[Low-Tech] Smallsword with the Bronze Age 'Rapier?'

[DanHoward]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Speaking of organic material tending not to survive in most found examples, here's a fairly cinematic idea for consideration: Imagine that some (very few) bronze knives and rapiers had wooden or hardened-leather handguards, possibly cup/bowl shaped. We have no evidence of this, of course, and realistically they could have put wear on the blades that would still be detectable, but in even a borderline-cinematic setting, it seems plausible and interesting. My current thought is that if present at all they'd add somewhere between six ounces and one pound of weight, and have fairly low DR, possibly only DR1, but I haven't taken a look at Low-Tech to work out how close my guess is.

We have thousands of illustrations of weapons from that time. Find one that looks like one of these handguards.