(urth) Fuligin invented

gwern0 at gmail.com gwern0 at gmail.com
Thu Jan 17 12:13:33 PST 2008


On 2008.01.17 18:01:57 +0000, Matthew Keeley <matthew.keeley.1 at gmail.com> scribbled 1.0K characters:
> On Jan 17, 2008 4:58 PM,  <brunians at brunians.org> wrote:
> > That sucker in the wiki article was as long as TE. Couldn't tell if it had
> > a mercury channel, but that kind of thing would be obvious. I have heard
> > of swords with sliding weights also.
> >
> > So Severian wasn't joking when he said the horizontal stroke was harder
> > than the vertical one....
>
> According to the Wikipedia article, "The Sword of Justice at the
> Higgins Armory Museum is a fine example of such ceremonial weapons
> used to designate status and authority." If that's the sword in the
> picture, that's really neat, as the Higgins is only about fifteen
> minutes' walk from my house. I'll check it out next time I'm at home
> (i.e. in six months) and ask about weights and mercury in blades of
> that type. If anyone would know about that sort of thing, it's the
> folks at the Higgins. I'll see if I can get some relevant pictures as
> well.
>
> I recall that Wolfe mentioned basing TE off real swords, so I wouldn't
> be surprised if the Higgins had something similar.
>
> So... report forthcoming I guess.
>
> -Matt

Actually, if you do go, I would love for you to get some more pictures and especially note down any information appertaining to swords of justice - I wrote the Wikipedia article, but I didn't take the picture of the sword, and I've always been slightly worried that it wasn't what it seemed to be. (Also, my sources on the topic were thinner than I'd've liked.)

--
gwern
Macintosh Fortezza Ortega GAFE Internet Fox WQC wire SLI Gist
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