Blackbeard's Sword?

National Geographic Society ^ | January 12, 2011 | Willie Drye

[SunkenCiv]

Could this partly gilded hilt have held Blackbeard's sword? There's no way to know for sure, though it was found amid the North Carolina wreck of the Queen Anne's Revenge, the flagship of the infamous 18th-century pirate... After running aground on a sandbar in 1718 near the town of Beaufort, the ship was abandoned but likely remained intact and partly above water for as long as a year before collapsing and disintegrating... The newfound hilt may have been left behind because it was unwanted, or it may have been inaccessible, according to Moore's colleague Wendy Welsh, a conservator on the project. Blackbeard's brief career as a pirate lasted only about two years, but during that time he became one of history's most feared outlaws.

[Constitution Day]

Very cool! I agree with what many of the posters here have already said; it looks like a decorative weapon rather than a fighting one.

At any rate, it would stand no chance against a fearsome Lase-ARRRRRRRR!

I love your new & improved tagline, BTW.

[ThanhPhero]

It may have been a captured piece and not the one he carried to fight.