Artist: Unknown; Date(s): circa 1750 - 1770; Classification(s): weapons, hanger, casting (process), sword, cast with curved blade; Acquisition: bequeathed by Henderson, James Stewart, 1933-03-16 [HEN.M.289-1933]
Description: Hanger. The entire hilt is in gilt-brass (?), gilt-bronze (?); some traces of the gilding remain. The hilt (grip and pommel in one) is formed, in Rococo style, of a small elegant hoof springing from a shell-and-sunburnt motif. Knuckle-guard and short rear quillon, which is turned inward against a downturned small pelta-shaped shell-guard, which has a deep rim decorated with acanthus. Blade curved and back-edged with a narrow fuller against the back starting 10.2 cm (4") below the hilt and ending at the sharpened portion of the back-edge. There is a broad and shallow fuller down the middle of the blade. At the forte it is nicely engraved with a standing warrior wearing a tall headdress like a Royal Artillery busby with a carbine slung slantwise across his back. Above his head is a kind of funerary-urn shaped frame enclosing the words V. PANDOUR (vivat Pandour). This is repeated on the reverse. Below the hilt is another lettered inscription, now too worn to decipher, in a longhand script.