Variations of famous Viking-era swordsmiths' names

vilhelmsson · 28th October 2019, 05:23 PM

In "The Vlfberht sword blade reevaluated," from 2008, noted sword scholar Anne Stalsberg says that the high count on documented Ingelrii's is 37 by Geibig. Of those 37, she accepts 32.

For reference, Stalsberg examined 166 Ulfberht's in her study. But she says that there is really no good way to estimate how many there are for a couple of reasons. First, there are a lot in private hands. Second, given the way inlays can deteriorate or be obscured over time, determining which swords are Ulfberhts through close analysis, delicate cleaning, and CT scan is a monumental task because of the volume of swords. There are over 2,500 swords in Norway alone that still have to be examined.

There are a lot of nice sword finds in Finland, and there is some evidence that Finnish smiths had advanced techniques that weren't practiced in western Scandinavia. But the weight of the scholarship at this time is that Ingelrii is linguistically Frankish, and most likely the name of a person because of the finds of inlays with "me fecit" (made me) following "Ingelrii."

Jim McDougall · 30th October 2019, 07:57 PM

Vilhelmsson, this is a fascinating topic which has intrigued and obsessed me through most of the many years I have studied arms. Makers marks and blade inscriptions have been a field which has really needed far more investigation in the broader scope of arms, however the Ulfberht and Ingelrii inscribed blades have been one of the exceptions.

Some years ago as I was researching the 'Passau wolf' mark, I began to wonder if perhaps this was a kind of pictographic representation which would recall the 'berserks' of Scandinavian and of course Viking fame. I thought that with little literacy, that such a device representing 'feared warriors' would have a place on the blades of swords in Passau, a sort of center for mercenary soldiers. In the well known convention of quality or 'trademark' type symbolism this would recall the also well heralded exploits of these much earlier warriors.

It was the that I began thinking of the very swords the Vikings used, the 'Ulfberht' bladed swords, and that perhaps the word itself meant something akin to 'wolf man'. With this possibly the word was used as a kind of metaphor in a religious sense to protect the warrior in battle and imbue him via the sword, the power he needed to prevail.

In the past couple of days, trying to research more so I could better reply here, I found the article "Ulfberht Blades: New Answers to Old Questions" in 'History of Antique Arms: researches 2016'...by Anne Feuerbach and Thomas Henley.
In these, that very idea was posed in a compelling study which reflects the remarkable research which Ms. Feuerbach has always presented in her well known work on the metallurgy of sword blades, well supported by her co author Mr. Henley.

In this article (2017) it is revealed that most of the Ulfbert blades of the 10th century, many of which were found in English regions, were likely commissioned by Haakon the Good, the Norse ruler who was situated in England in those times. What is unique on these early examples is that the blades were forged using crucible steel from Central Asia traded with Scandinavia, and this trade is well supported in the material. The other apparently later examples of Europe were of high quality smelted steel.
It would seem that perhaps the early examples (of Haakon? 10th c.) of crucible steel ingots may have been the initiation of the Ulfberht 'hallmark' which was carried forth in the Frankish production. Naturally where these were produced is still inconclusive, but possibly this was the case.

It is noted that in these times literacy was virtually non existent, and paganism and the use of runes were of course common. While Christianity was becoming well spread, it was a transitional period with regard to language and the methods of conveying it. The use of alphabetic characters was not notable until the 11th century.

Here it is suggested that Haakon the Good, who is believed to have commissioned these early Ulfberht blades may well have used the 'word' (in Carolingian letters and with the Cross Potent or Greek cross) to appease both the Pagan and Christian elements of his forces. The 'wolf' metaphor was of course recognizable to both (cited, "Wulf min wulf: An Eclectic Analysis of the Wolf Man" by S. Danielli, ' Neophilogus, 91, (3), 505-24, 2007).

The Greek crosses would have had a certain 'runic' appeal as well as the Christian symbolism , and the 'word' would be seen as a recognizable one which could be read by the literate in its metaphoric sense.
What puzzles me (as a non linguist) is that the 'T' is separated by a cross rather than being included in the word. Is this some sort of diacritic (?) or superscript type of abbreviation?

With the Ingelrii, as has been pointed out, this does appear to be a shop or maker name (Me Fecit noted). The Ulberht however, does seem to be a metaphorically used religious imbuement and talisman.

Victrix · 30th October 2019, 11:24 PM

Jim, it’s interesting to note that even today in Sweden you find people whose first names are Ulf and Bert, which have Germanic origins and mean wolf and noble/shining respectively. So Ulfberht could then be translated as noble/shining wolf. I think the vikings were Germanic tribes which settled in the North, and were stubbornly reluctant to be converted to Christianity with lapses in between. The Franks and other Germanic tribes further South were much earlier in adopting Christianity. If the blade was decorated with crosses then presumably it would more likely have been produced by a Christian smith perhaps in Frankish lands. It’s a mindboggling thought that the Ulfberht (noble/shining wolf) brand could be the predecessor of the latten running wolf mark of Passau? Surely it must be a coincidence, and the Passau wolf mark appeared centuries later I understand.

Jim McDougall · 31st October 2019, 01:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Victrix

Jim, it’s interesting to note that even today in Sweden you find people whose first names are Ulf and Bert, which have Germanic origins and mean wolf and noble/shining respectively. So Ulfberht could then be translated as noble/shining wolf. I think the vikings were Germanic tribes which settled in the North, and were stubbornly reluctant to be converted to Christianity with lapses in between. The Franks and other Germanic tribes further South were much earlier in adopting Christianity. If the blade was decorated with crosses then presumably it would more likely have been produced by a Christian smith perhaps in Frankish lands. It’s a mindboggling thought that the Ulfberht (noble/shining wolf) brand could be the predecessor of the latten running wolf mark of Passau? Surely it must be a coincidence, and the Passau wolf mark appeared centuries later I understand.

Victrix, thank you so much for answering!! Interesting note on the Ulf and Bert names still used there. My suggestion of a possible link from Ulfbert to Passau Wolf is admittedly tenuous, but I thought an intriguing possibility. When the 'wolf' came into use in Passau by knife makers long before its recognized use on sword blades, it seemed a most interesting choice for a symbolic device. It was of course so highly stylized it was in cases almost unrecognizable, still it carried an almost temporal significance in a talismanic sense, along with what became known in that capacity as 'Passau art'.

The point was that in this same convention, the Ulfberth name seems very likely to have been the same kind of imbuement. The connection between it and the Passau wolf is of course most probably a coincidence, but in my view a most interesting one.

To carry similar theme, the Passau wolf (actually used in Solingen in continuation of the symbolism/quality connotations) was later transmitted into the Caucasus with trade blades, likely late 18th c. It continued use representing quality (presumably) but again the wolf symbolism carried forward. The universality of the wolf warrior connotation is unclear in connections, but the similarities are compelling.

To the original query, the somewhat contemporary name 'Ingelrii' (to Ulfberht) does seem a maker (or shop) name which probably may have been used spuriously in the same manner which prevailed in sword blade making industry in continued instances over time.

vilhelmsson · 31st October 2019, 05:28 AM

Jim,

Fascinating analysis!

I just read through the Feuerbach article, and I have some concerns with it. But I am also intrigued by it. We can do no more than speculate about many of the details of this time period, and Feuerbach’s speculation is a fun one!

For the concerns:

First, most of her articles are about crucible and Damascus steel from central Asia. So she might be biased towards seeing central Asian steel? She strongly cites A. Williams for finding that all of his Group A designated Ulfberhts were made of crucible steel. However, Williams research found that 9 of the 14 swords in Group A had at least some high carbon hypereutectoid steel and therefore are likely crucible steel, and the remaining 5 could be crucible steel, though of lower carbon content. A sample size of 14 may also not be statistically relevant for extrapolating to the chemistry of the steel for all Ulfberhts of a certain period. Williams also notes in “Crucible Steel in Medieval Swords,” that other researchers suspect that lumps of high carbon steel from Viking Age steelmaking sites found far west of Central Asia were the result of decarburizing cast iron, though he believes they are the result of smiths not properly handling crucible steel. It seems that there is a lot of research left to do! Maybe it was crucible steel? Or some of it was? And where were those swords forged?

Second, Harald Fairhair is semi-mythical. There is also no contemporary evidence of the existence of a Norwegian king named Haakon the Good though there is contemporary evidence of his brother. It seems that the English chroniclers would have been eager to record that Aethelstan had fostered a Norwegian king? I’m not sure it’s responsible to conclude as strongly as the article does that Haakon the Good commissioned the early Ulfberhts, and that “+Ulfberh+t” is a hybrid pagan-Christian symbol born of a king whose Catholicism may have been an invention of much later chroniclers. There is also not good evidence that berserkers fought naked, and I’m not sure that identification of your own side in battle would be a strong factor. Though a prominent Ulfberht inlay could be a powerful symbol of the wielder’s prestige and their sword’s quality. And we think that Viking Age Scandinavians believed that the written word, when executed properly, possessed and conferred magical qualities.

There is also the chronological problem of the earliest Ulfberht’s with Mannheim hilts dating from the mid-8th to mid-9th century, and Haakon the Good, if he existed, was born circa 920 AD.

In summary of my concerns: she is less cautious about her conclusions than the evidence suggests she should be. Anne Stalsberg’s article on Ulfberhts, by contrast, is a more academic exercise in asking the questions we don’t know while only answering what we do and can know.

Where I am intrigued (mostly where Feuerbach and Stalsberg overlap):

Stalsberg writes that Ulfberht, and, especially, the consistency of the spelling of the Ulfberht swords she examined over the mid-8th through late-11th century is linguistically Scandinavian. Scandinavians had dropped the ‘W’ around 800, to when the Ulfberhts are first dated. Whereas, variations on Ulfberht were more common in the Frankish realms until the end of the 11th century, including Wolfbert, Wolfbertus, Uolfberht, Uolfbernt, Uolfbernus, etc. So maybe the word on the blades, as argued by Feuerbach, had a Scandinavian source rather than a Frankish source.

However, Stalsberg also writes that the inlay is written in Latin/Carolingian characters which suggests that it was a Frank who was inlaying, or directing the inlaying of, the blades.

Stalsberg does not look at the Greek cross as a symbol of Christianity. She also seems to take it for granted that Ulfberht is someone’s name, which could be a mistake. Instead, she asks who was literate and signed their name preceded by a cross? Abbots and bishops. And these bishops and abbots employed a lot of slaves who would be doing the actual smithing. She also suspects that the second cross may indicate a second person, likely the overseer or “swordmaster,” who either had the same name as Ulfberht, or was just represented by the second cross (E.g., Ulfberht & Ulfberht, or Ulfberht & Son(s)). She is careful to write that she can’t conclude that it is the signature of an abbot or bishop because no contemporary abbots or bishops with that name have yet been found.

Ulfberhts are traditionally (What can I say? I’m an American; 100 years makes something “traditional”) believed to have come from the Lower Rhine due to the finding of the name Wulfberti in the bequest of a villa to the abbey St. Gallen in 802 AD. But Stalsberg writes that there is a need for an academic analysis of the Confraternity books of the abbeys of the Lower Rhine to find out whether there were abbots or bishops or other people named Ulfberht associated with abbeys to draw a more conclusive connection between the Ulfberht blades and abbeys of the Lower Rhine.

Stalsberg’s maps show that most of the early and mid-Viking Age Ulfberhts have been found in Norway and not in the Frankish realms. Ulfberhts from the late Viking Age are more evenly found across Northern Europe. It is unlikely that a Frankish smith could be commissioned to make the blades for Haakon or that they could have been traded for, as analyzed by both Stalsberg and Feuerbach. Frankish sword blades were not for traders; they were to be paid as tax to the king/emperor or to be used to arm the Bishops’s levies in service of the king/emperor. Feuerbach and Williams write that they could have been forged by Baltic smiths at the terminus of the central Asian trade, which was certainly robust as that time. Stalsberg suggests that they likely arrived as either loot or as a ransom payment for bishops and abbots, but that we just don’t know yet.

If Haakon indeed existed, then he had a long reign for a Norwegian king! This supports the idea that he could have been alive long enough for the mass production of a blade with a specific signature. But, again, Ulfberhts pre-date Haakon.

Preserved Viking Age Scandinavian art is mostly in the form of metal work which is not delicate enough to reveal blade decorations. European Viking Age art is not really interested in swords. Anglo-Saxons weren’t very interested in portraying swords in art until the later Viking Age, and there are very few, if any, other than the following, examples portraying blade decorations. However, there is one piece of Anglo-Saxon art in a miscellaneous manuscript that could be an Ulfberht sword, and I attached a photo here.

This appearance in a manuscript suggests that there could have been general knowledge about what a fine inlay like this meant in regards to the quality of both the sword and the man who wielded it. But it is also, again, a limited sample size. I wanted to write that it meant we could draw the conclusion that the Ulfberht symbol was at least widely regarded amongst the warrior and authority classes as a symbol of quality and prestige, but I think we can only draw the conclusion that maybe it was regarded as such.

Some Speculation Incorporating Feuerbach
I wonder if there was an early abbot named Ulfberht? Haakon, or someone similar, owned a sword, maybe a valued ancestral sword that was one of these Ulfberhts. His Ulfberht fascinated him because of its beautiful iron inlay, powerful magic from the runes and its history of having been wielded by powerful ancestors, and Ulfberht, as read to him by one his Frankish slaves, was a homonym with beasts important to Norse paganism, plus it had a cross, a powerful symbol of the southerners’ god who sacrificed himself to himself, similar to Odin.

He commissioned many Ulfberhts after he got rid of his brother. Some of the swords he gave to his sword host were made from crucible steel in the Baltics, some were partially made from crucible steel, some were made from bloomery steel, and some were older swords. The Ulfberht sword then proliferated across northern Europe in the late 10th and early 11th century as Scandinavians saw greater use as mercenaries and particularly with Cnut’s considerable empire.

Ibrahiim al Balooshi · 31st October 2019, 12:21 PM

THIS THREAD HAS TO RUN LIKE MAD!!

Please see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulfberht_swords where a good grounding appears on INGELRI weapons>

https://www.bing.com/images/search?v...vt=0&eim=1,2,6 is an INGELRI weapon

BONHAMS HAD ONE WHICH THEY SOLD...SEE https://www2.bonhams.com/auctions/21639/lot/218/

Victrix · 31st October 2019, 10:46 PM

In Wikipedia on Passau history I found this: ” During the second half of the 5th century, St. Severinus established a monastery here. The site was subject to repeated raids by the Alemanni. In 739, an English monk called Boniface founded the diocese of Passau, which for many years was the largest diocese of the German Kingdom/Holy Roman Empire, covering territory in southern Bavaria and most of what is now Upper and Lower Austria. From the 10th century the bishops of Passau also exercised secular authority as Prince-Bishops in the immediate area around Passau (see Prince-Bishopric of Passau [de]). I have read that swords with blade inscriptions starting and ending with crosses are believed to have been used in ecclesiastical territories which seems to fit Passau as bishopric.

The prevalence of Ulfberht sword finds in Northern Europe may be because the swords were used by viking mercenaries serving in Frankish lands and then brought home with them on their return? The swords would be found in excavated condition because of lingering practices amongst pagan vikings of burying the dead with their swords and sacrificing the weapons of defeated enemies in bogs etc. When the vikings became Christian these practices ceased, and archaelogical finds become more rare.

Ibrahiim al Balooshi · 3rd November 2019, 02:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vilhelmsson

Jim,

Fascinating analysis!

I just read through the Feuerbach article, and I have some concerns with it. But I am also intrigued by it. We can do no more than speculate about many of the details of this time period, and Feuerbach’s speculation is a fun one!

For the concerns:

First, most of her articles are about crucible and Damascus steel from central Asia. So she might be biased towards seeing central Asian steel? She strongly cites A. Williams for finding that all of his Group A designated Ulfberhts were made of crucible steel. However, Williams research found that 9 of the 14 swords in Group A had at least some high carbon hypereutectoid steel and therefore are likely crucible steel, and the remaining 5 could be crucible steel, though of lower carbon content. A sample size of 14 may also not be statistically relevant for extrapolating to the chemistry of the steel for all Ulfberhts of a certain period. Williams also notes in “Crucible Steel in Medieval Swords,” that other researchers suspect that lumps of high carbon steel from Viking Age steelmaking sites found far west of Central Asia were the result of decarburizing cast iron, though he believes they are the result of smiths not properly handling crucible steel. It seems that there is a lot of research left to do! Maybe it was crucible steel? Or some of it was? And where were those swords forged?

Second, Harald Fairhair is semi-mythical. There is also no contemporary evidence of the existence of a Norwegian king named Haakon the Good though there is contemporary evidence of his brother. It seems that the English chroniclers would have been eager to record that Aethelstan had fostered a Norwegian king? I’m not sure it’s responsible to conclude as strongly as the article does that Haakon the Good commissioned the early Ulfberhts, and that “+Ulfberh+t” is a hybrid pagan-Christian symbol born of a king whose Catholicism may have been an invention of much later chroniclers. There is also not good evidence that berserkers fought naked, and I’m not sure that identification of your own side in battle would be a strong factor. Though a prominent Ulfberht inlay could be a powerful symbol of the wielder’s prestige and their sword’s quality. And we think that Viking Age Scandinavians believed that the written word, when executed properly, possessed and conferred magical qualities.

There is also the chronological problem of the earliest Ulfberht’s with Mannheim hilts dating from the mid-8th to mid-9th century, and Haakon the Good, if he existed, was born circa 920 AD.

In summary of my concerns: she is less cautious about her conclusions than the evidence suggests she should be. Anne Stalsberg’s article on Ulfberhts, by contrast, is a more academic exercise in asking the questions we don’t know while only answering what we do and can know.

Where I am intrigued (mostly where Feuerbach and Stalsberg overlap):

Stalsberg writes that Ulfberht, and, especially, the consistency of the spelling of the Ulfberht swords she examined over the mid-8th through late-11th century is linguistically Scandinavian. Scandinavians had dropped the ‘W’ around 800, to when the Ulfberhts are first dated. Whereas, variations on Ulfberht were more common in the Frankish realms until the end of the 11th century, including Wolfbert, Wolfbertus, Uolfberht, Uolfbernt, Uolfbernus, etc. So maybe the word on the blades, as argued by Feuerbach, had a Scandinavian source rather than a Frankish source.

However, Stalsberg also writes that the inlay is written in Latin/Carolingian characters which suggests that it was a Frank who was inlaying, or directing the inlaying of, the blades.

Stalsberg does not look at the Greek cross as a symbol of Christianity. She also seems to take it for granted that Ulfberht is someone’s name, which could be a mistake. Instead, she asks who was literate and signed their name preceded by a cross? Abbots and bishops. And these bishops and abbots employed a lot of slaves who would be doing the actual smithing. She also suspects that the second cross may indicate a second person, likely the overseer or “swordmaster,” who either had the same name as Ulfberht, or was just represented by the second cross (E.g., Ulfberht & Ulfberht, or Ulfberht & Son(s)). She is careful to write that she can’t conclude that it is the signature of an abbot or bishop because no contemporary abbots or bishops with that name have yet been found.

Ulfberhts are traditionally (What can I say? I’m an American; 100 years makes something “traditional”) believed to have come from the Lower Rhine due to the finding of the name Wulfberti in the bequest of a villa to the abbey St. Gallen in 802 AD. But Stalsberg writes that there is a need for an academic analysis of the Confraternity books of the abbeys of the Lower Rhine to find out whether there were abbots or bishops or other people named Ulfberht associated with abbeys to draw a more conclusive connection between the Ulfberht blades and abbeys of the Lower Rhine.

Stalsberg’s maps show that most of the early and mid-Viking Age Ulfberhts have been found in Norway and not in the Frankish realms. Ulfberhts from the late Viking Age are more evenly found across Northern Europe. It is unlikely that a Frankish smith could be commissioned to make the blades for Haakon or that they could have been traded for, as analyzed by both Stalsberg and Feuerbach. Frankish sword blades were not for traders; they were to be paid as tax to the king/emperor or to be used to arm the Bishops’s levies in service of the king/emperor. Feuerbach and Williams write that they could have been forged by Baltic smiths at the terminus of the central Asian trade, which was certainly robust as that time. Stalsberg suggests that they likely arrived as either loot or as a ransom payment for bishops and abbots, but that we just don’t know yet.

If Haakon indeed existed, then he had a long reign for a Norwegian king! This supports the idea that he could have been alive long enough for the mass production of a blade with a specific signature. But, again, Ulfberhts pre-date Haakon.

Preserved Viking Age Scandinavian art is mostly in the form of metal work which is not delicate enough to reveal blade decorations. European Viking Age art is not really interested in swords. Anglo-Saxons weren’t very interested in portraying swords in art until the later Viking Age, and there are very few, if any, other than the following, examples portraying blade decorations. However, there is one piece of Anglo-Saxon art in a miscellaneous manuscript that could be an Ulfberht sword, and I attached a photo here.

This appearance in a manuscript suggests that there could have been general knowledge about what a fine inlay like this meant in regards to the quality of both the sword and the man who wielded it. But it is also, again, a limited sample size. I wanted to write that it meant we could draw the conclusion that the Ulfberht symbol was at least widely regarded amongst the warrior and authority classes as a symbol of quality and prestige, but I think we can only draw the conclusion that maybe it was regarded as such.

Some Speculation Incorporating Feuerbach
I wonder if there was an early abbot named Ulfberht? Haakon, or someone similar, owned a sword, maybe a valued ancestral sword that was one of these Ulfberhts. His Ulfberht fascinated him because of its beautiful iron inlay, powerful magic from the runes and its history of having been wielded by powerful ancestors, and Ulfberht, as read to him by one his Frankish slaves, was a homonym with beasts important to Norse paganism, plus it had a cross, a powerful symbol of the southerners’ god who sacrificed himself to himself, similar to Odin.

He commissioned many Ulfberhts after he got rid of his brother. Some of the swords he gave to his sword host were made from crucible steel in the Baltics, some were partially made from crucible steel, some were made from bloomery steel, and some were older swords. The Ulfberht sword then proliferated across northern Europe in the late 10th and early 11th century as Scandinavians saw greater use as mercenaries and particularly with Cnut’s considerable empire.

Reference;
A. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haakon_the_Good

SALAAMS VILHELMSON, I have just completed reading the work you mention by Dr Anne Fuerbach and although you note certain faults (in your estimate) there is no way members can view your criticism since no reference is given to the work in your post.

It exists at https://www.academia.edu/34909016/UL...D_QUEST_1_.pdf

And I have to say it is very compelling indeed and rather than being off the mark firmly covers a very highly possible well researched construct. Moreover I am not usually confronted on these pages by such a put down of another specialists observations in such a way. The paper is an excellent dissertation on this important subject and the author is a highly respected researcher so much so that I wondered if you had made an error or had lost something in your translation?

Regards,
IBRAHIIM AL BALOOSHI.

vilhelmsson · 3rd November 2019, 10:58 PM

Hello Ibrahiim,

I stand by my analysis. All experts have bias. And I tried to be gentle in my analysis.

A semi-mythical 10th century Norwegian king, central to the contrived Norwegian conversion narrative of the sagas, did not control Baltic, or Volga, trade far outside of his zone of power, and commission Ulfberht blades that existed one hundred years before he was born. And that's still a nice way of saying it.

The dominant theory is still probably the most likely because there is no good evidence to suggest otherwise: Ulfberht was the name of an abbot, yet to be discovered, who ran a good forge on the Lower Rhine.

It doesn't look like the Bonham's Ingelrii sold, even though it has some unique features.

Reventlov, do you happen to have the title of the French article (I'm not good at searching for sources in other languages unless they're in a bibliography or footnote)? Ingelrii's workshop being in Cologne, on the Lower Rhine, would draw a nice connection to the theorized location of the Ulfberht workshop.

One comparison between Ulfberhts and Ingelriis is that all Ingelriis follow a similar inlay pattern on the blade face opposite the Ingelrii inlay whereas Ulfberhts are more arbitrary. An interesting study into the connection between Ulfberhts and Ingelriis could be to trace the estimated evolution of opposite side inlay on Ulfberhts to see if it evolves into the pattern observed on Ingelriis.

If there is a connection between Ulfberhts and the Passau Wolf, it could be linked to the Fossa Carolina, which may have linked the Rhine and Danube river basins. But the wolf is a common martial motif.

31st October 2019, 05:28 AM	#5
vilhelmsson Member Join Date: Feb 2019 Location: Bay Area Posts: 57	Jim, Fascinating analysis! I just read through the Feuerbach article, and I have some concerns with it. But I am also intrigued by it. We can do no more than speculate about many of the details of this time period, and Feuerbach’s speculation is a fun one! For the concerns: First, most of her articles are about crucible and Damascus steel from central Asia. So she might be biased towards seeing central Asian steel? She strongly cites A. Williams for finding that all of his Group A designated Ulfberhts were made of crucible steel. However, Williams research found that 9 of the 14 swords in Group A had at least some high carbon hypereutectoid steel and therefore are likely crucible steel, and the remaining 5 could be crucible steel, though of lower carbon content. A sample size of 14 may also not be statistically relevant for extrapolating to the chemistry of the steel for all Ulfberhts of a certain period. Williams also notes in “Crucible Steel in Medieval Swords,” that other researchers suspect that lumps of high carbon steel from Viking Age steelmaking sites found far west of Central Asia were the result of decarburizing cast iron, though he believes they are the result of smiths not properly handling crucible steel. It seems that there is a lot of research left to do! Maybe it was crucible steel? Or some of it was? And where were those swords forged? Second, Harald Fairhair is semi-mythical. There is also no contemporary evidence of the existence of a Norwegian king named Haakon the Good though there is contemporary evidence of his brother. It seems that the English chroniclers would have been eager to record that Aethelstan had fostered a Norwegian king? I’m not sure it’s responsible to conclude as strongly as the article does that Haakon the Good commissioned the early Ulfberhts, and that “+Ulfberh+t” is a hybrid pagan-Christian symbol born of a king whose Catholicism may have been an invention of much later chroniclers. There is also not good evidence that berserkers fought naked, and I’m not sure that identification of your own side in battle would be a strong factor. Though a prominent Ulfberht inlay could be a powerful symbol of the wielder’s prestige and their sword’s quality. And we think that Viking Age Scandinavians believed that the written word, when executed properly, possessed and conferred magical qualities. There is also the chronological problem of the earliest Ulfberht’s with Mannheim hilts dating from the mid-8th to mid-9th century, and Haakon the Good, if he existed, was born circa 920 AD. In summary of my concerns: she is less cautious about her conclusions than the evidence suggests she should be. Anne Stalsberg’s article on Ulfberhts, by contrast, is a more academic exercise in asking the questions we don’t know while only answering what we do and can know. Where I am intrigued (mostly where Feuerbach and Stalsberg overlap): Stalsberg writes that Ulfberht, and, especially, the consistency of the spelling of the Ulfberht swords she examined over the mid-8th through late-11th century is linguistically Scandinavian. Scandinavians had dropped the ‘W’ around 800, to when the Ulfberhts are first dated. Whereas, variations on Ulfberht were more common in the Frankish realms until the end of the 11th century, including Wolfbert, Wolfbertus, Uolfberht, Uolfbernt, Uolfbernus, etc. So maybe the word on the blades, as argued by Feuerbach, had a Scandinavian source rather than a Frankish source. However, Stalsberg also writes that the inlay is written in Latin/Carolingian characters which suggests that it was a Frank who was inlaying, or directing the inlaying of, the blades. Stalsberg does not look at the Greek cross as a symbol of Christianity. She also seems to take it for granted that Ulfberht is someone’s name, which could be a mistake. Instead, she asks who was literate and signed their name preceded by a cross? Abbots and bishops. And these bishops and abbots employed a lot of slaves who would be doing the actual smithing. She also suspects that the second cross may indicate a second person, likely the overseer or “swordmaster,” who either had the same name as Ulfberht, or was just represented by the second cross (E.g., Ulfberht & Ulfberht, or Ulfberht & Son(s)). She is careful to write that she can’t conclude that it is the signature of an abbot or bishop because no contemporary abbots or bishops with that name have yet been found. Ulfberhts are traditionally (What can I say? I’m an American; 100 years makes something “traditional”) believed to have come from the Lower Rhine due to the finding of the name Wulfberti in the bequest of a villa to the abbey St. Gallen in 802 AD. But Stalsberg writes that there is a need for an academic analysis of the Confraternity books of the abbeys of the Lower Rhine to find out whether there were abbots or bishops or other people named Ulfberht associated with abbeys to draw a more conclusive connection between the Ulfberht blades and abbeys of the Lower Rhine. Stalsberg’s maps show that most of the early and mid-Viking Age Ulfberhts have been found in Norway and not in the Frankish realms. Ulfberhts from the late Viking Age are more evenly found across Northern Europe. It is unlikely that a Frankish smith could be commissioned to make the blades for Haakon or that they could have been traded for, as analyzed by both Stalsberg and Feuerbach. Frankish sword blades were not for traders; they were to be paid as tax to the king/emperor or to be used to arm the Bishops’s levies in service of the king/emperor. Feuerbach and Williams write that they could have been forged by Baltic smiths at the terminus of the central Asian trade, which was certainly robust as that time. Stalsberg suggests that they likely arrived as either loot or as a ransom payment for bishops and abbots, but that we just don’t know yet. If Haakon indeed existed, then he had a long reign for a Norwegian king! This supports the idea that he could have been alive long enough for the mass production of a blade with a specific signature. But, again, Ulfberhts pre-date Haakon. Preserved Viking Age Scandinavian art is mostly in the form of metal work which is not delicate enough to reveal blade decorations. European Viking Age art is not really interested in swords. Anglo-Saxons weren’t very interested in portraying swords in art until the later Viking Age, and there are very few, if any, other than the following, examples portraying blade decorations. However, there is one piece of Anglo-Saxon art in a miscellaneous manuscript that could be an Ulfberht sword, and I attached a photo here. This appearance in a manuscript suggests that there could have been general knowledge about what a fine inlay like this meant in regards to the quality of both the sword and the man who wielded it. But it is also, again, a limited sample size. I wanted to write that it meant we could draw the conclusion that the Ulfberht symbol was at least widely regarded amongst the warrior and authority classes as a symbol of quality and prestige, but I think we can only draw the conclusion that maybe it was regarded as such. Some Speculation Incorporating Feuerbach I wonder if there was an early abbot named Ulfberht? Haakon, or someone similar, owned a sword, maybe a valued ancestral sword that was one of these Ulfberhts. His Ulfberht fascinated him because of its beautiful iron inlay, powerful magic from the runes and its history of having been wielded by powerful ancestors, and Ulfberht, as read to him by one his Frankish slaves, was a homonym with beasts important to Norse paganism, plus it had a cross, a powerful symbol of the southerners’ god who sacrificed himself to himself, similar to Odin. He commissioned many Ulfberhts after he got rid of his brother. Some of the swords he gave to his sword host were made from crucible steel in the Baltics, some were partially made from crucible steel, some were made from bloomery steel, and some were older swords. The Ulfberht sword then proliferated across northern Europe in the late 10th and early 11th century as Scandinavians saw greater use as mercenaries and particularly with Cnut’s considerable empire. Attached Images

31st October 2019, 12:21 PM	#6
Ibrahiim al Balooshi Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Buraimi Oman, on the border with the UAE Posts: 4,408	THIS THREAD HAS TO RUN LIKE MAD!! Please see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulfberht_swords where a good grounding appears on INGELRI weapons> https://www.bing.com/images/search?v...vt=0&eim=1,2,6 is an INGELRI weapon BONHAMS HAD ONE WHICH THEY SOLD...SEE https://www2.bonhams.com/auctions/21639/lot/218/ Last edited by Ibrahiim al Balooshi; 31st October 2019 at 12:52 PM.

28th October 2019, 05:23 PM	#1
vilhelmsson Member Join Date: Feb 2019 Location: Bay Area Posts: 57	In "The Vlfberht sword blade reevaluated," from 2008, noted sword scholar Anne Stalsberg says that the high count on documented Ingelrii's is 37 by Geibig. Of those 37, she accepts 32. For reference, Stalsberg examined 166 Ulfberht's in her study. But she says that there is really no good way to estimate how many there are for a couple of reasons. First, there are a lot in private hands. Second, given the way inlays can deteriorate or be obscured over time, determining which swords are Ulfberhts through close analysis, delicate cleaning, and CT scan is a monumental task because of the volume of swords. There are over 2,500 swords in Norway alone that still have to be examined. There are a lot of nice sword finds in Finland, and there is some evidence that Finnish smiths had advanced techniques that weren't practiced in western Scandinavia. But the weight of the scholarship at this time is that Ingelrii is linguistically Frankish, and most likely the name of a person because of the finds of inlays with "me fecit" (made me) following "Ingelrii."

30th October 2019, 07:57 PM	#2
Jim McDougall Arms Historian Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Route 66 Posts: 9,785	Vilhelmsson, this is a fascinating topic which has intrigued and obsessed me through most of the many years I have studied arms. Makers marks and blade inscriptions have been a field which has really needed far more investigation in the broader scope of arms, however the Ulfberht and Ingelrii inscribed blades have been one of the exceptions. Some years ago as I was researching the 'Passau wolf' mark, I began to wonder if perhaps this was a kind of pictographic representation which would recall the 'berserks' of Scandinavian and of course Viking fame. I thought that with little literacy, that such a device representing 'feared warriors' would have a place on the blades of swords in Passau, a sort of center for mercenary soldiers. In the well known convention of quality or 'trademark' type symbolism this would recall the also well heralded exploits of these much earlier warriors. It was the that I began thinking of the very swords the Vikings used, the 'Ulfberht' bladed swords, and that perhaps the word itself meant something akin to 'wolf man'. With this possibly the word was used as a kind of metaphor in a religious sense to protect the warrior in battle and imbue him via the sword, the power he needed to prevail. In the past couple of days, trying to research more so I could better reply here, I found the article "Ulfberht Blades: New Answers to Old Questions" in 'History of Antique Arms: researches 2016'...by Anne Feuerbach and Thomas Henley. In these, that very idea was posed in a compelling study which reflects the remarkable research which Ms. Feuerbach has always presented in her well known work on the metallurgy of sword blades, well supported by her co author Mr. Henley. In this article (2017) it is revealed that most of the Ulfbert blades of the 10th century, many of which were found in English regions, were likely commissioned by Haakon the Good, the Norse ruler who was situated in England in those times. What is unique on these early examples is that the blades were forged using crucible steel from Central Asia traded with Scandinavia, and this trade is well supported in the material. The other apparently later examples of Europe were of high quality smelted steel. It would seem that perhaps the early examples (of Haakon? 10th c.) of crucible steel ingots may have been the initiation of the Ulfberht 'hallmark' which was carried forth in the Frankish production. Naturally where these were produced is still inconclusive, but possibly this was the case. It is noted that in these times literacy was virtually non existent, and paganism and the use of runes were of course common. While Christianity was becoming well spread, it was a transitional period with regard to language and the methods of conveying it. The use of alphabetic characters was not notable until the 11th century. Here it is suggested that Haakon the Good, who is believed to have commissioned these early Ulfberht blades may well have used the 'word' (in Carolingian letters and with the Cross Potent or Greek cross) to appease both the Pagan and Christian elements of his forces. The 'wolf' metaphor was of course recognizable to both (cited, "Wulf min wulf: An Eclectic Analysis of the Wolf Man" by S. Danielli, ' Neophilogus, 91, (3), 505-24, 2007). The Greek crosses would have had a certain 'runic' appeal as well as the Christian symbolism , and the 'word' would be seen as a recognizable one which could be read by the literate in its metaphoric sense. What puzzles me (as a non linguist) is that the 'T' is separated by a cross rather than being included in the word. Is this some sort of diacritic (?) or superscript type of abbreviation? With the Ingelrii, as has been pointed out, this does appear to be a shop or maker name (Me Fecit noted). The Ulberht however, does seem to be a metaphorically used religious imbuement and talisman.

30th October 2019, 11:24 PM	#3
Victrix Member Join Date: Apr 2017 Location: Sweden Posts: 682	Jim, it’s interesting to note that even today in Sweden you find people whose first names are Ulf and Bert, which have Germanic origins and mean wolf and noble/shining respectively. So Ulfberht could then be translated as noble/shining wolf. I think the vikings were Germanic tribes which settled in the North, and were stubbornly reluctant to be converted to Christianity with lapses in between. The Franks and other Germanic tribes further South were much earlier in adopting Christianity. If the blade was decorated with crosses then presumably it would more likely have been produced by a Christian smith perhaps in Frankish lands. It’s a mindboggling thought that the Ulfberht (noble/shining wolf) brand could be the predecessor of the latten running wolf mark of Passau? Surely it must be a coincidence, and the Passau wolf mark appeared centuries later I understand.

31st October 2019, 10:46 PM	#7
Victrix Member Join Date: Apr 2017 Location: Sweden Posts: 682	In Wikipedia on Passau history I found this: ” During the second half of the 5th century, St. Severinus established a monastery here. The site was subject to repeated raids by the Alemanni. In 739, an English monk called Boniface founded the diocese of Passau, which for many years was the largest diocese of the German Kingdom/Holy Roman Empire, covering territory in southern Bavaria and most of what is now Upper and Lower Austria. From the 10th century the bishops of Passau also exercised secular authority as Prince-Bishops in the immediate area around Passau (see Prince-Bishopric of Passau [de]). I have read that swords with blade inscriptions starting and ending with crosses are believed to have been used in ecclesiastical territories which seems to fit Passau as bishopric. The prevalence of Ulfberht sword finds in Northern Europe may be because the swords were used by viking mercenaries serving in Frankish lands and then brought home with them on their return? The swords would be found in excavated condition because of lingering practices amongst pagan vikings of burying the dead with their swords and sacrificing the weapons of defeated enemies in bogs etc. When the vikings became Christian these practices ceased, and archaelogical finds become more rare.

3rd November 2019, 10:58 PM	#9
vilhelmsson Member Join Date: Feb 2019 Location: Bay Area Posts: 57	Hello Ibrahiim, I stand by my analysis. All experts have bias. And I tried to be gentle in my analysis. A semi-mythical 10th century Norwegian king, central to the contrived Norwegian conversion narrative of the sagas, did not control Baltic, or Volga, trade far outside of his zone of power, and commission Ulfberht blades that existed one hundred years before he was born. And that's still a nice way of saying it. The dominant theory is still probably the most likely because there is no good evidence to suggest otherwise: Ulfberht was the name of an abbot, yet to be discovered, who ran a good forge on the Lower Rhine. It doesn't look like the Bonham's Ingelrii sold, even though it has some unique features. Reventlov, do you happen to have the title of the French article (I'm not good at searching for sources in other languages unless they're in a bibliography or footnote)? Ingelrii's workshop being in Cologne, on the Lower Rhine, would draw a nice connection to the theorized location of the Ulfberht workshop. One comparison between Ulfberhts and Ingelriis is that all Ingelriis follow a similar inlay pattern on the blade face opposite the Ingelrii inlay whereas Ulfberhts are more arbitrary. An interesting study into the connection between Ulfberhts and Ingelriis could be to trace the estimated evolution of opposite side inlay on Ulfberhts to see if it evolves into the pattern observed on Ingelriis. If there is a connection between Ulfberhts and the Passau Wolf, it could be linked to the Fossa Carolina, which may have linked the Rhine and Danube river basins. But the wolf is a common martial motif.