Spanish Dancer - A Belduque Interpretation (Chuck's Sheath done!)

ScottRoush

ScottRoush

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Jan 10, 2010
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The idea started for this after I attended Ric Furrer's shear steel course. I was looking for something to use the rest of my shear steel billet for and Chuck Burrows recommended a belduque. Belduques were basically earlier equivalents of bowies and were brought to the New World by the Spanish. They were often seen in the American Southwest and Mexico and were very long, pointy fighters with thick spines, forge welded iron fittings and full tangs. Maybe Chuck will pipe in with further info and pictures of originals. In fact... Delarond's belduque seen in Chuck's last post was what got my butt moving on this again.

I'm typically not interested in strict historical reconstructions therefore mine deviates in a couple of respects. First... the fittings were probably individually forge welded while I basically welded on a couple of big wrought iron bars in the vicinity of the handle and bolsters (see pics). Also.... after attending Blade this year I've become interested in thin, light bladed, well balanced fighting knives. I love the graceful elegance of the thin blade with nice distal taper. As well as the speed of handling. Therefore mine doesn't have the typical 1/4" spine but a hair over 1/8". I also elected for a morticed, hidden tang contruction of the scales placed between the forge welded bolster and pommel. Mine is also a bit shorter.. some of the historical examples had 15" plus blades.

But the over-all profile and look reflect the spirit of this knife I think.

I'm calling it 'Spanish Dancer' as it is just so graceful, fast and a joy to handle. It is 15.5" long, with 10.5" blade. The steel is Aldo 1084 with multiple edge quenching that brought out some very interesting alloy banding that actually shows some shiny areas (vanadium??) from extended ferric soak. The balance is right at the bolsters, closer to the handle. The wood is some very unique 'curly black oak burl' given to me by Mr. Mark Farley. I've never seen anything like it. Then there are some buffalo horn spacers.

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(edit: not sure where the red cast came from... I swear the original doesn't look like that! Photobucket!)

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(looks so much smaller in this picture.. guess it's my big, gnarly paws)

A quick snap of the spine:

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Here are some steps in the construction:

Wrought iron tack welded to 1084 -

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Wrought iron forge welded on and blade profile forged. Next time I will forge the blade first and then weld on the fittings. Duh. :o

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Might be hard to see but this after using my press to forge down the handle area between the bolster and pommel:

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tres cool!
 
I'm not familiar with this type of knife and would love to learn more - if Chuck could add pics of the originals, that would be cool. Knives from different periods and different cultures are always of interest to me.

As for yours Scott, I think it's a terrific-looking blade. Lean and lethal.

Roger
 
Scott - beautifully done mi amigo! I love this interpretation of an historical piece.......

Here are teh images from teh post that Scott linked too.....
Belduques from New Mexico and No Texas - courtesy Jim Gordon's museum in NM
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From the Marc Simmons book on SW Spanish Colonial Ironworl
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From the MOFT Fur Trade Cutlery Sketchbook
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From a private collection - this one is from El Paso Texas
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Belduques are based on the earlier Spanish fighting knives which were designed for armour piercing thus the typically thick spines as seen in the last images, the one from El Paso whihc has a 16" blade. They are the North American version of the gaucho knives of Argentina and Brazil. While many of the originals are quite large there are others in the more "reasonable" sizes of 9-11" inches with blades in the 1/4" thickness range. In style and fittings they ran the gamut from plain to ultra fancy.

I am real honored to be chosen to make the sheath for this piece and can't wait to get in my hands - at that time I will figure out what style of sheath to make for it - again originals ran the gamut from plain working man styles to fancy silver mounted to the Indian influenced styles typical of the New Mexico styles.
 
That's a beautiful interpretation, Scott. The more traditional belduques look really similar to the Argentine criollos, at least to my eye. It stands to reason that they would, though.
 
Outstanding Scott and a WRTC sheath to compliment. PLUS that wood has a pulse. I'm giddy over it. Chuck, thanks for the history.....Randy
 
Once again one of your threads not only showcases a fantastic knife but is full of information.

Thanks! What a great looking knife.
 
Thanks a lot folks... I really appreciate the nice words. This knife was a pain in the butt. But... I'm going to do more of it because it seems like there is so much that can be done with forge welded fittings....

One point of clarification... This was not shear steel. I kind of muddled that in the my intro. It was Aldo 1084. But the next one will be shear steel....
 
Nicely done Scott :thumbup:

Very interesting history associated with this design


In the image that Chuck posted, I'm curious as to whats going on in pommel area of the bottom knife shown ??
Is there just something underneath propping the handle area up, or is the ornate steel pommel cap looking thing somehow attached to the handle :confused:

Wild Rose said:
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Click to expand...
 
Thanks again for the nice compliments folks.

David.... My understanding is that most belduque fittings were integral either to the forged steel itself or forge welded and 'pseudo-integral' such as is the case for mine. And they were generally full tang. Am I answering your question??

Now I just need to learn to do some carving and engraving so I can bling this style up. Wire inlays would look pretty sharp in the handle too, eh?
 
Just got Chuck Burrow's (Wild Rose Trading) sheath for this belduque today and am very pleased. The craftsmanship is incredible and the attention to detail... especially in the beautiful staining... is truly magnificent. A great match for my knife and I know the customer will be very pleased.....


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