Backsword

Swedish cavalry pallasch m/1808 – a British pattern 1796 heavy cavalry sword purchased by Sweden in 1808.

A backsword, or pallasch (British Army: heavy cavalry sword), is a type of cavalry sword, characterised by having a sabre-style hilt with a single-handed grip, but with a long heavy straight blade, allowing it to effectively thrust in a cavalry charge.^[1][2][3]

Etymology

Backsword is so called because the sword initially was single-edged, where the triangular cross section gives a flat back edge opposite the cutting edge (cf. Old Swedish: enbak, lit. 'single-back', for the "seax").^[4]

The name pallasch stems from Hungarian: pallos, which is drived from Turkish: pala, a type of cavalry cutlass,^[5] likewise single-edged. It is the common name for the type in most European languages: French: palache, German: Pallasch, Danish: pallask, Swedish: pallasch (/palaɕ/ or /palatɕ/), Polish: pałasz, Russian: Палаш (palaš).^[2]

The similarities to the sabre, however, means that he weapon is often called that.^[1] A 1667 Swedish name is pälax-sabel ("pallasch-sabre").^[2] In pop-culture, the erronously named anime Saber Rider and the Star Sheriffs features a protagonist who wields a backsword, not a saber.

History and design

From around the early 14th century, the backsword became the first type of European sword to be fitted with a knuckle guard.^[4] Being easier and cheaper to make than double-edged swords, backswords became the favored sidearm of common infantry,^[4] including irregulars such as the Highland Scots, which in Scottish Gaelic were called the claidheamh cuil (back sword), after one of several terms for the distinct types of weapons they used. Backswords were often the secondary weapons of European cavalrymen beginning in the 17th century.^[3]

Despite being single-edged, and so named, later examples often have a "false edge" on the back near the tip, which was in many cases sharpened to make an actual edge and facilitate thrusting attacks. Some examples likewise were designed with a double-edged tip for trusting

The British heavy cavalry adopted the design in 1786 as the 1796 Heavy Cavalry Trooper's Sword. It was a direct copy of the Austrian pattern of 1769 pallasch for heavy cavalry. It was copied by cavalry officer John Le Marchant (who also designed the curved 1796 pattern light cavalry sabre), after whitnessing the Austrian weapon in use during the Low Countries Campaign of 1793-95, when he also made many drawings of Austrian cavalry equipment. The board of general officers initially denied to arm the heavy cavalry with a straight sword, but ultimately addopted the Austrian sword as a model. It is probable, once a straight sword had been decided upon, that he then suggested the Austrian sword as a model.^[6][7]

The term "backsword" can also refer to the singlestick, which is used to train for fighting with the backsword, or to the sport or art of fighting in this fashion.^[8] Backswording was an alternative term for singlesticking tournaments in England.^[9][10]

See also

• Classifications of swords
  • Types of swords
  • List of swords

• Basket-hilted swords
• Cutlass
• Dusack
• Falchion
• Golok
• Machete
• Messer
• Parang
• Sabre
• Shamshir
• Szabla
• Shashka

Citations

1. Matt Easton. "WHAT IS the PALLASCH Sword?". youtube.com. Schola Gladiatoria. Retrieved 2026-08-30.
2. "pallasch sbst". saob.se. Swedish Academy. Retrieved 2026-08-30.
3. "Forms of European Edged Weaponry". MyArmoury.com.
4. Loades, Mike (2010). Swords and Swordsmen. Pen & Sword Books. ISBN 978-1-84884-133-8.
5. d:Q4131481
6. Thoumine, R.H. (1968). Scientific Soldier, A Life of General Le Marchant, 1766–1812. Oxford U. Press. p. 44-45.
7. Robson, B. (1975). Swords of the British Army. Arms and Armour Press. p. 23.
8. Allanson-Winn, R. G.; Phillipps-Wolley, C. (1890). Broadsword and Single-stick. George Bell.
9. "Backswords". Oxford Journal. 29 May 1784. p. 2. Retrieved 17 September 2021 – via British Newspaper Archive. Backswords at Stow-on-the-Wold, on Thursday the l0th of June, 1784, will played for, at Backswords, a purse of ten guineas, by Thirteen a Side. To appear on the Stage at Ten o'clock, but in case no sides attend by eleven, Half a Guinea will be then given to each man who breaks a head, and Half a Crown to each Man who has his Head broken.— The blood to run one Inch. N.B. the above meeting will continued Yearly, on the second Thursday in June.
10. "the Prince Regents' Birthday". The Morning Post. 16 August 1819. p. 3. Retrieved 17 September 2021 – via British Newspaper Archive. Backswording for a gold laced hat

General references

• Dwelly's Illustrated Gaelic to English Dictionary. Glasgow: Gairm Publications, 1988, p. 202
• Culloden: the swords and the sorrows. Glasgow: The National Trust for Scotland, 1996

Further reading

• Włodzimierz Kwaśniewicz, Leksykon broni białej i miotającej, Warsaw: Varsavia, 2003.
• Pierre Goubert & Maarten Ultee, The Course of French History, London: Routledge, 1991.
• Philippe Contamine, War in the Middle Ages, Oxford: Blackwell, 1984 ISBN 0-631-13142-6
• R. G. Allanson-Winn & C. Phillipps-Wolley, Broad-sword and Single-stick: with chapters on quarter-staff, bayonet, cudgel, shillalah, walking-stick, umbrella, and other weapons of self-defence (All-England Series.) London: George Bell, 1890.