Subject: Re: blacksmithing

From: "David C. Hufford" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 15 Mar 1996 07:28:41 -0500 (EST)

I agree with you, Mike.  I've seen too much cold-worked and arc welded 
stuff labeled *forged*.  If you put some of these *blacksmiths* in front 
of a coal forge and anvil, they'd be lost.  While a traditionalist, I 
believe the judicious use of the electric welder or oxy-acetylene torch 
is valid as an auxillary technique; sometimes (as you point out) there 
may be no other way to accomplish the design.  However, by definition, 
blacksmithing must use forging as the predominant process.

David C. Hufford

---

From: Ralph Snel <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 15 Mar 1996 14:01:12 MET

> stuff labeled *forged*.
Is that where forgery comes from? :)

Seriously, Niko and I are from the same country and I've seen these "forged"
things. It's become so popular that any piece of metal that doesn't have
a piece of plastic on it somewhere is called "smide" in Swedish, which means
something like forged, but not necessarily handforged. There is no real single
word for "handforged object" that I can think of now, but something that is
very often used is "konstsmide" (as a noun), which means art-forged. This
used to stand for the handmade stuff untill a few years ago. Now anything
that vaguely resembles art or pretty stuff and is welded together from
anything that will rust is called "konstsmide". This very often is
candlesticks and such.

The worst thing I've seen sofar is a brandname called "konstsmide", producing
wooden and plastic lamps. It has nothing whatsoever to do with blacksmithing,
not even generic smithing.

Calling your things handmade "konstsmide" does the job for the moment, but
I've already seen handwelded (and unpainted) candlesticks called handmade
konstsmide. There is just no single word or short description for what is
the true blacksmithing. For the moment a "handforged" (not used as a noun yet)
(vs handmade) object still makes a difference, but handforged already
encompasses power hammer and die work.

Ralph Snel
[email-masked]
Sweden (handforged knife-maker, a.o.)