Part of an ongoing series looking at bladed weapon terminology. If you like the T-shirt, see it at the link below with many more of our designs - www.redbubble.com/i/t-shirt/D...
I always loved the design of those late 1700’s navel swords. the ivory hilt and the gently curved guards that end in a tear drop shape. not too complex and not too simple. very aesthetically pleasing.
Good video. One addition: Another influence (maybe even the major one) might not come from medieval Ballock Daggers, but from Irish large Knifes called Skean. These are depicted already in the 16th Century and have some significant design attributes which early Dirks in Scotland also show.
Also Dudgeon daggers from the Scottish Lowlands. Blades were shorter, but the Dudgeon dagger hilt does bear a passing resemblance to the earlier dirks.
Definitely a short sword (dirk, dagger et al) are more suited for confined space use. I think many of these sized weapons/tools across cultures are also ritualised tools, whether one considers the Japanese Wakizashi, the Malay keris, or the Arab jambiya. Interesting that you referenced a naval short sword with chain but not mentioned its relationship with the Turkish yatagan. The Scottish dirk always seemed to me closer to a Gaelic adaptation of the Roman gladius. Thank you this video on the dirk. 🥃🥃
Well, i think that might have to do with british cultural genealogy. when the navel dirk was coming into style, probably the scottish dirk was more familiar to the english and the rest of the british than the quillon or poinard, in both appearance, and probably more importantly, terminology, for any very long dagger/ very short sword. like the video said, it being a rough classification rather than specific.
I really wish that moderns law (at least in the US) defined it so easily. I recently moved to a different state, and being someone who carries a pocket knife, and sometimes a fixed blade, for day to day use, I thought I should look up the knife laws for my new home state. I was really surprised that the laws specifically forbid "dirks" among other specific types of weapons, like stilettos and balisongs. Stilettos and balisongs made sense to me, since they got banned pretty much everywhere, but I never saw a law specify dirk. Well, it turns out that they define "dirk" as "whatever we think a dirk is" and it basically encompassed any big knife. No size specification, no specifications at all in fact. It's completely up to the discretion of the police and the judge as to whether said knife it too big or too dirk-like for them, whatever that means.
Indeed weapons laws can be a pain. From firearms, knives, and other weapons, I always consider that when traveling and where I live. Some States are horrible, and others are great. I live in NH and there are no laws governing blades. And in some States each township/city can arbitrarily regulate blades and you may be fine outside that town but be 1/4 inch too long inside it and have legal problems should it be pushed. It's not only stupid, but actually unconstitutional as well. But here we are.
Beautiful... exactly why I started to become entranced by large daggers -- during and after living for 5+ years on my sailboat! So much so, I only have two or three longswords... OK, more interested in the Napoleonic sabres :)
Earned a sub based on your opinion of wearing a sword around a ship. I own a couple of medieval swords with traditional leather sheaths and belts. I love them, they are potentially devastating weapons, and they could cleave through a horses neck. BUT ..... I could not easily walk around my apartment wearing them, let alone a ship. I think this is an important metric when discussing weapons in general. If your weapon is longer than any door you might have to pass through, it is inevitable that eventually you will have an "accident". Its why baseball bats are such terrible weapons for home defence. Person = up to 6 feet Baseball bat = up to 4 feet Arm length = about 3 feet. Average ceiling = 7 feet. Average hallway width = 4 feet. People swinging bats creates a radius vastly larger than the environment allows. There was a reason why Rome went with the gladius for hundreds of years. Its not ideal, but its practical in lots of situations where other weapons are not.
Wonderful video on a weapon that had hitherto been neglected by the YT HEMA circuit! And your two specimens are absolutely stunning. I actually own a rondel-bollock dagger hybrid made by Tod, based on an original. This is a VERY short video(35 sec.) about a very iconic early American naval dirk. It's the one that was actually carried AND used by Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon at the Battle of Derna during the Barbary Wars in North Africa in 1805. There's not even enough space here for me to describe how important and symbolic this battle/war was in American military history. Lt. O'Bannon also played a key role in some saber history as well!😁 He is the reason that the "mameluke" style of saber became the standard issue for the US Marine Corps. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presley_O%27Bannon This is the little video from the National Museum of the Marine Corps about his personal dirk. It's pretty flipping amazing stuff... ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-LTTv3lNU5uw.html
Nick, I have a question: how long are the blades on those beasties? Also, nice video, well presented info and overlay images of things being discussed. Thank you, Angus
37cm for the military dirk (which is around typical) and 38cm for the Highland dirk (which is very much at the large end of the scale). Glad you enjoyed it.
Now I'm wondering if dirks and bollock daggers were inspired by a Roman gladius hilt some native found lying around Hadrian's Wall, took a fancy to and then stuck a local blade on it.
That's something of a myth that often gets retold about many weapons. West germanic seaxes, glaives, and dirks especially. Certainly broken weapons were repurposed and recycled at need, but hardly in such abundance that it was the majority of production over purpose built daggers. Generally, dirks and long daggers were bought by men who could not afford swords in the first place across the centuries. They weren't exactly making do with a broken version of a weapon they didn't own to begin. Plus, if your sword broke or warped, chances are good that you're dead, not wondering how you might get a new weapon out of it. And if you stand over a victorious battle, you're not busy looting broken old weapons to sell to a cutler like it's some sort of elderscrolls game. Weapons and old war gear were frequently repurposed for tools however, and a number of existing existing farm implements and cook pots started out as scavenged scrap metal and old helmets. More commonly, you see it in the modern period where perfectly servicable weapons are shortened for convenience. Particularly in ww1 with chopped down sabers or thick bayonets repurposed into thinner fighting knives.
My hypothesis on the etymology of the name "dirk" is that it is another form of the word "dagger". Both therefore would come from the Middle English "diggen", which is an alteration of the Old English "dician" (to dig a ditch/mound up earth). The word "dirk" therefore, would not have come from Scots GAELIC, as it only entered the English language in the Rennaisance period. Therefore the word would come via the SCOTS language, of LOWLAND Scotland, itself being a direct derivative of Old English (the language of Bernicia/Northumbria, the Anglian Kingdom which ruled much of southern Scotland up til about the 9th Century AD). Presumably via the regiments of lowland Scottish regiments (?) The word itself deriving from the thrusting action of a dagger. The dagger being essentially a heavily thrust-centric weapon, as opposed to a cut-centric weapon, know to us today as a "knife". That thrusting action being essentially the same as a "digging" action, as a spade digs into the earth. Indeed evidence of this hypothesis can be found in the name of "spade". Because that word derives from the Italian word "spada" meaning "sword". This word being a direct descendant of "spatha", the Latin word for a long cavalry sword. In addition, one of the original four suits of cards in a set of playing cards, was "swords", which later changed to what we know now as the suit called "spades", again drawing a parallel of the spade to the sword and it's digging or thrusting action. It may well indeed be that the change in playing cards from "swords" to "spades" is actually the direct ancestry for the modern word spade (digging implement). As it may have been called that in visual reference to the playing card suit "spades". All hypothesis, I have no evidence (other than that above). But I think the argument is compelling.
Todd Cutler has the dirk in your example listed as Lowland and Highland. Is there anything you can add to the history outside the Highlands? I find the info quite scarce on the evolution in the Lowlands after the dudgeon/bollock dagger.
While this is oversimplified, the Scottish Lowlands had a lot of overlap with French material culture, as per being allies (against the English) and parts of their gentry/aristocracy being genetically French. I know that the Lowlands were more comparable to the French and English with their swords than to the Highlanders for the 16th and 17th centuries.
Yeh that is what I was getting at where I said the term began to be used for large daggers more widely. Johnson's dictionary lists the dirk as merely a large dagger or short sword, and so there is no doubt it would have been used more widely, but the Highland and Navy/Army types were the ones mostly commonly associated with the name.
@@AcademyofHistoricalFencing Cool, thanks. I was thinking especially of later fantasy novels, where “dirk” is often used-partly, I suspect, because it suggests something brutal and savage rather than because of its accuracy. I wondered if this was just a later anachronism or actually part of ongoing usage.
As far as the naval dirk being worn when it's not convenient to carry a sword ship-board. At that point in naval history, even if you're boarded, there's going to be plenty of fore-warning to break out the boarding axes, and pikes. Yes, the riggers are probably going to be busy trimming the sails, and battening down the hatches. Gun crews are going to be loading the guns, but somebody can go down to the armory for the crew.
Absolutely there should be time to gather up weapons in most major fights, and yet there are scenarios where officers were caught by surprise, not just with pirates but night attacks, cutting out actions, mutinies, and also on land with bandits, small skirmishes and the like. I found one account where a Leuitenant used his dirk to parry a bayonet musket away as the bayonet was being directed at his Captain in a small fight in a port town. The musket went off and killed the Captain in that instance, but an interesting reference to the dirk in a serious fight.
@@AcademyofHistoricalFencing I'd love a link to that story, but it's like that sniper shot through the scope of another sniper. An interesting anecdote, but not the sort of thing that Navies armed their crews around.
I recently was reading in my copy of Swords for Sea Service (can't remember which of the 2 volumes it was) that some officers kept their Midshipman's dirks after promotion and fought with them in combination with their swords. I found this interesting as I had not heard of this before, to be honest it was about the only exciting thing in the 2 volumes, it's ok as a reference but it's not a good read.
I've not seen exact resources for this, though often midshipmen didn't even have a dirk at all, and there are several instances documented where young midshipmen were sent into service by their family with a new dirk, only to be told they were not permitted to use it and had to go and buy a sword. As far as using them in combination with sword, there are reference to sword and dagger used occasionally, but they never expressely say it is their officers dirk or any number of other short blades that were commonly used. It would certainly be logical for them to be carried for offhand and backup use.
Is it possible that the Dirk came from the Romans? Scotland was the only country they never conquered, but there was alot of trade between the two and it looks very similar to the Gladius, which was 60cm minimum in length?
By this period, none. Earlier on they were added to sabres without a knucklebow to provide some extra protection, but once solid knuckleows became common, the chain was redundant. By this period it was really just being done for fashion.
The Dutch word for 'dagger' is 'dolk', and 'Dirk' is a men's name. So, can have 'Dirk's dolk' (Dirk's dirk/Dirk's dagger). Changing the Dutch pronunciation of 'dolk' to the English pronunciation of 'dirk', is also not that strange. Apart from hoping to confuse everyone with this comment, I am also genuinely wondering whether the English/Scottish 'dirk' might have some Dutch origin; the time period seems to be correct for some Dutch influence anyway.
That’s maybe not so suprising as during the 17th Century huge numbers of highlanders and islanders ended up in the Royal Navy as they were excellent sailors as the waters around Scotland are treacherous. I believe as many as 30% of the sailors at Graf algae were Scottish. So you can see how the word could have jumped into general parlance for a dagger...
A lot of naval terms come from ethnic groups who at one time fulfilled the role... like Stevedore... every port in the world uses the Portuguese term for a loader...
type " blood red knife" in Google translate (English to Scots Gaelic). The word red in that usage (dearg) could be pronounced "dirk" to people not fluent in Gaelic. Sgian Dubh, therefore means a "black knife" denoting it's concealed nature.
I think a similar analogy would be the Arab and Berber wearing of the strongly curved jambiyah tucked into the front of the sash by all men once they come of age. Lawrence of Arabia wrote a bit about it and their utter requirement like breathing to have the knife at all times
Yes, and just any manner of dagger really. Even aboard Royal Navy ships there were the regulation cutlasses, pistols, pikes etc, and then an assortment of small blades and hatchets used for close in fighting and espeically below decks.
Only briefly. The idea of the dirk being a midshipman's weapon is a misconception that has been going on since the 19th century. By regulation in almost all periods the midshipman was to carry a sword. There are examples of families sending their sons to the Navy with a Dirk and being surprised to learn they had to have a sword. There appears to be a very small window int he 1850s when the dirk was a midshipman's item but it was very short lived. Dirks were however the weapon of Volunteers 1st and 2nd class, which is what many young men served as before becoming a Midshipman.
As with a lot of land and sea terms, there is cross over, just like how cutlass got used for some swords on land when hanger would be the "correct" term. Cavalie Mercer, an artillery officer, specifically states he and other artillery officers carried dirks.
Well that is how language change works. Once a term falls into common usage it is correct then for its time. And a word can have multiple meanings across different cultures and languages too.
