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i8 o
K Ø B E N H A V N S K E S V Æ R D F E G E R E
us a rather vivid and coherent picture o f the
sword-cutler’s work. It is astonishing how
much repair work was done, old blades being
repeatedly re-polished and furnished with
new scabbards and hilts before being issued to
the regiments again. A list o f swrord-cutler’s
tools delivered to a military sword-cutler on
his departure to his regiment, is found in the
accounts o f the year
16 78
, when Denmark
was at war with Sweden.
The very idea o f free guilds independent o f
public control was quite incompatible with
an absolute monarchy. More than twenty
years, however, went b y before the King
made up his mind to deal with the problem.
In
1681
.and
1682
two Royal ordinances were
issued concerning; the guilds and the appren
tices ; the principles were repeated in the Code-
book o f Christian V in
16 8 3
, according to
which the magistrate should control the
guilds; but despite all these orders, the guilds
continued their internal life and kept their
traditions. Theoretically, .anybody who had
learned a craft should be allowed to swear his
citizen’s oath and establish himself as a master,
hut it proved impossible to deprive the guilds
o f their inherited right to control new mem
bers, and die guilds consequently kept their
power and influence as long as efficiency o f
production mainly depended upon the crafts
man’s skill.
In the
1680
’s most o f the guilds were given
new statutes; those o f the sword-cuclers are
dated M ay
14
th,
1685
, and improved their
previous, conditions in two respects: they
were given a monopoly o f producing and sel
ling swords, and they were allowed to pro
duce and sell other articles in gold, silver and
other metal. The monopoly, however, proved
to be invalid in certain cases when military
units contracted w ith braziers or dealers for
new side-arms; when the dealers could meet
the demands o f the Crown, the complaints o f
the sword-cutlers were in vain. It was easier
for them to maintain their rights against en
croachment in the case o f small swords sold
to private persons. In
1700
an unauthorized
dealer had his stock confiscated in favour o f
the swords-cutlers.
c h a p te r
4
THE SWORD-CUTLER’s HEYDAY
In the late
1 7
th and most o f the
18
th cen
turies, the small sword formed a regular part
o f a gentleman’s dress; furthermore, the ha
bit o f duelling had spread from military
circles to other classes o f society and did not
fall into disuse till after the middle o f the
century. In that period almost any citizen o f a
town would, on certain occasions, wear a
sword, and at court not only the young cava
liers, but even lower servants o f the stable
and the hunt and young craftsmen who had
terminated their apprenticeship with the
purveyors to His Majesty were paid a sum
“for dress and sword” , the latter being the
token o f freedom. The sword-cutlers there
fore had a wide field o f activity and our
knowledge about them is more copious than
in the previous epochs.
Only a limited number o f sword-cutlers’
names occur in the Royal accounts and still
fewer were granted the official title o f sword-
cutler to the King. This took place for the
first time in
17 2 9
, but even before that time
there was an obvious tendency for most o f the
sword-cutler’s work for the court to be done
by one sword-cutler. During the reign o f
Christian V (
1670
-
1699
) only Bendix Nielsen
is mentioned by name among the sword-
cutlers working for the court, and, after the
year
170 0
, Hein Kopper, son o f the Marcus
Kopper who had been in the service o f Prince
Christian in the
1640
’s and, later on, officially
appointed sword-cutler to King Frederik III,