Saber of a senior officer of the light cavalry, France, model of 1801, AN 9

length of saber in scabbard 1070 mm, length of saber 1004 mm, length of head 864 mm, width of head at base 30 mm, thickness of back at base 9 mm, weight of saber 850 g, weight of saber in scabbard 1270 g

Hand closed, brass binding, gilded. The sigmoidal, cross-barbed yoke, with pointed, elliptical whiskers. Rear arm of the hilt curled towards the head into a flat volute. The front one, twice arched, forms the main bail, connected to the headstock. Both side bows, arched, connect to the main bail at the level of the head. The long cap, with the bottom attached with a wedge to a socket in the rear arm of the hilt, with the top, topped with an oval shaped half-olive, riveted with the headstock pin. The rear arm of the hilt and the bail decorated all over with laurel leaf motifs, the whiskers decorated with rosette and palmetto motifs. The long cap with an ornament in the form of a palmette, a grotesque and a rooster, the symbol of France, holding laurel branches in its talons. Between the hilt and the base of the head a leather pad. The head of steel, polished, one-third of its length tarnished navy blue, with a slight curvature. Profiled on both sides along its entire length in two furrows with a strongly protruding bone and a round back. The pen is double-edged, the hilt in line with the ridge. On both rusticated lobes etched ornament: panoplia, crescent, twigs, garlands. On the threshold, at the root, on both sides of the ornament. All, characteristic of the head of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, elements of the decoration of the head gilded. At the level of the belly, on the inner side, an etched inscription: "Union et Force" (Union and Force), on the outer side: "A.J. Egalite." On the outer ornament of the threshold the initials of the manufacturer: "SH" (Samuel Hoppe, active in late 18th and early 19th century Solingen). P o c h w a steel, polished, with a single gilt brass riffle with a movable collar on the back. Neck of brass, gilded, with moustache sockets, fixed in the scabbard sheath by a press fit. Scabbard with a flat back, finished with an asymmetrical spur.
state of preservation: 5/4/4