Targe from Armlann Gàidhealach

Armlann Gàidhealach was formed in Edinburgh at the end of August 1745, in anticipation of the return of Charles Stuart.  Its owners were Màiri MacNeil of Edinburgh and Caitlin O'Shaughnessy of Kilmacduagh, who temporarily moved to Scotland for the venture.  They officially began production three days after Stuart entered the city on September 17.  The factory produced targes, furnished German broadsword and dirk blades in the usual fashion, imported French firearms and swords, and stored and distributed captured government arms.  When government troops reoccupied Edinburgh in January, the workshop was hastily moved to a barn outside the city, where they continued production right up until the disaster at Culloden on April 16 of the following year.

Last year, I was able to obtain a beautifully-preserved targe through my connections with the Hawkins family of Gloucestershire.  They weren't Jacobites, but some were friends with O'Shaughnessy and MacNeil, and bought out the remaining stock to help the venture recoup some of their investment and dispose of/launder the evidence, since the Hawkinses had ties with the shipping industry down in Bristol, and the middle class in their own hometown would purchase swords.

The vast majority of Armlann Gàidhealach's stock has been sold, auctioned off or given away over the centuries, but I hope to put aside enough money next year to get a sword and dirk.

Iron Age Irish dagger

Pray, tell me the story of young Cú Chulainn,
How his eyes were dark, his expression sullen,
And how he'd fight, and always won,
And how they cried when he was fallen...
- Thin Lizzy

This is another set of fittings for my Atlanta Cutlery Arkansas toothpick blade, a wide but thin and handy blade that would be equally suited for a plug bayonet, a Medieval quillon dagger, or even a transitional antennae or anthropomorphic dagger from the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures.

In fact, the Irish short swords on which my interpretation is based were usually longer and less tapered (sometimes even flared toward the point), comparable to gladii in size and shape, and were basically short variations on the late La Tène long sword.  What inspired me to go this route is that the shape and proportions of the toothpick blade make it look like a miniature of one made by Shane Allee some years ago.  As a set of fittings made to be removable, this one features threaded construction secured with a ground-down steel hex nut.  (I'd have preferred brass, but as the set of dies I bought was defective, with a pair of 1/4-28s and no 1/4-20, I had to settle for whatever 1/4-28 nut was available.)

The pommel is pine and the guard is probably poplar.  The scabbard is two boards of basswood - soft and requiring little effort to cut, but splintery and loose-grained; I really wouldn't recommend it for fine carving like this.  The carvings are based, with some simplification, on a metal scabbard from Lisnacrogher.  The grip, somewhat shortened, is actually a leftover from an MRL rondel dagger currently hilted as my sharp akinakes for Persian reenactment.  I have no idea what wood it's made of, only that it seems like a good, dense hardwood, and it smells horrible when cut.  Aside from it, all the wood parts are stained with Minwax mahogany and finished with boiled linseed oil.

The throat is 0.015-inch brass sheet, held down with arrow glue and brass-headed tacks stuck through finishing washers.  The tacks are cut short so they don't protrude into the scabbard and scratch the blade.  The belt loop is somewhat heavier-gauge brass strip, soldered to the throat and tacked through the throat into the wood.

The chape is actually a large cotter pin.  I have no idea what a cotter pin is actually made for.  It's wrapped with soldered-on brass strip and held in place with the same aforementioned assemblage of washers and tacks (though down here they're well clear of the blade, so they're stuck through both the front and back scabbard pieces).