Prosthetic Conscience

Swords in New Orleans

So while Lori was doing bridesmaid stuff, I wandered down to the Vieux Carré for a couple of hours. And what trip to the Vieux Carré would be complete without visiting the antique weapons shop on Royal St.? Okay, probably most would. But since I have learned a lot more about swords and sword history since I lived in New Orleans, I wanted to go there and have a look around.

They have a very broad selection of 19th century military swords and a few late 18th century swords, mostly American, British, and French, as well as a few non-European weapons. There was pretty much a whole wall of sabres, including the expected Civil War era American sabres and a few Napoleonic era British and French ones. I asked the shopkeeper for more information about a smallsword that wasn’t labeled with any details, and he told me about it, that it was a late 18th century French military sword. It must have been a dress sword of some sort, as it certainly wasn’t a battlefield weapon.

The prices were somewhat reasonable, in the sense that while I would never spend that much money on that kind of thing, even if I had it, I can imagine someone else doing so. For example, a French model 1822 light cavalry sabre, probably the most elegant example of its class of weapons, was “only” around $1000. I don’t know whether that’s actually a good deal or not, but given that medium-end reproduction swords (admittedly, reproductions of older types of swords) can be $800, I can see a collector paying that without breaking my brain.

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