Londesborough Sale (1888), when £315 was paid for it, though for some unknown reason in the catalogues of both collections it is called "an executioner's sword." The steel grip is indented for the grasp of the fingers; while the knuckle-guard, single quillon, and pas-d'âne may roughly be said to resemble a snake or monster. The whole hilt is engraved with guilloche patterns and gilt. The blade is back-edged and scimitar-shaped, splendidly etched and gilt for part of its distance with arrangements of scroll-work, introducing the following inscription in Lombardic characters: IHS. AVTEM TRANSIENS PER MEDIUM ILLORUM IBAT. It bears three fleurs-de-lis as an armourer's mark, and is probably North Italian of the last quarter of the XVth century (Fig. 646).
The last and rather late curved sword with falchion blade we illustrate (Fig. 646A) is of Milanese workmanship of the first third of the XVIth century. The pommel and grip are in one piece and the ends of the quillons are fashioned with gargoyle heads. The shell of the guard is chased and pierced, the entire hilt being richly damascened. The blade is decorated with intersected recessments. This piece was formerly in the collection of the Count of Valencia and is now in that of Mr. S. J. Whawell.
With the advent of the second half of the XVth century comes the earliest influence of the classical Renaissance, which makes itself apparent at first rather in weapons than in armour. The beautiful simplicity of the Gothic form has hardly as yet been affected; but evidence is already forthcoming, particularly in Italy, of the growing appreciation of classical ornament as applied to weapons. Classical decorations, and even the actual shapes are being borrowed from Greek and Roman originals. Germany and northern Europe generally resisted the introduction of this new fashion effectively for another half-century; but by then, with perhaps the exception of the German, all styles were thoroughly permeated by its influence.
The great artist-sculptors of Italy turned their attention to the designing of sword hilts, among whom we may cite Andrea del Verrocchio, Donatello, Polidoro Caldara, and, in the next generation, Leonardo da Vinci; while in other countries such masters as Hans Holbein, Pierre Woeiriot, and in the next generation Antoine de Jacquart, are all to be found responding to the demand for enriched weapons.
Although we leap over a few years by so doing, we will turn to the hilt of a cruciform-hilted sword, now adapted to classical decoration, as the first example of the utter banishment of all previous principles of decoration.
