Big swords and Bronze Age war protests | Curator's Corner S1 Ep2

British Museum Curator Neil Wilkin spends a lot of his time thinking about metal - he’s Curator of the Bronze Age. Was seeing bronze for the first time like the internet or 3D printing? Does he secretly enact Game of Thrones with the objects?
Neil has been working with UCL and members of the public to create 3D models of Bronze Age dirks (large ceremonial swords). This will help us to understand how these weapons were created and, in some instances, destroyed.
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[@NickdeVera]

guy walking through a bog, stubs his toe, pulls out a sword. i have been Chosen

[@losthor1zon]

Not quite as dramatic as pulling a sword out of a rock that it's stuck in, but it'll do.

[@jonathonfrazier6622]

Nick de Vera for tetanus.

[@TheSaneHatter]

"Crom!"

[@Criomorph]

He is Shreck, Lord of the Bog, Master of the Swamp, and by this sword his roll is divinely ordained!

[@anders6227]

Shreck is love, Shreck is life

[@Enzo012]

The story of King Arthur returning Excalibur to the 'Lady of the Lake' likely has some past echoes of people thrusting bronze swords into bogs.

[@pawedziedzic3250]

My thought exactly!

[@Auriflamme]

Not just bogs, a lot of swords have been found which were ritually cast into pools or other bodies of water. The presumption is that it is a gift of a particularly beautiful object to the gods.

[@TheLittledikkins]

And they have found tons of Iron Age weapons thrown into rivers, bogs, lakes, and ponds. Almost any body of water seemed to be a sacrifice site.

[@DAYBROK3]

Also the sword from a stone you cast a bronze sword not an iron one. So a Bronze Age sword is removed from a stone. Something to ponder.

[@allangibson8494]

@Astro Turf Other than finding a lot of bronze swords in bronze age bogs and lake bottoms....(along with a lot of ritually killed people).

[@loran1212]

I'm so happy that curator's corner is getting a series, this is so fascinating! I love hearing from the actual experts, and the production value is also amazing.

[@zenaidebuonaparte3882]

Theres nothing expert about this guy

[@LeonM4c]

Man ya'll are cynical af. To me he just seems like an excited guy sharing a cool project he's working on with his team. Even as an adult he remains a student in learning. Watch it or don't, no need to shit on a guy who's passionate about the work he does, geez.

[@maxoutrage7270]

Cody McMillen I’m not shitting on him, but this guy isn’t an expert. The idea that this was a Bronze Age war protest is laughable. I’d love to see any contemporary evidence of that.

[@kashmirha]

@@maxoutrage7270 On the other hand you are a F noobody. :D Expert of noobodyness :)

[@davidworsley7969]

@@zenaidebuonaparte3882 Only a deeply stupid person would think that anyone other than an expert would hold such a prestigious post at the British Museum. Doctor Wilkin is a highly qualified expert with many published works.

[@nsnick199]

I can't wait for the day when I can pop on a VR headset and examine all sorts of historical objects like this!

[@abe1r550]

I’m still waiting 🥲

[@ToolforOffice]

Ooh

[@Bcfcuklhpwalker]

Yes Zuckerberg like real men will allowed this go live in your bubble world just don't expect every one to follow

[@mikefule330]

About the "anti war protest": a lot of people below have been very critical of this, suggesting it is Neil projecting his modern world view onto an historical period. I doubt that he means"protest" in the modern sense of people marching and waving banners in the forlorn hope of changing government policy; or the sense of well-meaning hippy types making up a ritual to express their personal distaste for war. I think he means a protest in the sense of a community gesture expressing sadness at the inevitable loss that goes with war. Bronze age people lived day to day by growing crops, herding animals, catching fish, and hunting. These are labour intensive activities. War may be exciting and, if you win, glorious, leading to wealth: slaves, livestock, land, treasures. However, it is also a risky business. It leads to the deaths of farmers, herdsmen, fishermen and hunters, the despoiling of the fields, loss of the livestock, loss of the fishing boats, and destruction of homes, and can be followed by a period of starvation. Even in the more organised mediaeval times, there was a recognised "campaigning season" because the soldiers had to get back to bring in the harvest. We may think of the "beaker people" (a modern term that they would not have recognised) as "warlike" but that does not mean they spent their entire lives fighting - only that war was an ever present danger. Before the war comes fear, and the need to secure the favour of whatever gods the society has; after the war comes grief for loss, relief for the survivors, and thanks to the gods for victory, then a period of rebuilding. It seems likely that the burial of the dirk was related to some form of ceremony or gesture at the beginning or end of a conflict. Without more data, we can only speculate.

[@azn3000]

You are one of the few sane people in this comment section that didn't resort to either calling him a liberal or an idiot and instead wrote out a well thought out response. I salute you.

[@AkBirdman17]

@Jason McBeavis your a twat. It's very reasonable to believe this. I prefer to believe an intelligent man, rather than an ass like you.

[@BlookbugIV]

In whatever sense he meant it, it remains a ludicrous assertion.

[@user-bw5ek8oz9g]

Yeah, and there could be some ritualistic feel around it.

[@iseriver3982]

People seem to forget that if you took a bronze age baby and raised them in the modern world, no one would notice. Bronze age people were as human as we are, so if people today can protest, then people in yesteryear can protest too. That said, Neil's idea of protest does seem incredibly silly. Especially since there's broken weapons, and symbolic weapons, found in graves of 'great' people. Plus there's a known religous like symbolism in the UK of bronze age people putting spears point end first into the ground, just like how the sword was found.

[@wfcoaker1398]

Not sure of the “protest against war” angle. Thrusting a sword into the soil of someone else’s territory could be symbolic of either declaring war on them, or of having conquered them. Bending a sword to make it unusable could be symbolic of the end of conflict between different groups.

[@thepeacefish]

Wf Coaker came here to say this 👆👆

[@j0nk0movies]

I was hoping to see this in the comments.

[@Questpeace]

Problem with that is how expensive and powerful that symbol would be. If you just left that behind what group of people wouldn't pull it up and make it into an actual weapon. Though I do think positioning it as a symbol against war is a stretch it could be a sign of an age of relative peace wherein the upper-class warrior caste could walk around with ceremonial blades as nothing but a status symbol.

[@Questpeace]

@@ems4884 I think it boils down to the rarity of bronze tools during that time (let alone huge ~swords with no usage other than decoration). To use such symbols as against enemies would just arm the enemy. I'd say they were just aggressive symbols brought forth by an age of relative peace-- an implication of war and murder, but clearly not a tool for those ends. They could genuinely be a symbol of peace-- the sword had not lost its stature but it had lost its use. Then the Norse came.

[@wilfredruffian8429]

It would seem that such a sacrifice would be made to ensure success in battle.

[@18yardsout96]

I'm surprised nobody has brought up the term, "bury the hatchet." I wish the curator, Neil, had given us more context for his theory. I find it more plausible that it was a peace commemoration. It could also be a votive offering, but if the brutalized one implies the end of something, not a beginning.

[@suicaedere7244]

"Hey Ben, did you forgot putting the handle in the sword again?" "W-what? Oh, shit!" Angrily trows sword.

[@Nobody-qw1vi]

3:20 For a second there I was amazed that you knew that the sword's owner was walking his dog as he buried the sword... Grammar, man!

[@dirkbonesteel]

It's much more likely a celebration of war won or probably sacrifice to ensure winning a war. I have never in my long life heard a anthropologist even mention possible war protest motive, and I think there is a reason for that

[@qboxer]

Yes, precisely. As mentioned above, it could also be a symbolic gesture as a dual sacrifice commemorating the end of the war. It's really unfortunate in my mind that the curator in this instance has decided to put his anachronistic and highly unlikely explanation as if it was a likely one. His is highly unlikely, and to be honest rather ridiculous.

[@liftthathigher]

Bloggs CHURCH!

[@thomaszaccone3960]

Totally agree. They were sacrficial objects. Further, put a handle on it and no mortal could possibly use such a large item even with an edge on it. It may have been made for some early pagan God and offered as a bog sacrifice to him

[@moreston4366]

Especially when you consider these were the Bell-Beaker people, an Indo-European peoples who were by nature very war-like and were the ancestors of the Celts and the Germanic peoples who were both noted for their constant warfare. Also to note this is Britain, when the Bell-Beaker's came to Britain, the native inhabitants of Britain mostly "Disappeared". And by Disappeared, they were probably killed in Genocide or completely outbred in genocide, the Bell-Beaker's would be the last people I'd think of as protesting war.

[@jessicalee333]

There have definitely been historical pacifists, and pacifist cultures... a lot of them got wiped out, as you might imagine. Given the constant warfare blanketing Europe from the earliest history until 1945 or so (with only a few notable periods of peace, none lasting nearly as long as the current one), it seems unlikely that these skillfully made weapons would have come from people with a distaste for fighting. I don't think we need and conspiracy theories about increasingly vaguely-defined "cultural marxism" to explain that.

[@jamesparlett1419]

That gnome on the bottom of the bookshelf is freakin me out.

[@davidevans3227]

omg! just spotted him!

[@aspektx]

I think the idea of making 3d printer files available to the public is brilliant.

[@iffysignal8784]

as an ex pattern maker, I don't understand why you wouldn't join the 3D printed blade then use that as the pattern for the mould and cast the dirk in one piece of bronze..(as it would have been made originally) that way when you bend/fold it it won't break at the weak point, ie the weld.. in fact, if you took into account the contraction (shrinkage) of the particular ratio of alloys in the bronze, of the original blade (before you 3D printed) you could make a perfect reproduction.. Anyway, it sounds like a great experiment that I would be very interested to know the results of. :-)

[@deadhorse1391]

I have done sand casting of bronze and I agree with you. I think when the original was made they probably made it in a stone mold and Didnt sand cast it. To bend something like this would be very easy, just put it between two branches and bend it. Sometimes I think people might read to much into ancient discoveries ...I once lost a shotgun over the side of my boat while duck hunting....wonder what people will think in 4,000 years if they find my offering to the gods !

[@MoviMakr]

A lot of these swords were hammer treated to be more compressed/stiffer, so bending a battle-ready sword would have been more difficult than using a fork in a tree. The Ancient Celts all over Europe did the same type of thing to iron/steel weaponry as well, which would have been even more difficult. There are clear cultural/ritual implications for some of these artifacts, but I do agree that there is some chance that some of the more intact artifacts could have been accidentally lost by their original owners, left behind by looters who ransacked and burned the owners' homes, etc.

[@losthor1zon]

Deadhorse1 - if you ever read Motel of the Mysteries, you'll have a pretty good idea. lol

[@allangibson8494]

@@deadhorse1391 Probably wonder what the wooden object was. The iron would be long gone in 4000 years (unless it was stainless steel).

[@9087125498172345]

Perhaps placing the sword in the bog represents two clans “burying the hatchet” so to speak?

[@nunyanunya4147]

it was a gift to the gods. a promise kept for a prayer answered.

[@user-wg3gc5uz1g]

This might be a silly couple of questions, but.. I always thought that bent swords had in fact been discovered from later periods (non bronze age as far as I am aware) buried along side its owner. In this sense bending the sword is actually a clever way of retiring the sword and making it more difficult for grave robbers to make use of (assuming they wouldn't just melt down said sword at a smithy :D). Remember owning a sword (much less a giant blunt dirk) was a symbol of status for much of ancient times. They would be cherished and past down (depending on culture obv), and some would even gain names and legends to go along with the infamy of their owners. So in this sense bending it to the point of making it unusable makes sense as a grave offering, retiring the sword with the warrior etc. Could this be it? Or are the bent swords the curator is reffering found in seemingly random locations? Lastly, did they ever revisit the site where the giant bronze dirk was discovered? I would love to have gotten any kind of topographical soil analysis, even a rough sketch of the strata can offer huge contextual clues to the "smaller" and "larger" biome conditions as well as indicate what, if any, use that particular bog may have had. I.e were they using the Pete from that bog for fuel? Any signs of burning or soil-strata disturbance around the actual "hole" (for lack of a better word) could indicate a path, or the "well-traveled-ness" of the site. Which in turn could (with other solid, or colaboriting discoveries) indicate a religious or communal site that could literally have been subjugated to anything (lol). Hope this maybe gives someone an idea, or a fun thought experiment.

[@guardian1326]

I doubt it was a sign of protest. Maybe the end of a war between two clans, and it was a symbol that the sword was no longer needed. An end to the conflict.

[@ONECOUNT]

If 5 tribes swear to come to each others aid and each was given a dirk to commemorate the pact, bending and destroying the dirks woulld represent a breaking of that oath.

[@Dummyplugg]

I can imagine two groups of people that have made peace with each other after a war coming together and sacrificing a dirk as a symbol of their peace.

[@thomasring67]

"A sword without a handle has no handler" an old Bronze Age Irish guy protesting the war

[@Auxius.]

Reminds me of the folded cross of the Stafford-shire hoard where a golden cross was folded in a similar fashion: "Many of the finds at the site had been damaged prior to deposition, and the gold had been twisted or bent, and in some cases broken. It is believed that the cross was folded up so that it could be packed easily into the hoard before burial.".

[@losthor1zon]

The "peace treaty" hypothesis sounds much more likely than a protest, which is pretty much a projection from a modern perspective. But without knowing for sure what these things symbolized, their destruction or burial can't really be interpreted properly. If they represent rulership, for instance, then the act of destroying one or giving it to the bog would represent something quite different. Giving things to a bog seems to have been a common form of ritual, so it could also have been an offering of some sort.

[@Spetulhu]

Aye, they would put other sacrifices in bogs too, even humans! Sacrificing a ceremonial sword blade could be seen in several ways. Giving it to the gods when the war is over in gratitude for having peace is a good theory ("burying the hatchet" as mentioned), but it could perhaps also have been a way to ask for power in war. Give the gods a blade in the hope they bless your weapons?

[@ttaibe]

To say they sacrificed anything is speculation in itself. They might not have viewed it as such at all. But I had the same idea. There will be peace between us, we will remake our weapons into a ceremonial sword and bury it so that our peace will last. Anything we say about them is projection and or speculation at this point.

[@ttaibe]

@Brian W I would say what you are saying might be a good example of projection too.

[@jameswells554]

Given the fact that it was thrust into the big, rather than laid could possibly be symbolic of a taking of the land by a ruler, a symbol of conquest if you will.

[@bepolite6961]

If I was making an offering to the gods, I would make it something of extreme value to me and thus a significant personal statement to the gods, beside gold/silver, what was more valuable at the time than bronze?

[@ozipk]

bloody beaker folk comin over ere

[@richardvanh7147]

They took our jobs!!...lol

[@moreston4366]

@@richardvanh7147 took more than Jobs, they literally committed Genocide against the natives in one way or another it seems, and have ruled this Island ever since. DNA shows us that even nowadays native British people still cluster with the ancient Beaker British people, we're one in the same, and only about 10% (I believe) of the Native DNA remains (although, the natives were closely related to continentals whom the Beakers partially descended from)

[@SarionFetecuse]

@@moreston4366 The pre beaker people looked like middle Eastern folk, the beaker folk were light skinned

[@Sandwich13455]

@@SarionFetecuse yeah they were cheddar men!

[@Bassfully]

BEAKERANIANS TAKING OVA

[@justanotherbrickinthewall2843]

The Vikings bent the swords of the foes they had slain in battle so that their foes couldn't use them in the afterlife. The idea that the Bronze Age was a time of peace is probably wishfull thinking. We humans have hunted and fought for food and survival for most of our existence. Chances are we will have to do so again in the near future.

[@anderander5662]

Even if you proved that to this idiot he wouldn't accept it.... he has an agenda here and it looks like people aren't buying it

[@justanotherbrickinthewall2843]

Achilles lived in the Bronze Age (!)

[@haroldlanceevans]

"The idea that the Bronze Age was a time of peace is probably wishfull thinking." It clearly wasn't but he didn't say that it was. In fact, I don't agree with this protest hypothesis, which was a few seconds of an eight minute video, but there would be no need for protest against war in a peaceful period anyway.

[@justanotherbrickinthewall2843]

This isn't the video I commented on.

[@eliseg1221]

I thought he broke in to prose for a sec there. "This Dirk was found And pulled out of the ground By a man in a bog Out walking his dog And was pooled from the soil After the man stubbed his toe"

[@stepaushi]

That's poetry, not prose.

[@mainemountainman3743]

Poetry, not prose, jusr sayin'

[@rubenskiii]

Within the first minutes he said the Bronze age is the first time people see a metal... Well, i guess the Copper Age isn't existing then...

[@Growmetheus]

Wow, each time I expect to learn a little bit about an artifact I end up learning about so much more.

[@kaderin1001]

So interesting! Can't wait to hear from the next curator!

[@jimmysgameclips]

Photoscanning woo! Love to see technology at work like this

[@jrfras]

My theory on the dirks being bent and thrust into bogs, is the obvious, it is probably a religious gesture.

[@scouttyra]

I've seen theories about this stating that they believed that in order for the sacrifices to be able to get to "the other side" they had to be broken/"dead".

[@khasab6124]

It's not specifically the 'dirks' that are bent. There are many many swords and knives found in rivers and bogs that have been bent. Other objects are also twisted and broken before being deposited; gold and silver cups, torcs etc. They mention them quite often in the Time Team videos and it seems to be generally agreed that they are the sacrifice of beautiful treasured objects to the world of the Gods. The bending is to 'decommission' them, to take them out of the world of men and out of their original function and hand them over to the Gods. Certainly there has never been the slightest suggestion that they are in any way an anti-war protest which I think would be projecting our thoughts and values on people from a very different time...

[@khasab6124]

@Artemis Fowl No they would never have made something that was for them so expensive and beautiful just to lift peat, It isn't even a good design to lift peat. This is Royal ceremonial stuff.

[@khasab6124]

@Artemis Fowl You're *_completely_* wrong. It sounds like you are just inventing nonsense in your head. I cannot be bothered to argue or explain.

[@khasab6124]

@Artemis Fowl no one recorded anything in the bronze age when swords were placed in rivers and pools. We have no records. it is the considered opinion of archaeologists and other experts. You are neither . You can "buy" it or not, but what you really need is a lot more reading and information. Random, uninformed speculation will get you nowhere.

[@hehehepssst]

my first idea about sacrificing the dirk (?) was that it could be to symbolise a victory. .. maybe the winner of a conflict would force the other party to produce and then destroy the dirk. in this case additionally to the symbolism you have the effect of further weakening your opponent because of the resources they would need to create it.

[@RoyalAviator]

I would assume that they could symbolise different tribes or something. They could be something that is passed down generation by generation, but when one tribe fights another and defeats them they destroy it as a symbol of the destruction of the other tribe.

[@johnbradley2343]

It reminds me of the Eastern Native American tradition of "burying the hatchet", in which parties would commemorate making peace by physically burying a weapon of war. This famously happened at the founding of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. Perhaps these European blades were sacrificed in a similar manner, to commemorate warring groups achieving peace.

[@pofict]

My first thought was it being used as a primitive version of a tomb of the unknown soldier, a way to honor those who died in battle with a single gesture. Great to see all the different theories and constructive discussion here.

[@jacobrobison4546]

Good-ness, just because your 3D printer is small, does not mean all of modern humanity struggles to produce a flat triangle

[@TheDevinMT]

Jacob Robison it's more allegorical than that

[@ptonpc]

For a curator he did seem pretty clueless.

[@kashmirha]

Great stuff. I fall in love with bronze swords. They are like some kind of alien tech artifacts.

[@ArtyFartyBart]

I live about a kilometer away from the location where one of these dirks was found. I'm not holding out hope on finding one myself though.

[@-meganeura]

Get a metal detector, and your chances more than triple, I have found things older than bronze age. just don't get eaten by the bog. ;)

[@mclpoison7882]

A protest? Uh, not very likely imo. I would understand a disposal of a failed blank, or design. The sacrifice of something considered extremely valuable. But that bronze was, as I said, extremely valuable in its day. Disposed of in “protest”? Not likely.

[@bozo5632]

It wasn't recycled, so it probably was deliberately "sacrificed" or something.

[@stanhutchins4365]

I’m just glad he didn’t say the sword was ceremonial. Usually means they have no idea

[@pubcollize]

A protest against conflict? This archeologist wouldn't be able to identify Occam's Razor if he stubbed his toe on it.

[@Tvalfager]

I do not think it is a war protest. I think it's the exact opposite. It could be a holy celebratory sacrificial mark of a heroic victory granted by the gods. Probably by a small religiously motivated mercenary band, or migratory tribe.

[@janebaca4095]

what leads ypu to believe this or was it only your fantasy

[@d.e.s4432]

Interesting. I think you're right, it's probably not a protest. I assumed it might have been symbolic of the removal of a king/chieftain. Destroying the dirk that represented his rule would be ceremonially deposing him or getting rid of his authority. Alternatively it could be a burial of a king or war-leader as well.

[@russelltimmerman3771]

I saw stuff like this in China. Ancient bronze daggers and spades that clearly were never used or intended for real use, they were standard units of metal, kind of a transition from trading instruments and weapons to standard sized trading ingots of bronze for melting into other goods. Proto currency.

[@Shiyounin]

Fascinating!

[@christophervanmeier1648]

Two things come to mind: I seem to remember reading/hearing t swords are often found alongside causeways through fens and moors? The second cound the "bending" have been a ritualistic show of strength by a leader/proto leader?

[@Kuhmuhnistische_Partei]

"And try to unite all six dirks for the first time" And lo, the six primordial blades of war and slaughter were finally united and thus the Age of War began; and any peace in the world melted in the raging fire of holy bloodshed.

[@Peterowsky]

Let's 3D print this thing that's usually cast (and therefore quite cheap to make with the same material and a backyard smelter)! Give money!

[@dobypilgrim6160]

War protest? You may well be "projecting" sir! They had gods of war!

[@anderander5662]

Sir.?

[@andrewrobertson444]

I'd suggest the bending of the sword is neither a protest nor a peace gesture but likely an act of sacrilege or perhaps to prevent unworthies taking it after the owner's death.

[@peterkratoska4524]

Well, there is the term "bury the hatchet" signifying peace.

[@rexmundi3108]

A bent sword being deposited in a bog suggests to me not a protest but a ritual either commemorating a new peace or asking the spirits for it.

[@hans-christianbauer5947]

War protests? I'm pretty sure that ancient people were far too busy to be peace activists. Your military strenght was essential to your own survival and a deterrent towars your enemies. It was common to use weapons as sacrificial items to the gods, and they were bent so no enemy could pick them up and use them against you.

[@bombfog1]

And this Curator cannot bring himself to say Craftsman, rather he calls the creators of these dirks Craftspersons. This fellow doesn’t seem to be very rigorous in his scholarship, as is so often the case with SJW academics.

[@hans-christianbauer5947]

@@bombfog1 Indeed, I'm getting the same vibe from him. Ideologues don't make good historians...or good anything, really.

[@renepickardt1457]

Could it have been unfinished? Maybe the rivets weren´t made before it was placed in the bog.

[@kristi.s9922]

A metal sword in bronze age is like a Lamborghini nowadays. You don't drive it into the wall unless you wanna make a huge point.

[@NickDingle-ku6zq]

We need more Sue Brunning!!

[@danielwengert1790]

Maybe the sword thrust into the bog isn’t a protest but a tribute.. the Bronze Age equivalent to pouring the first sip of your beer on the ground for your dead fallen homey? 🍻

[@kjem7670]

I love this show

[@tombombadil8142]

The original looks so beautifully futuristic :D

[@theprimitiveblackhatsociet8274]

Pulled it up out of the ground, is he now the rightful king of England? 😜

[@denwiessimo6088]

The potential as an energy weapon was lifted by bending it.

[@lordspamify]

Bending your sword and throwing it in a bog? Sounds like a surrender or peace gesture

[@rileymiller5122]

I would like to point out that they had copper before bronze. Copper is the majority of the chemical make up of bronze. So to say they didn't have metal before is completely false and should be made clear.

[@trumpocalypsenow4654]

Copper is actually much harder to work than bronze, and can be quite dangerous for the craftsman (copper production generates toxic gasses). Copper tool culture was not as widespread as bronze became. Some areas/populations likely transitioned directly from stone to bronze.

[@jameswells554]

@@trumpocalypsenow4654 there was a copper age in Britain for a short period prior to the arrival of the beaker people, but other than that yeah; undoubtedly some areas transitioned directly through outside introduction.

[@davidevans3227]

..amazing.. More! 🙂

[@lakrids-pibe]

3000 year old authentic display sword for the wall mount. Perfect for the game room.

[@jimslicer807]

I've got a 6000 year old flint axe on the wall in my man cave. Sets the room off nicely.

[@bruced.1472]

Could the dirk be a "library template", instead of something "ceremonial"?

[@nv3534]

This is the first thing I thought as well!

[@pRahvi0]

Makes me wonder if there was something particular lying in the ground that the object was thrust through. Like pinning something (maybe symbolically) down or mashing it into something (or somebody) like a stake into a vampire.

[@davidbunderla5492]

It's most likely to be a master as in the same way you have a perfect master to make silicone molds for resin casting that way you will have identical copies every time

[@subjectline]

It seems reasonable to use a thing like this in a peace treaty.

[@patrickkeller2193]

my first idea as well, like the american natives burrying a tomahawk

[@sargondp69]

makes much more sense than a protest (modern imposition). Perhaps buried on the border dividing two people. They may have been funerary or ornamental and simply lost.

[@dooterscoots2901]

Yea also as a metaphor for the treaty as in the conflict is buried" you know ? maybe just me.

[@mrward6510]

Yeah makes abit more sense than a protest.

[@ttaibe]

My thoughts as well. We fought, it is over now. same could possibly be said for those broken/bent swords, although in a different way. This weapon was used for fighting, the fight is over, burry it so we will have peace ( or the spirits, or whatever).

[@Beccaboo530]

I may be ignorant to the museum world, but it just seems like the British museum is the gold standard when it comes to the multitude of mediums they use to share knowledge with the public.

[@lawrencecole6527]

Might have been the base of an ancient signpost or a land marker probably for a bus stop.

[@830toAwesome]

Not being able to 3D print something as old as a bronze dirk isn't testament to how hard it is to make something of that size. Not that it's easy. It's a testament to how 3D printing has a long way to go to print large things. We could make a mold of the dirk and be churning out replicas if we wanted to do it in metal without any single problem.

[@asmartremark]

830toAwesome I thought the same thing

[@DeoTheophilus]

More than that, it speaks to the sizes of most things we need today, building a larger 3d printer is a relatively small cost, most of the cost of 3d printing is the extruder and motors, the size is determined by how much space you want the device to take up in your shop balanced with the size of objects you plan on printing, there is no upper limit on printer size other than the maximum span a metal rod can travel without much bend, and so the comment about difficulty is more one of the knowledge of the specific person doing the printing and the amount of money they have to spend on the project rather than challenge.

[@Chris-jo1zr]

Yeah, that and you can print something that scale, it's just not easy to get a printer with that much Z height travel.

[@semperludens9241]

Planting something that looks like a giant bronze age cinquedea reminds me more of conquest. Like somebody who plants a flag into newly discovered or conquered territory.

[@Vision-gn2jl]

it was probably used as an sample...to show off the craftsmanship for possible buyers.

[@The1Helleri]

Do you have functional swords in your collection? If so how does this compare in regards to size and weight?

[@chumleyk]

This guy looks like a blast.

[@unicoiroots3266]

The copper and tin that made it came from the earth so the plunging of the Dirk into the bog could be in thanks or reverence? Giving back of sorts

[@stationshelter]

great!

[@jimslicer807]

Best video purely from the comments below. This curator has really angered a lot of people. Wonderful.

[@JazzyBlues79]

Perhaps the dirks were burried as a ceremony/sacrifice to apease the gods during times of famine and or crop failure? The dirk would have been a valued object so thrusting it in to the ground may have been thought to help bring a better harvest.

[@anderssorenson9998]

I always wondered how bronze age swords were made were the edges treated hammer hardened? Or could you even tell without harming it. Can ultrasound be used to look inside the sword to tell something we couldn't ever tell just by looking at it

[@bepolite6961]

I found several bronze age metal detecting. The edges were at least 1/3" wide and even after 3000 years all that was needed to make them razor sharp would, would have been to rub them with a stone. They all had dinks in them, not dents, the edges were actually split back, with V shape indents in the edge and was obviously caused by edge on edge contact. I could not believe just how uniform the edges were and sharp they were.

[@adam-k]

You find a half finished sword and the only thing you can think of that it is a symbol. It is a half finished sword.

[@ollimoore]

I know this comment is old but I can’t help myself sometimes. If it was blunt, unused and had never been hilted, but is of a design which is usually found sharp/used/hilted then sure “half finished sword” is the obvious explanation. However, if the type of sword has only ever been found in a blunt, unused, never hilted state, and furthermore is of a very large size for the proportions and just happens to look like a grossly and impractically enlarged version of things which *were* evidently in actual use.....THEN there just might be a symbolic or ceremonial explanation.

[@refusist]

very interesting

[@antagonizerr]

When going from a stone age people to a bronze age one, it's likely that it was hafted like a bi-face point rather than having an integrated handle. The resin, wood and bindings would have long rotted leaving only the blade. Likely as a ceremonial lance or pike.

[@Dirtbag-Hyena]

CraftPERSON?? My phone even knows its wrong.

[@chrishewitt4220]

Perhaps the offering of a bronze sword was symbolic, tying up a peace treaty between opposing sides as a way of signifying an end to hostilities?

[@JCOwens-zq6fd]

I've used a reproduction bronze sword & while they are tougher than most tend to expect. They are however not all that hard to bend.

[@halfabee]

It has been spoken that so many derks, Knives and sword have been found in water/bogs it was a sacrifice to their gods.

[@sanguma]

Hi Neil, if these unsharpened dirks all came from the same workshop don't you think they could have just been templates for other manufacturers of the "real" swords? Then in an act of industrial sabotage or to hide it from enemies they could have been trown into a bog.

[@Go-Dawgs]

Michi Wegmann 🌟Exactly what I thought; I should have read comments 1st before making mine.

[@TheFireAngel13]

Then why not reuse the metal and melt it down again? Tossing it seems wasteful, especially if it was as big a deal as they claim in this video.

[@chuckymcnubbin1518]

Hello Neil, is it possible that the dirk that was found in the bog was made for the purpose of proving one's skills in metalworking? Today's equivalent would be an apprentice completing his or her final exam before being fully certified. Or perhaps the handleless bronze swords were demonstration pieces made by swordsmiths to show their metal working skills to kings or leaders for the purpose of long term employment?

[@mortallious1234]

I've left some marvelous things in bogs.

[@peterleffler2062]

Wouldn't a metallurgist be able to tell you if the bending was done hot or cold? My money is on cold.

[@oldcountryman2795]

It’s absolutely trivial to find a parallel for a completely new material, plastic. Plastic simply did not exist when my parents were born and now it’s EVERYWHERE. The introduction of plastic makes the Bronze Age pale in comparison.

[@teeheeteeheeish]

The act of bending one’s sword was a funeral ritual for deceased warriors. It symbolizes that they perished in combat and was typically a high honor.

[@shaunmark1]

The beaker folk were pushing dirks into the bog...yeah, that's certainly a symbol, totally explains it.

[@kingsransomsilver3712]

I can tell you whether it was heated or not when it was bent with a simple hardness tester.

[@fabianmastrapa1112]

Fascinating. First thing that comes to mind for me is it may have been a gesture for fallen veteran soldiers. What reinforces it in my mind is that it's meant to be blunt and handle-less; which to me symbolizes a weapon out of commission with honor. Just my two cents.

[@_Thoughtful_Aquarius_]

fabian mastrapa, I immediately thought of them as being a "tombstone". I was disappointed to see that there wasn't any symbols displayed on it.

[@LL-gf6dr]

this is the sort of person i would date... absolutely.

[@LeonidasSthlm]

Wow! That dirk is amazing! Almost 2500 years old and it looks like it is from the lord of the rings.

[@GazalAlShaqab]

I am a little late here (the video was published 7 years ago), but I highly appreciate nevertheless! (this is a part of YT "magic": it stays!!) BIG thanks to Neil & the Team! PS. What is this Neil's lovely accent? So beautiful!

[@BigTimeZergRush]

As far as bending it, they could of just stuck it between 2 trees that are close to each other and then used the leverage to bend it easily. imagine hearing that the war was over and the smiths would then need to more or less stop production of the swords and then they needed to melt some down to make other bronze objects so they would bend the swords to make it more compact so they can fit it in the furnace. Just a thought.

[@sophiejones7727]

and then buried it? it's a deliberate sacrifice. You could be right about the bending method though.

[@rexmundi3108]

2:45 Couldn't something like this be an unfinished weapon?

[@ronaldgoss6855]

Interesting to see the dirks carved on stone megaliths

[@aidankidd6947]

Why didn't you glue the 3d printed sword together then make the casting for the bronze sword ??

[@krassos]

Fantasy sword wall hangings from the bronze age.

[@JEARP]

Symbol of judgement.

[@shelbybrown8312]

Thats awesome