Need help naming a sword

Glaurin #350

Hey guys,

First of all: Thank you for all your work here, this project is amazing!

I just joined the community recently (long-time lurker ^^) and need your help with something. I practice HEMA (Historical European Marital Arts) as a hobby and decided to comission a custom-made training longsword (also the sword is one big step towards completing the ranger-costume that I've been building for quite some time) . Being the Tolkien fanatic that I am, I designed the thing mostly based on design elements from the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy.

I thought it would be kind of fitting to give the finished blade a name, but my proficiency in Tolkien's languages is still in it's infancy -_- -> HELP PLEASE!!!! xD

If you guys have any good ideas for the name of a sword just drop them in here.

Thanks in advance for your help, I appreciate it!

P.S: The only really decorative element of the whole thing is a silver star that will be embossed into the leather of the scabbard. Perhaps that info inspires some ideas.

Ríon Gondremborion #356

significant rubbing of hands together Here we go...

So, conveniently for me (as my experience with compounding words in Quenya is basically nonexistent) the sword used by a ranger would most likely have a Sindarin name, which I have more confidence with.

Here are a few ideas, all of which (except for one case) are Neologisms, and come from the fact that you mentioned a silver star.

Silver Star: *Gilgeleb, "Star" Gîl + "Silver" Celeb. Note that this would be a bit poetic as the use of "Silver" Celeb as a noun and not an adjective implies the star is actual silver, not just silvery. For a more literal name one might go with *Gilgelebren

Greystar: *Thingil/*Gilthin(d), "Pale Grey" Thind + "Star" Gîl. The latter name would be if the name you're going for is fashioned to be a little older as in Middle Earth, old is always in style. Now, there is an attested name Gilmith, but if you want to name your sword after a lady from Dol Amroth, be my guest.

Starfist: *Elbor, "Star" El + "Fist" Paur. Self explanatory.

Starfire: *Elnor/*Gilnor, "Star" El/Gil + "Fire" Naur.

Star of the Wilderness: *Elthrovan, "Star" El + "Wilderness" Rhovan. Themed on Star + Ranger.

There are many other names along these lines, but these were a few of my favorites (save for #1, but I felt I needed to include a literal name).

Nimlothiel #359

Hello Glaurin! Three names sprang to my mind when I saw your comment, however one was actually suggested by Ríon Gondremborion (!) - Gilgeleb/Gilgelebren and the other two are as follows:

Angil/Angel or Gilangren/Elangren, which both would translate as 'Iron Star/Star of Iron', however your sword is probably not going to made out of iron so this might not be the best name.

Elrod/Gilrod, which may be a better alternative to the above as 'raud' just means 'metal', therefore this name translates as 'Metal star'.

Hope this helps!

Glaurin #361

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you very much for your help so far ^^.

All your suggestions look really good. Seems like I will have a hard time deciding on a final name. If you have more ideas just throw them at me.

Perhaps I have some ideas myself. If that happens I'll post them here and ask for help tranlating them (if possible -_-).

If the sword is finished (which won't happen until the end of september) I'll try to post a link to some pictures just so you know what you found a name for. ^^

@Nimlothiel: The sword is indeed not made of iron, it's made of steel xD. I would have to straighten out an iron blade after every 2 Minutes of practice ^^.

Nimlothiel #364

@glaurin, yes I think a sword of iron would not be ideal!

Glaurin #676

It took some time, but the sword was sent out to me last friday, and should arrive within the week.

Here is the link to the sword's product page, in case you want to know exactly what you helped find a name for.

balefireblades.com

Ríon Gondremborion #677

It looks wonderful!

Cirmacin #678

Hey Glaurin! Great to hear that your sword is on the way! Just curious, what was an estimate price for your longsword? I haven't heard much from Balefire Blades - thanks!

Glaurin #679

Hey Cirmacin,

Just got the sword about 5 hours ago. It feels as nice as it looks.

Balefire Blades is a relatively new company located in the UK. The smith at Balefire Blades is Chris Adams. He learned his craft under Marco Danelli (one of the most famous and well respected swordsmiths for HEMA weapons in Europe; if you are in HEMA for some time you have probably stumbled over that name somewhere) until Danelli Armouries had to close it's doors due to health reasons on Mr. Danelli's side. This led to the founding of Balefire Blades around early 2018 (if i remember correctly). Just have a look around the Balefire Blades homepage / facebook for more details.

balefireblades.com

At the moment they only do custom work, which by its very nature is quite expensive. I don't know about the pricing of other swords, but I imagine the prices vary significantly depending on the hours (not so much the size of the thing) Chris has to put into a build. My sword alone cost me £600 without shipping (665 Euro in my case; I don't know your native currency, so you'll have to do the concersion yoursel if needed ^^), which is quite a sum (!!!) for one HEMA sword (given the grinding work on my sword was probably a pain in the a**), but I happened to have the funds and a sword design stuck in my head that i really (!!!!) wanted to have built. The quality of the sword I got today seems to surpass any cheaper practice longsword I have handled so far (extremely solid and precise build quality), and considering it is a complete custon job the price is, at least for me, justified.

The best thing you can do is to probably just send an inquiry via Facebook or mail and ask for a quote on a design you want to have built and an estimation of delivery times (I think atm you would have to wait at least 4-5 months for a sword, since their popularity seems to be growing). The communication via FB is usually handled by Alicia Lewis (usually she answers within a day). Perhaps you can provide some sketches or reference pictures as I did, so Chris gets an idea what you want.

As soon as I have had the chance to put the sword through it's paces for a bit I intend to write an initial review on the Schola Gladiatoria forums. If you want I can drop the link in here once that happens.

I hope that helps.

If you have some more questions just let me know