare (Henry IV, Part II, 1597). The 'Irish' term it is specifically noted had nothing to do with these basket hilts being used in Ireland or produced there, but was more a collective term referring to 'Gaelic', if I have understood correctly.
Returning to the curved blade on the Sandal example, this is an interesting aside;
On p.241, footnote #34, it is noted there are references in 1586 to semetaries (scimitars?) or Turky swordes in inventories. The comparison of course suggests turky= curved.
Further, the Cutlers Co. and others were supplying swords with Turkey blades for City Bands in 1642, while in 1622 Francis Markham wrote that "the blade of a musketeers BASKET HILTED sword should be broad, strong and somewhat massie(sic) of which the Turkie or Bilboe are the best. '
We know bilbo was an English term for the highly regarded straight blades of Spain, coming out of the port of Bilboe in the north......and Turkey of course seems to refer to 'curved'.
These references suggest that the hilt form of the Sandal sword (shown in previous post) may well be the form delivered by Stone in 1631, as the basic hilt structure had been in use, and clearly delivered in number in 1622 by the Cutlers Co.
As the form had been in use (in some variation, but fundamentally the same) as early as 1614, 1622 and these forms remained in use well into the century, it seems highly probable that Stones examples were of this type.
Who assembled these and where is unclear, but possibly in the Hounslow compound where shops were being situated post 1629.
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