My first impression of the Albion Berserkr (single edged Viking sword) 

She gifted you a albion sword? Wow. If that isn't love, i don't know what is.

I can't believe no one has said this yet, Cara is AWESOME! Skall you are one lucky dog sir!

And the pommel big enough to end a t-rex rightly!

Obligatory pommel comments aside, it seems to me that pommel was designed so that you could bash pretty effectively with it at close range.

My love for swords Is like a truck BERSERKR

Here in Latvia single edged swords during the viking era were very common (not so sure if these originated in our region), so common that only Norway challanges us on the number of those swords found in our country, but as a guy lecturing public in the subject during annual town festival explained, that largely was because of poor quality of local "swamp iron", so the good quality steel was saved for the cutting edge.

Actually, vikings did write stuff down. The problem is that they wrote on materials that didn't last well. I recall a documentary where they mentioned a rare find of viking age letters written on rolls of tree bark. It included surprisingly mundane stuff like love letters and invoices for unpayed debts.

It wants to do things on its own?! That's horrifying! It wants souls!

Just a completely random question Skall, does the pommel unscrew?

Is it possible to use this for my bicycle cavalry matches?

You are the man. I was raising a small collection of swords for a time but the hobby slowly faded. Now after finding this channel and seeing all these blades and your dialogues my passion for steel has been reignited. I look forward to your future content and to restarting my collection :D

Got to move around with this one today, it's AMAZING !

If only my girlfriend also understood my sword enthusiasm. She just thinks I'm being juvenile.

holy shit, that design, IT LOOKS FUCKING AWESOME, SO SIMPLE, BUT SO GREAT

Really appreciate your reviews and philosophical ramblings Skallagrim. For some reason makes the day better. Can't wait to move in January, I've always been very, very interested in archaic weapons of all types, and I'll finally be going to an area with plenty of HEMA clubs (Southern California). Thanks to you, and the magic of RU-vid, I know that I'm not the only nerd who enjoys medieval martial arts.

Great video and i can't wait to see the review video. I very much love to see reviews on Albion's and congrats on getting another beautiful sword to the collection.

35 seconds in and im already in love with that sword

Have an Albion Jarl coming to me in a few months. Let me know if you would be interested in doing a review of it. -JR

Congratulations Skall! I have been eye-balling that one for years.

Hey Skal, the method where you transfer from the hammer grip to the handshake grip was called slipping it was considered common practice for Norsemen to use this, it gives the user an advantage where you gain a little larger reach. It was more common to allow the pommel to extend past your ring finger so you only had your thumb, pointer and middle finger holding onto the grip.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T HAVE ENOUGH ROOM TO SWING YOUR SWORD? I THOUGHT YOU WERE IN A FOREST

I'm still recovering from you bending the Caithness.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this Albion! We've wondered about it a bit and your video, well, just makes us want to buy one!!!

i started watch your videos with subs but now i realize i dont need it, you significly improved my english. thank you!

I love that pommel

*BERSERKRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!* --Lindybeige

i hope you get the entire albion collection, these reviews are awesome

This is the first sword of yours I've coveted. Really cool. My personal favorite sword types are the Gladius and the sabre. This is like the spawn of both.

I like the third option, that they may have alternated hand positions. Let's not forget how sophisticated fighters in medieval Europe were. The Viking's success against them in raids would indicate that they had no less sophistication themselves.

too bad that with that type of swords ,vikings cannot end their enemies rightly

I cannot wait for a test video on this one! Such a beautiful blade. Way to go wife!

congratulations on the awesome find, the sword looks nice as well.

She's a keeper

Is it just an issue on my side or does the audio sound kind of low quality?

Great looking blade, looks perfectly at home when you used it in conjunction with the shield.

Very nice sword! Another great product from Albion. And what a gift to recieve!

Is the audio strange for anyone else? Sounds like an older mic or something.

i don´t know if this is to personal, but may it be possible to know what tattoo cara ist getting? And about the the big pomel, maybe they wanted to end their enemys rightly

Looks like a nice sword can't wait to see the tests

Joe & the other guys over at Albion make some great stuff. I have some of his customs & I adore them all.

If someone was having this sword made could they request a little longer handle for people with larger hands?

How's your knee holding up Skall? I hope you're getting better. :D

I like the new background! Very cool! Can't wait to see the cutting video with the new sword! XD

That thing looks beastly. It will be great to see the test cutting video for it.

Couldn't you get in close enough with a shield, to use the shorter cut style?

Audio sounds different... I learned something about Viking swords today.

I am a huge fan of the "cast blow". I practice it quite often with my viking sword and have come to prefer viking pommels to later disc pommels on arming swords. Roland of Dimicator demonstrates the cast blow very well. I find it actually improves my edge alignment.

Well wow! Being very interested in the viking age I always wanted to see you review some viking swords, I loved the scandinavian axe review. Some time later (today) I had forgotten the name of your channel and decided to search for "viking sword" to find it "just as I pressed search I remembered that you didn't have any viking sword reviews, that was the review I was wanting to see, but suddenly... there it is your channel and a review of a viking sword which have just been posted. I found both your channel again and the review I most wanted to see! Faith? Will of Odin? Who knows, but it was awesome anyways.

dumb qustion incoming: How good does it do with trusts? I can see that it has been made for cuts but well so has the katana and i do renember that it peformed, well better then expected in that video you did some time ago.

Isn't it called a Langsax/Langseax? It is also called Norwegian sword. In fact, it derives from the war (combat) knife. From what I remember Sax is generally Germanic thing. Langseax (i thing) means Long Knife so it's basically a early medieval messer ;)

Great video as always Skall! Gotta say, off topic, but I love that background.

Thanks for mentioning my videos on the viking sword grip and cast blow shield brother :D

the question about the pommel, CAN YOU THROW IT?

So... is a viking style machete? Looks really cool

I want your sweatshirt. That is awesome. Glad you are enjoying it so far.

im so hyped to see the actual review

That thing looks kinda ugly, not "Ugh, that thing is ugly" kind of ugly but more like "This thing was made for one purpose, to kill, not to look good!" kind of ugly.

Is the pommel unscrewable? cause you know...

Got a similar one agree with you 100% and I do I like the design.

The shape of this sword is just amazing, i love it **

got a hint of Roman in the scabbard. Norwegian sword I like

I'll be honest the first thing I thought of was Guts when I read the name.

Nothing says "I love you" like a big-ass sword. Great video as always!

i would love to see your whole collection man. i love swords shame ill never own one. love your vids keep up the good work man 😊

Mabe vikings just liked to hit peopel with pomelstrikes.

That's a really nice looking sword. Very simple, very pure.

Beautiful in its own way. Looks like a Norman Arming sword, a Gladius, and a Messer had a 3 way. AWESOME zombie sword.

skal I love your videos. educational and funny. I know you bash on your humor a lot but it is always a great watch.

I watched scholagladatoria, he said you have to use your elbows more because of the pommel design and it made me realize the pommel design forces you to use your entire arm and body if you want to give a powerful blow. It's genius, because an inexperienced swordsman would probably try to mostly use his wrist. Using your elbow and shoulder would make the strike several times stronger, and using your body would help even more. I've got no idea if that was intentional in its design, my own theory is that it's meant to resemble Thors hammer.

I'm thinking of getting an Albion Laird sword (basically the Caithness with a similar [yet different] guard) and I'm very excited for it.

The first method of the two shown here seems vaguely related to Matt Easton's video on tulwars - supposedly their characteristic grip also encourages draw cuts with the wrist kept stiff. Looking forward to the sword review! (Cara is awesome.)

I love how you guys celebrate Halloween. I want to adopt this.

That is one of the most beautiful swords I've seen in my life

The way to handle a Viking sword (as shown by Skall) appears to be consistent with Viking combat. If being restricted to holding the sword at an angle that will yield better cuts and being used with a shield, armor, and a high protein diet with daily training, I could see that being a reason for the design choice of the pommel. While this has it's own pros and cons, it would make sense that the Vikings would say to a student "if the pommel is hitting your wrist you're using it wrong".

Nice present! That is one well made sword for the price. As to fighting style, the Vikings used shields and the sword was designed to work with their shields. I suspect that the grip was designed for the shorter, close in cuts that come with such close combat. Cutting at short range was very common with the targets either the head or legs (most mass graves from battles at that time show a high proportion of cuts to skulls and leg bones). Thanks for sharing. Looking forward to the tests.

Great sword! I played with the one in Racine and was debating about getting it. It has a lot of blade presence and feels like it could chop through anything. One thing I've noticed about the Rollo trainer from Albion is that the grip design works as steel knuckles. You can punch with it! I would imagine a punch and draw cut in close measure was one option for those guys.

I love single edge Norse swords. My 1st sparing sword is much like what you have in hand. Short handle and we would called it casting letting the pinkie and ring finger let go as you reach the point in which the blade will go no further without loosening those fingers. I also found a horizontal cut flowing to overhead you can grip the pommel with your other hand and deliver a powerful blow vertically. That was just a interesting thing I noted. Some of the originals were hefty weight wise.

I have been eyeballing this beauty for some time now. DO WANT!

Cool! They actually found a single-edged sword from the 8-9th century just a week ago in Norway!

Another beautiful sword! Thank you for making all the awesome videos and reviews. I'm happy to say, after watching countless hours of videos on your channel, I finally decided to make a purchase myself. Daggers are more interesting to me than swords for some reason so I went with the Darksword Armory Black Prince Dagger off Kult of Athena to begin my collection. I noticed you don't have many videos on daggers...do you collect a lot of them yourself? Do the same principles apply for collecting daggers as collecting swords (things to avoid, things to look for etc.)? Thanks again for getting me into the world of weapon collecting!

A tip, if I may When trying out cuts with viking swords and axes, get your other arm in front of your body to simulate the shield. I know its automatic to the body of swordsman to get the arm behind but, just a tip for better understanding and thinking of those kind of weapons. Thank you for your videos, I always apreciate them most!!! May the gods be with you.

I like how into this you are. most people don't go in as deep and just play with it.

Well my friend, this is a impressive sword, and you sure did gain my interest . this is a custom sword that i could see myself getting interest to purchase

Hey Skallagrim, I haven't seen your video's in awhile so I'm must now getting back to watching them and catching up, but with the commentary on viking style sword use, I HAVE TO MENTION ESCRIMA. I'm been practicing it for 10 years now and the way we hold our weapons is almost always 90 degrees with very little wrist movement and a lot of power coming from the legs and turning the hips. It is much closer than with a European style arming sword, but having also held a round shield, i could, with confidence, say that it would be very easy to stay in that close with a shield to help protect you. This also makes sense because what we do know is how much emphasis was placed on the shield by the vikings (with what little we know obviously). Note: I didn't do any research before commenting, just using personal experience. TL;DR: It would be easy to use a Viking sword being held at roughly 90 degrees in combination with a shield because the shield would help you stay in close.

I sure that is something you will be finding a nice place for when you display it!

The large pommel reminded me of the Indian tulwars or talwars, as featured on Matt Easton's channel. Those pommels are disc-shaped, such that you simply have to hold the sword at an angle (no side-stepping allowed by using the handshake grip) and perform a draw cut rather than a simple chop - in other words: shorter range, better cutting power. Of course, those swords are strongly curved, making them even more cut-oriented than this one is.

Matt Easton at ScholaGladiatoria did a video a while back where he gave his impressions of how he thought a viking sword with that kind of pommel would have been gripped. His opinion was that you would choke down on the grip with the pinky pressed into the pommel. Might be worth a watch to any who are interested. Nice sword though. I am currently waiting on an Albion Jarl which I hope will be ready soon and shipped out to me before year end

I've been thinking about buying that for a while now.

Man that sword is beautiful!

Subscribed on Skallagrim when he had 50000 subs... now he has 410k! Congratulations Skalla, nice job

It's probably not a great way of doing it, but the way I put together historical fighting styles is: Step 1: Figure out the limitations, and therefore what isn't limited. Step 2: Gather all the knowledge of the people who used it that you possess Step 3: Fit the things that aren't limited into the knowledge you possess Step 4: discard any notions that do not fit into your image of the people. In this manner, I doubt that the Vikings would have used a handshake grip very much at all, in fact would avoid it in most cases, so the hammer grip used for close quarters slicing, and the upwards thrusts would be what I would use. In terms of stance, I believe a shieldless stance would be very wide and grounded, whereas a shield stance would be wide again, but side on to the shield. Attacks would be made around the shield, using body rotation to its maximum and utilising shield bashes more often than most styles.

Looking forward to the test! :D

Considering your thoughts on the way of using the sword, you may have forgotten that vikings were known to use rather large shields. So it kind of makes sense to assume that they used those to get close to their opponent and then use their swords for these close-quarter cuts while preventing their opponent from effectively using their weapons.

I think you could probably look at how swords like a Tulwar were used, since both have somewhat restrictive hilts and are mainly for cutting, that may give you an idea or two about how vikingblades were used.

That sword is pretty badass. I would imagine the slashing or drawing cuts with a beast like that would be awesome.

I seen 3 of those type of swords in a museum. Did not think they were that scarce one seemed to have the same sharped edged pommel as the berserker, while the other had the more conman rounded type of pommel.

Congratulations, it looks great.

Beautfully made!! My brother forged me a seax! What I would give to have a sword that beautiful!

Ah, will be interesting to see a test video for this.

I remember rewatching the animated "Beowulf" about a year ago, after i had watched this video. I instantly recognized some of Beowulf's warriors carrying single edged viking swords, just like this one. Thought it was a cool detail i didn't notice the first time i watched the movie.