Swordplay and Swagger

Date: c.1600  

Size: Rapier: H:1280mm. Dagger: H: 463mm  

Made in: England  

Made by: Unknown  

Material: Steel, Iron, Wood    

We tend to think of the play about Shakespeare’s most famous couple, Romeo and Juliet, as being about the tribulations of romantic love – when in fact it’s just as much about gangs of privileged lads slicing each other to death.

Although the play’s action is set in Italy, the issue of urban violence would not have been foreign to its English audience. Weapons were part of everyday life – all gentleman of the time would have worn something similar to this rapier and dagger set – part fashion accessory, part murder weapon.

Many such gentlemen would head south of the river to London’s South Bank where, outside the authority of the City, they could encounter the roaring entertainments of Bankside which could either lead the way to delights…or dangerous drunken feuds.

This object is from the Royal Armouries

British Museum Blog: Swords as symbols of status by Toby Capwell, Curator of Arms and Armour, The Wallace Collection

• Stage fights were extremely popular in Elizabethan theatre and actors used real weapons
• According to the 1574 Statute of Apparel, rapiers and daggers could only be worn by gentlemen 'and others of higher degree and place'
• Fencing was an essential part of the education of a man of any status
• The classic text for fencing was Vincentio Saviolo's Discourse of Rapier and Dagger, translated into English in 1595
• Some theatres were multi-purpose venues, offering displays of fencing and bear-baiting when no acting company was in residence

Melvyn Bragg discusses the history and philosophy of warfare, examining how has war been understood throughout the ages, who it has served and how has it been justified.

Listen to the programme