[423] Vulgo Kattywár; described in 1842 by Captain (the late Sir G. Le Grand) Jacob in his Report on Guzerat (Gujarát).
[424] The sticks correspond with the strings on the bellows of the Egyptian monuments.
[425] Iron, Jan. 8, 1876.
[426] I observe that M. Terrien de la Couperie has lately derived the oldest civilisation of China from Chaldæo-Babylonia of the Akkadian Ages, b.c. 2400–2300.
[427] Major Jähns (p. 416) would derive Schwert (= das Sausende, Schwirrende, i.e. whizzing) from the Sansk. svar, noise; and considers it originally a missile pure and simple. He quotes Isidore, who explains rhomphæa by wafan; Schwert and framea = asta vel gladius; ensis = hevas, hevassa; mucro = swert, gladius = wafan; culter = wafansahs, sahse. In the hebraising days Sword was derived from Sharat, to scratch, and Sabre from Shabar, to shiver.
[428] Of the Flamberge and the ‘flamboyant,’ or wavy blade, more hereafter.
[429] Muratori (Antiq. ii. 487) notes, ‘Spatam sive spontonem, and sponto, spunto, i.e. pugio’ (Adelung). Of spatha more to come.
[430] Or ‘die Schneide,’ the older forms being ekke, egge; while ‘valz’ was the middle section of the two-handed Sword.
[431] ‘Chape,’ derived from capa, and a congener of ‘cap’ and ‘cape,’ is differently used by authors. Some apply it to the mouthpiece or ring at the top of the sheath; others to the metal crampet, bouterolle, or ferule at the scabbard-tip, and others to the guard-plate. In Durfey (The Marriage-Hater Matched) we find ‘the hilt, the knot, the scabbard, the chape, the belt, and the buckles’ (of a Sword). Skinner explains it as vaginæ mucro ferreus. Mr. Fairholt defines chape to be the guard-plate or cross-bar at the junction of grip and hilt. Shakespeare, who knew the Sword, speaks of the ‘chape of his dagger’ (All’s Well &c. iv. 3) and ‘an old rusty Sword with a broken hilt and chapelesse’ (Taming of the Shrew, iii. 2). Commentators mostly explain this by ‘without a catch to hold it.’ Dr. Evans (Bronze, &c. chap. viii.) has exhaustively described the bronze chapes (bouterolles) in the British Islands.
[432] A congener of our ‘quill,’ from the Lat. caulis, a stalk. Littré is not satisfactory: ‘Quillon (ki-llon, ll mouillées), s.m. Partie de la monture du sabre ou de l’épée, située du côté opposé aux branches, et dont l’extrémité est arrondie. Dérivé de quille’ (cone) ‘par assimilation de forme’ (in fact, incrementative of) ‘quille. Etym. Génev. quille; de l’anc. haut-allem. Kegil; allem. Kegel, objet allongé en forme conique, quille.’ Burn translates quillon ‘cross-bar of the hilt of an infantry or light-cavalry Sword.’