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These sword captured my interest the second I first saw them. And I have been grinding my head trying to figure out how the were actually made. And I just saw something that all of them have in common that changed the little understanding I had of them. So what do all of them have in common except the diamond pattern? The pattern elongates towards the tip. Which to me would mean that the blades were forged more after the pattern had been put on. Because I first thought these were made by first forging the blades to near completion, and then adding the pattern by chiselling in the pattern and then adding the extra steel kinda like how the text on the Ulfberht swords were put in. Or am I way off anyone else that have a clue or might even have tried making one? Oh and it seems to be the same on many of the other Illerup swords with different patterns Edit: I just remembered I had these pictures to I think they should support my theory that the blades were forged more after the pattern were added. Because everything looks a bit wavy I don’t think it would look like that if the pattern was added as one of the last forging elements.

Ok even if you dont know german, these books are FANTASTIC. The complete archaeological journals from the Illerup Adal bog dig in Denmark are in 13 volumes (with volume 8 being all the maps) They're published by the Jutland Archaeological Society and I have no idea how many copies they printed of each, but I can not imagine it was a large number, being a rather specialty set of books. They're not cheap, nor are they easy to find, and they're in german, but I HIGHLY recommend getting these books if you can. A full set is going to run you around six or seven hundered dollars and take up a large amount of your book shelf... but if you EVER plan on attempting to create historically accurate or styled weapons of almost any sort, or hardware, or anything... these books are worth their (quite considerable) weight in gold ! Books 1 & 2 - The lances and spears Books 3 & 4 - The personal equipment (combs, etc) Books 5-7 - The magnificent equipment (scabbard hardware, ornamented hilts, and shield bosses, spurs, etc) Book 8 - the maps Books 9 & 10 - The shields Books 11 & 12 - The swords Book 13 - The bows, arrows, and axes

I think i posted this in the wrong forum originally, so I am reposting here Ok even if you dont know german, these books are FANTASTIC. Thec omplete archaeological journals from the Illerup Adal bog dig in Denmark are in 13 volumes (with volume 8 being all the maps) They're published by the Jutland Archaeological Society and I have no idea how many copies they printed of each, but I can not imagine it was a large number, being a rather specialty set of books. They're not cheap, nor are they easy to find, and they're in german, but I HIGHLY recommend getting these books if you can. A full set is going to run you around six or seven hundered dollars and take up a large amount of your book shelf... but if you EVER plan on attempting to create historically accurate or styled weapons of almost any sort, or hardware, or anything... these books are worth their (quite considerable) weight in gold ! Books 1 & 2 - The lances and spears Books 3 & 4 - The personal equipment (combs, etc) Books 5-7 - The magnificent equipment (scabbard hardware, ornamented hilts, and shield bosses, spurs, etc) Book 8 - the maps Books 9 & 10 - The shields Books 11 & 12 - The swords Book 13 - The bows, arrows, and axes