World Building, Part 6: The Sword!

Because Heroes Prefer Swords

My own sketches, pre-Graey Erb

This is not news.  A trope older than Beowulf and Iliad, literature both ancient and modern is full of examples that prove the trope.  Some ask why, and the simple answer is that a blade has been present in warfare for almost as long as war has been waged (considering someone had to figure out how to make them, first).  Even today soldiers bring a knife to their gunfights, and while there are no longer epic sword fights outside of Medieval Times and Renaissance Fairs, swords remain strongly embedded in how we think of war.  Therefore, it is natural that in fantasy settings, swords seems to always find their way into the hands of a hero.  The above link goes into some detail regarding examples in literature, and literary trends related to it, so instead I will tell you about The Sword of my book, and why I found it necessary to design this particular aspect of the book and bring it to life through art so early in my writing process.

My pommel design sketch.

Before I hired Graey Erb to create artwork, I tried my hand at drawing things myself.  Above I was toying with the shape of the blade.  I was inspired by the design of Orcrist from "The Hobbit" movies (shown on the right).  Big surprise, I'm sure.  Truth is at the beginning, I imagined The Sword for my protagonist would be like Anduril, considering my unrefined excitement for "The Lord of the Rings."  Further thought and time eventually told me that a European long sword seemed out of place among lizard folk.  It is much more common to find lizard folk or any of the other 'evil minion' labeled races having some manner of cruelly shaped curved swords.  This comes from history as much as literature, as European Christians demonized the pagan tribal peoples of Eastern Europe and the Muslims of the Near East, both of whom of battled various European kingdoms either across land or the Mediterranean Sea (Crusades, anyone?).  These cultures used curved blades that fit their tendency to attack from horse back, where a curved blade would be more practical than the straight edged blades that dominated Western Europe's armories.  This allowed me to tackle and subvert another common trope, referred to as the Sinister Scimitar.  In essence, my desire to subvert the "Reptiles are Abhorrent," which claims that lizard-beings are almost always evil, gives me the chance to subvert the trope claiming bad guys use curved swords.

Curved swords!

The first draft of Graey Erb sword concepts.

In order to create a fitting visualization of the sword I wanted, I emailed Graey (after discovering his art on Pinterest of all places) with a 20+ page project proposal that included my own sketches for designing the sword.  The first draft of concepts were very different from each other, as I did not have a clear idea of what the sword would look like.  The initial idea was that the sword was created during a Golden Age of the World.  Since the Deities of this world have (or can choose to have) a draconic form, the weapons are made to evoke that.  The pommel is shaped as the head of a dragon, the hilt is the neck/body, the crossguard the wings, and the blade has a tail either engraved or embossed upon it in some fashion.  After seeing the first draft, I pointed out what I liked and disliked, and Graey went back to work, creating a second set of concepts.  The one I liked the most, and that Graey iterated upon, was a combination of features from #1 (The pommel, crossguard and blade shape) and from #3 (the hilt texture and the style of detail on the blade).  I also asked him to work on the proportions of sword, such as making the blade longer and thinner.  The other designs, despite not being quite what I had in mind, actually gave me some ideas.  Numbers 5,6 and 10, with the angular design elements reminded me of the dwarven architecture in "The Lord of the Rings" and "The Hobbit" movies, so it gave me the idea that these designs could be reused when I get around to developing the other cultures that will be in my book.

Concept Pass 2

The second set of concepts nailed down the size and shape of the sword, leaving the details on the blade itself to be choose.  I again went with #1, as the sunburst at the top seemed appropriate. It seemed too plain, still, so Graey and I came up with a stylized sun to replace the plain circle.  It ended up being two pointed starbursts overlapping each other  Next, something needed to go on between the lines radiating from the half circle.  We narrowed it down to either a diamond or a four pointed star, and settled on the four pointed star.  From there the sword was more or less complete.  With some color, the sword came to life.  There is one feature that I found unique which came from the original concepts: a medallion hanging off the pommel.  It is common among the practitioners of Wushu, a style of the 'kung fu' martial arts in China, to have a tassel hanging from the pommel of their dao, a type of broad bladed sword.  I like it as a way that my character, upon getting the sword, to personalize it without changing the sword itself.  A common trope in fantasy is the named weapon, which either comes from the blade being historical/legendary or from the character being sentimentally attached to the weapon.  I have not decided yet if I will name it or how it would be named, so the medallion seemed a good alternative.

Final Concept Pass

The Sword of the Hero!