Knives and Scabbards

Catalogue of knives and scabbards found in London excavations, with discussion of date, technology, decoration and function.

Knives were vital to medieval man for a whole range of uses, from the domestic to the wider social context: Anglo-Saxon pre-Christian burials bear silent witness to this dependence in the many cases where knives are found among the grave-goods. Forged and hafted with great skill, sometimes with elaborately decorated scabbards, knives are of intrinsic fascination, besid...