sword does it exist

[Rokto Obotar]

So I was cutting this tri tip yesterday when my knife wasnt working. So I pull this long slender knife from the droor I never saw before and I put it to the meet and it cut straight through instantly. I looked at it and it bends and wiggles kind of. if you hold the blade and the handle you can actualy bend it to a cetain degree. Does this exist in any type of sword? If it does exist what is it used for? Thanks guys.

[ling hou]

Yes, blades like the one you mentioned exists. But there are some problems with what you talk about in sword production. The blade would be destroyed very quickly in real combat. Cutting trough a piece of meat or bread or some other relatively soft materiel with a very flexible blade will do wonders (think of a sheet metal cut…very sharp) but if you hit something hard it will do little more than bounce off it, also would potentially damage the blade. How you use the knife is different too, you saw through with a knife where a sword is used to slice, cut, stab or chop but very rarely used to saw through someone, that is why most of the knifes have serrated edges. Also you have to look at the length of a knife and the length of a sword. The length of a knife can keep its shape but a sword would retain bends and kinks and would be very quickly infective in real combat.
The traditional jians in China were flexible based on the how they were folded. The more modern weapons (modern wushu) uses a very flexible metal to simulate that flexibility in the real blades. In the hands of a master, a real Chinese jian will dance as if it was really flimsy, but on inspection it is rigid.

[Rokto Obotar]

So the sword I am thinking of is call a Jians or any kind of wushu weapon that is flexible? Im thinking about this specificly for practice/show/training I wouldnt think to duel with this or spar with this weapon ever unless I eventualy got into it and had the money to buy this kind of expensive sword. so again the name is a JIAN sword anyone else know of other types?

[ling hou]

the Chinese word for straight sword is "jian". The weapon you are talking about is a modern adaptation of a traditional sword. There is also that springy non traditional weapons in a "dao" (broad sword) "Da Dao" (gwan dao, general gwan's weapon) and others. Most forms you can use either...the diffrence is the weight and balance of the weapon. I got to hold a $15,000 dollar antique sword when i was in Long Quan...it was 3.5 Kg. which is about 7.7 lbs...it felt like it like it was only one pound in my hand.....if i only had an extra 15k then the problem of getting it out of the country

[sean_stonehart]

Waitasec... you say you study Praying Mantis & Eagle Claw & have never seen a Gim (Jian) or Dao????

[Rokto Obotar]

I just started those kung fu styles, I see all the weapons on the wall but I dont start learning about them for awhile. Also like I said I have a fracture I havent seen the inside of a dojo in awhile.

[Rokto Obotar]

I just talked to my cousins budy who owns a sword shop and he says he has 2 traditional daos and a jian and they dont actualy bend. Does the sword "look" like it is bending when it is used? If so I was wondering if there is a sword that actualy BENDS and Menuvers.

[ling hou]

a traditional dao should not flex...but a traditional jian should have some flex in them. bending and having flex are very diffrent. When you see someone really good at using the jian it will be flexing a lot. kinda like when you see someone use a wax wood staff, there is that wobble (if wobble is a word).

[sean_stonehart]

I like wobble... I tend to wobble at times... wobbling is good... Weebles wobble y'know ... Hamburgler wobble wobble wobbles...

[Yang Wei Xin]

The movie Hero by Jet Li has some good examples of older styles of Jian that had flexibility, and even a few instances where it was used in battle. Not sure how historically accurate it would be, after all, ive never see anyone fly, but hey, its a good movie.

[sean_stonehart]

Swords from the period that "Hero" was supposed to have taken place (pre-Qin Dynasty or right at establishment time of it) would've had a high brass/bronze content.

I'll defer to Kurt on that stuff, but I doubt any flex or movement in the blades at all.

[poetic misjustice]

when you say "bend and wiggle" do you mean the shape or physical properties of the blade?

[Yang Wei Xin]

the physical properties, like wushu or spring steel.

[Rokto Obotar]

So I found the blade I was looking for its a TAI CHI sword I believe and my cousins buddy owns a knife/sword shop and he is coming down this weekend I will be looking at his selection I think he has 7 of them and 3 daos. What can I look for in the sword to know its a good blade? Also how do i know if it was made by him or a real smith(fake or real sword).

[ling hou]

Sean you are correct about the swords of that time, late Zhou, start of the Qin Dynasty were using bronze...but there was still iron and steel. Documented is the first steel sword form the 3rd century B.C. Steel manufacturing was not very common at this time. And the swords made of iron would be extremly heavy and relatively short(think of a cast iron skillet). Bronze is expensive and that is why it was repalced with more durable iron and steel...folding was not really seen before the Sui or early Tang dynasties...and these folding techniques migrated to Japan.

There would, more than likely be very little flexing in these blades at this time. The iron swords were cast not forged, the Chinese skipped that stage in metallurgy and iron was a lot cheaper to produce than bronze. I dont have any real information on the steel sword from this time period....but when looking at style and form of both iron and bronze weapons from that time period (similarities) it would suggest that they were the same. Therefore the steel blades would likely also be very thick. I wish I had all my books with me.... Josh you are killing me, making me remember

[Yang Wei Xin]

500 bc the 10th year of duke ding of lu: spring and autumn period

In the spring and autumn period bronze weapons were further developed. troops were mainly equipped with bronze weapons such as ge, ji, JIAN, and arrowheads. In the beginning of the 5th century bc the people of chu invented the technique of carburizing steel. the relics discovered in yangjiashan changsha include steel swords(38.4 cm long) from the late spring and autumn period. this technique of carburizing steel provided the material foundation for making longer swords which were widel adopted in later warfare.

kang gewu
spring and autumn
pg.25

[Yang Wei Xin]

311 bc the 4th year of king nan of zhou warring states period
the relics unearthed demonstrate that in this period weapons made of iron were more common than bronze weapons. carburized steel swords have also been found. both the chu and han kingdoms were famous for their sharp iron swords.

pg. 26
same book.

[Yang Wei Xin]

there is a lot more info in this book on this subject, but i suggest you buy it yourself if you dont' have it. wing lam.com is where i got mine.

Kang Gewu
The Spring and Autumn of CHinese Martial Arts: 5000 Years

its short, with easily quotable passages for talks like this.

[MASTERforge]

Decent jian are near impossible to find.

I suggest you take a look at my site http://www.masterforge.co.uk there is video of jian flexibility. They can bend to about 30 degrees and flex back perfectly straight. They are made by the famous master Zhou, Zheng Wu of LongQuan

Leigh

[Eye4NEye]

I know this is an old thread and this is a little off topic, but I went to a Celtic Festival a few years back and there was a guy there that had a sword blade recovered from a battlefield in Scotland (it was just the blade, no handle or anything else) It was a thin blade from roughly the 13th century and had AMAZING flexibility. He could almost bend it tip to tip.