In the leadup to the adaptation of Stephen R. Lawhead’s series, The Pendragon Cycle, the Dailywire has been doing quite a bit to promote it through giving viewers a behind-the-scenes look into the filming of the show, kind of like the Appendices to Lord of the Rings, but somewhat less cool. However, in one of the most recent behind-the-scenes looks at the show) we get to see them making King Avallach’s sword, the same sword that would be passed on to Merlin and later to Arthur. As Jeremy Boring admits, this is one of the most important set pieces in the entire show, but unfortunately, the most fantastical element of this sword isn’t its backstory, its hilt, its wielders, or anything even close to that. Instead, the most fantastical element to it is the idea that it would ever stand up to an actual battle.
Now, I am not a bladesmith. I just enjoy playing with sharp, pointy objects, have a good friend who also likes weapons, and have a father who is a medieval weaponry nerd and will sometimes watch Forged in Fire for several hours while cooking dinner. With that said, I have four problems with the Avallach sword: casting, construction, how it looks, and historical accuracy, with the last two being things I may be a bit more qualified to speak on, but I digress.
First of all, while the method of casting the sword might make it easier to put in the cool designs we see in the video as well as make it cheaper to produce, that doesn’t mean that it’s a good method for creating a sword. Well-made swords are made by hand, using a process of heating the metal until it’s pliable, hammering it out into a good shape, cooling it, fixing any warps, and giving it an edge and fixing any imperfections with a grinder. You then will need to construct a guard and a handle for it. The process of forging a sword will give it a good grain structure, increasing its strength, will give it a more defined shape, and makes it denser and tougher for more durability. Though modern technology has made vast improvements to how swords and other blades are produced, the process has stayed mostly the same, making it possible to create historically accurate, durable swords.
Meanwhile, casting a sword involves making a mold of the desired shape, melting the metal down into a liquid, pouring it into the mold, letting it set, and breaking it out. Not only is this process incredibly historically inaccurate, but it also makes the sword very brittle due to the now very random grain structure. Casting also usually involves the use of a lower quality steel, which also affects how it will hold up. This means that if you hit it too hard on something, either it will completely snap or it will bend irreparably.
“But wait,” you might be saying. “Won’t forged swords also break or bend?”
The answer to this is yes, but while that might happen, it takes a lot more force to make it happen. Additionally, one way you can tell if a sword is well-made is by bending it a little and seeing if it will spring back into shape. If it doesn’t it’s a wall hanger that was made by casting and can’t be used.
(Bending a sword to see if it’s well-made is also a fun way to annoy bladesmiths at Ren Faires, but you didn’t hear that from me.)
Secondly, the construction of the Avallach sword burns my eyes. For one thing, the blade itself is incredibly thick (another problem that comes with casting), which would make it very difficult to wield and I imagine the process of putting a good edge on it was hell due to its bulkiness. The other thing is the tang, the part of the sword that you put the guard, handle, and pommel over. It’s unbelievably short and the only thing holding the hand guard in place is the riveted tang that screws into the handle. The pommel isn’t even its own separate piece, it’s just part of the handle (I’ll talk about the inaccuracies in the handle and pommel later). There seems to be nothing – not even a bit of epoxy – to hold everything together. That means that the handle with inevitably come loose in the wielder’s hand and once that comes off, it will be unusable. Heck, even if the handle is a little bit loose, it’s still a massive safety hazard because it could go flying.
If this sword was on Forged in Fire, it would immediately be disqualified for that reason.
Thirdly, there’s the general look of the sword and though there are some interesting elements to it, it just wouldn’t be very practical at all. While the handle is so big that it would maybe help counteract some of the weight of the blade to make it wieldier, it still looks like a very heavy, hard to manage weapon. On top of that, while the designs on the blade itself are cool, if you look closely at them, they go very deep into the metal, which is another possible reason as to why the sword needed to be so thick. While I think that this could serve a somewhat of a fuller (which is a groove used to make a sword lighter), it just doesn’t look right and from a usability standpoint, it seems like it would actually compromise your sword even more than it already is. If things like water, blood, dirt, etc. get in those grooves, they will be very hard to get out, leading to your sword rusting.
The sword handle – ignoring all it’s obvious construction issues – looks painful to hold onto. If the creators of the sword had gotten rid of the snake coils around the handle, it would’ve been fine, but as it is, it looks like something that would be digging into your hands constantly as it was swung. And that pommel is useless as well. Pommels on swords weren’t meant to be merely decorative; they served the practical function of keeping the sword from slipping out of your hand. The pommel on the Avallach sword is so small that it would do nothing to keep the sword from flying out of your hand.
Lastly, from a historical standpoint, the Avallach sword is still crap. It resembles nothing from real life, partially because of how it was made and constructed, and partially because Jeremy Boring had the workshop responsible for the props go nuts with it. While I get that they were trying to make it resemble something from a fantasy culture, it’s okay to make a fantasy-esque sword look like it would be useful in real life. If we go and look at Anduril/Narsil from Lord of the Rings, it doesn’t just look like something you would see in Middle-Earth, but it also looks like something you would find in real life because it was based off of real-life swords. If Jeremy Boring had wanted to make a sword that didn’t look like it just came out of a video game like Genshin Impact, he should’ve perhaps hired some historians or actual bladesmiths who know what the hell they’re doing to tell him what looked good while meeting the book’s standard instead of just going off of what the book said. While I can give him props for trying to be book accurate, when you’re working with camera’s, sometimes what is described in the book that sounds good won’t translate well into real life. If I were in charge of making these swords, I would’ve drawn as much inspiration from Saxon swords (many of which are quite beautiful) or other swords found around the Mediterranean region since the Avallach sword originally came from Atlantis.
Ultimately, the Avallach sword looks like it should have “Made in China” stamped on the hilt somewhere.
Until next time,
M.J.
The Tanuki Corner 
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