Peter Geuzen, Fake Hercules Sword enthusiast and Friend of #Swordgate, has produced an updated version of his poster that includes additional information and comparisons. Here it is:

Changes from Version 3 include:

• An abstract at the top of the page;
• Occurrence dates, Sword numbers that correspond to the entries in the Fake Hercules Sword database, and provisional type designations;
• Blade similarity indicator arrows and annotation for Type F;
• Indicator lines and annotation for similar "clean blade" versions (possibly Type CS);
• Indicator lines and annotation for the single "Pugio" (Type P) example;
• Enhanced pinstripe.

One of the things that's made #Swordgate fun is the online interactions I've had with people who are interested in the swords in particular, pseudo-archaeology in general, ancient Rome, the history/prehistory of Nova Scotia, The Curse of Oak Island television program, and any and all combinations of those things.  Science is a human endeavor.  In this case, the human component has been just as rewarding to me as making progress in cracking the problem.

I've really enjoyed interacting with Nova Scotians who have a genuine interest in the cultural heritage of their province.  I've gotten a lot of encouragment from them, and that has helped to keep me going. The people who send me messages, write me emails, and comment on this blog tell me that the issues involved in Swordgate matter to them on several levels. They are interested and engaged, and the story matters to them.

I wanted to pass along this video by a Nova Scotian giving his point of view of what's been going on. If you're wondering what people on the local and regional level think of all this, his words will provide you with a good data point.  It's not just an academic issue of whether the sword (or any of the other pieces of "evidence" being put forward) is authentic or not. It's about more than that.  Watch the video if you've got 15 minutes. (Fair warning: there's a little bit of language -- nothing worse than what your kids have probably already heard if they've graduated the fourth grade).

I want to thank everyone for the comments and links related to shrinkage during during the metal casting process. I apologize for not having time to respond to the comments or investigate the sources thoroughly at this point.

The take-away point I'm getting is that size decrease is inevitable during metal casting.  A given mass of metal will have a greater volume when molten then when solid, so the metal piece that is produced from a mold will be smaller when cold than the mold it filled up when molten. There is also the potential for molds made of ceramic to shrink while when they are produced.

Anyway, it appears that it's perfectly logical to expect a trend of decreasing size if a series of objects that was produced through a "chain" of copying.  The first generation will be smaller than the original; the second generation will be smaller than the first, etc. The sources several of you provided suggest about 1-2% size difference between the mold and the cast is typical of copper alloys.

The larger size of the Hercules on the California sword shows up in all the dimensions.  The Design Toscano sword in the smallest. The Italian eBay sword is in-between. That supports a chronological ordering with the California sword earliest, the Italian eBay second, and the currently-produced Design Toscano sword latest.

If these three swords represent different generations, how much size decrease was there between generations? I calculated the differences (in both millimeters and percentages) of the measured dimensions of two pairs: (1) the California sword (Sword 3) and the Italian eBay sword (Sword 4); and (2) the California sword and the Design Toscano sword (Sword 5).  Here are those data: 

The measured dimensions vary from 0.8% to 4.2% between California and Italian eBay, with a mean difference of about 2%. To me, that seems most consistent with California and Italian eBay being representatives of sequential generations. Maybe the generation of the J Type swords was just once removed from the generation of the F types (in other words, an F Type sword was used as the model for the J Type, replacing the partially fullered blade with a shorter, unfullered blade).

The differences between the California sword and the Design Toscano Sword vary from 5.6% to 11.1%, with a mean of about 7.8%.  Assuming a 1.75% decrease in size per generation, the Design Toscano sword could be fifth or sixth generation (with the California sword being "Generation 1").  A fifth generation sword would be expected to be about 93% the size of a first generation sword, assuming each generation is 98.25% the size of its parent.

I think the Cvet sword, the Spain sword, and the sword currently for sale on eBay (from Florida) could be members of a generation between the Italian eBay sword and the Design Toscano swords. These swords appear to be copper alloy swords with relatively "clean" blades missing the suite of anomalies that we're using to define the J Type.  I've been calling this grouping "Type CS" in my head.  If my hypothesis is correct, the dimensions of the Hercules on the Cvet sword should fall between those of the Italian eBay sword and the Design Toscano sword.

This is just a quick post to show you a first-time-ever, in-person lineup of three of the provisional types of Fake Hercules Swords. The Italian eBay Sword (aka Sword 4 in the Fake Hercules Sword Database) owned by Trevor Furlotte arrived at SCIAA today to much fanfare. I taught class this morning until 9:45. When I got to my building after that I was immediately told that a box had arrived. Three PhDs watched me open the box and we got to do a quick visual comparison between the Italian eBay sword, the California sword, and the Design Toscano sword. Then everyone went about their business for the day, including me.  

I'm looking forward to having a careful look at the Italian eBay sword when I get a bigger block of time. But I wanted to share one quick observation.  If I've correctly surmised that the various types of swords we've defined have a chronological significance (with Type F [California] being earliest, Type I [Design Toscano] being most recent, and Type J [Italian eBay] being somewhere in the middle), it appears that there may be a trend of decreasing size of the Hercules figure through time. Look at this image of the sword hilts lined up against a straight edge:

Hercules gets shorter from left to right, which is what I think is an earliest-to-latest time ordering of these things. I had already noticed that the Design Toscano Hercules was smaller than the California Hercules, but I hadn't even thought about how the Type J would compare.

A decrease in overall detail from left to right is also noticeable in the line-up.

I'm not sure exactly how to explain the decrease in size, but it is intriguing. In craft traditions, a decrease in size through time of stylistic elements (i.e., parts of the design that are not stongly constrained by functional requirements) could be expected to be the natural result of accumulations in copy error. Generally, humans can't reproduce something exactly correctly by hand -- there's typically a +/- 5% error that isn't noticeable to the human brain or controllable based on our abilities. (Some researchers contend that a decrease in mean size is the expected outcome of accumulated copying error -- I've played around with that in some of my modeling work and found that the median drifts downward rather than the mean, but that's not super relevant here and it's been a long time since I thought about it.)  But why would there be a trend toward decrease in size over time when a mold is used?  I'm not sure why that would be, but it's interesting because it seems consistent with some kind of copy chain (i.e., copies made from copies) rather than copies made by reference to some original.

I'll have more to say about this later when I have some time to take a close look at all of these and fill in some blanks in the database.

I don't quote Ronald Reagan often, but brace yourselves because I'm going to quote him now:

"There you go again."

Reagan delivered that line in an exchange with Jimmy Carter in a presidential debate in 1980. He said it following a laundry list of claims by Carter about Reagan's stance on healthcare issues, famously dismissing what he regarded as a bunch of inaccurate nonsense.

Most of the latest temper tantrum of inaccurate nonsense delivered to the world by demonstrated liar, accomplished plagiarist, and former Facebook user J. Hutton Pulitzer can be just as easily waved off as foot stomping that is not relevant to the "evidence" that he has put forward to support his claim of an ancient Roman visit to Nova Scotia. There is one point I wanted to discuss, however, that relates directly to misinformation about the Nova Scotia sword.

In her analysis of the sword, Christa Brosseau found the copper alloy used to make the sword to be 35% zinc. The high level of zinc (indicating a modern brass) was one of several observations that led Brosseau to conclude that the sword was probably manufactured sometime after 1880. Brosseau wrote that "a brass that is being put forward as ancient which contains a zinc content greater that 28% is suspicious." 

In his post, Pulitzer seems to be claiming that ancient Roman artifacts commonly had levels of zinc in the 35% range.  He writes:

When dealing with Pulitzer, the safe answer to the "who does one trust" question is always the same: not Pulitzer.

The webpage he links to does indeed say that copper alloys classified as brass contain between 5% and 45% zinc.  It says the Romans made brass, but it does not say that the Romans made high zinc brass. They did not. I'll back up my statement with a couple of quoted references (thanks to my readers for pointing these out), and then finish off my discussion of Pulitzer's characterization of Roman brass with a helpful meme.

Here is quote from "A Roman Late-Republican Gladius from the River Ljubljanica," a 2000 paper by Janka Istenic:

Here is what is says about Roman brass on Wikipedia, which one would think would be an easy enough source to consult:

Finally, there is a 2006 paper ("Neutron Activation and X-Ray Fluorescence Analyses of Early Roman Age Bohemian Artifacts") that I saw bandied around Facebook with some excitement because those reading it thought it indicated that some Roman brass contained up to 85% zinc. They were referring to Table 2, apparently, which they were reading wrong: the table shows only one entry for an artifact with a zinc level above 26%. The "85.7" in the Zn column under "Drinking Horns" is saying that 85.7 percent of the drinking horns in the sample have 0-2 percent zinc.

There is no evidence of which I'm aware of Roman brass with a zinc content greater than 30%. That means there is no evidence that the metals in the Nova Scotia sword could have been made in ancient Rome.

It's interesting to note that Pulitzer's attempts to discredit the testing of the sword have now moved from claiming a conspiracy to fake the results of the test (by swapping swords) to claiming that Brosseau's results are in line with what we expect of ancient Roman brass. This is not an insignificant shift, as he is basically admitting that his XRF results (which he still has not described in detail) are garbage compared to what Brosseau produced. I have a feeling he looked at Brosseau's summary of her analyses and realized there was no longer a path for him to claim that his alleged testing was somehow "superior" to hers. So now's he's left having to argue that the Romans could have indeed made that metal. Good luck with that argument - it's not a winner. 

Roman brass with 35% zinc?  There  you go again . . .

Peter Geuzen has produced an updated version (3.0) of the #Swordgate poster that includes all twelve of the known Fake Hercules Swords. Perhaps the mystery will be solved with the thirteenth sword is found . . . cue the dramatic music.

I hope to find time soon to update the Fake Hercules Sword database and update the Argumentative Archaeologist pages with the latest posts on the sword, the "crossbow bolts," and the Harold Stone. I'll probably create "Oak Island" and "Roman Scotia" pages there to organize all the information. I'm also going to create a distinct area on this website to organize posts about the various swords - there's a lot of information about them now and I can make it easier to find. I've got a lot to do today and probably won't be able to squeeze all of that in, but it's coming.

The latest weak coffee to be added to stew of "evidence" for a Roman occupation of Nova Scotia is a "Roman inscribed stone." The carved boulder, described in this post as a "Roman symbology stone," joins an evidence list that already includes such powerhouse "smoking guns" as a modern brass tourist sword and some "crossbow bolts" that are most likely pieces of historic period logging tools.  

The "Roman symbology stone" is depicted as covered with all kinds of symbols that don't look like much to me. Apparently you have to be a professional cacheologist to understand that the symbols on the stone mark

"some form of a Roman Recon Mission, possibly a forbearer to various Iberian Reconquistas hit the shores of Oak Island."

Or, as Howard Montgomery (an alert member of an Oak Island group on Facebook) did, you could just turn the stone upside down and read it as it was meant to be read.

It says "Harold."

These pieces of "evidence" seem to be getting dumber and dumber, which (hint hint) is the wrong direction to go if you want to build a case that anyone will take seriously. ​

Recently I've been asked how long I plan on staying on this topic. I don't really have an answer to that except to say that I'll write about something if it interests me. I found #Swordgate to be fascinating, so I put quite a bit of effort into it. The drivel that we're seeing now, while somewhat entertaining in a strange way, doesn't have much appeal to me beyond the "how long does this go on" question. I'm curious to see how all this plays out now that (1) the main piece of "evidence" has been pretty thoroughly examined and (rightfully) thrown in the garbage pile and (2) the main proponent of the case has demonstrated himself to be less than credible both in terms of his interpretations and his statements of fact.  Lately we've seen a second round of attempts to get the "Roman" story in the media.  My impression is that those attempts have been less successful than the first round. We've also seen some kind of strange battle on social media that has apparently resulted in Pulitzer being suspended from using his Facebook accounts.

One thing that I haven't seen yet is others in the "fringe" community distancing themselves from this debacle.  As someone commented on my blog (sorry - I haven't been able to find the post again), what we're seeing here has moved beyond "fringe" archaeology into the realm of "tassel" archaeology. I get emails from people across the spectrum on things like this. One person who self-identified as someone on the "fringe" told me that "everyone on the fringe side is laughing at Hutton as much as the archaeological community." As far as I know, however, no-one on the "fringe" side has publicly said "enough of this nonsense." People who carefully read what I write will know that I am open to many different ideas about the past. I am a scientist, however, and for me to accept a claim as credible there has to be some kind of evidence that stands up to scrutiny. I think many of you on the "fringe" side understand and appreciate that and also understand that what we're seeing here does not meet even the minimum thresholds of quality of evidence, sincerity of investigation, or honesty of argument required to be taken seriously. The Ancient Artifact Preservation Society went all in on Pulitzer's story, and is apparently still backing all of this. Some of you could do a lot for your own credibility, I would suspect, by weighing in with your judgement of the merits of what's going on. Pulitzer is pretending to speak for all of you right now, and what he's saying is not making you look good.

That's just my opinion. If you want to keep drinking the weak coffee and pretending it tastes good to you, that's your business. Prepare yourselves for some pretty bad tasting stuff coming down the road: my impression is that the coffee is only going to get weaker. Don't say I didn't warn you when we're debating a Little Caesar's box washed up on shore (that's from another blog comment that I can't find - sorry for stealing it to whoever said it) and you're still letting the TreasureForce Commander speak for you. 

The stone says "Harold."  What else are you waiting for?

This is just a quick not to point you in the direction of the latest addition to the Fake Hercules Sword club: the Cvet sword (it will become Sword 12 in the Fake Hercules Sword Database). It is another copper alloy sword that I think is probably similar to the Spain sword (Sword 7) and the Florida eBay sword (Sword 10) -- it has a relatively short, unfullered blade that is missing the casting anomalies present in the Type J swords.

I also give you another cartoon from Killbuck, which pretty much sums it up.

The "sword" episode of The Curse of Oak Island aired in Canada last night, and Dr. Christa Brosseau is now free to discuss her analysis and results. In the period of time between now and when those of us in the U.S. got to see the episode, I've seen many incorrect (and, frankly, insulting) statements about Brosseau's work coming from those who have staked all their credibility on the sword being an ancient Roman artifact. We owe her a "thank you" for participating in this endeavor.

I am very happy that Brosseau has agreed to let me publish this statement here. I'm sure that many people who will read this are not experts in metals analysis. Brosseau is. Even if you don't understand every detail of this summary, take note of the manner in which she describes the rationale for the tests she undertook, her methods, the equipment that she used, and her results. That's what professionals do.

Brosseau tells me that she has been following this blog with interest, and will try to answer questions posed to her here. Have a question about the analysis after reading what she has to say?  Fire away.  I especially welcome serious questions from people who still "believe" in the sword. Insulting nonsense comments will be deleted. 

​Here is what Brosseau sent me:

The story about claims for a Roman visit to Nova Scotia continues to get sillier. With the "100 percent confirmed Roman sword" that started this debacle over a month ago now 100 percent debunked by both our work on this blog and the metallurgical results summarized on The Curse of Oak Island, focus on the sword has been supplanted by conspiracy claims, a new "smoking gun" piece of evidence, and some kind of bizarre war being waged on social media. This intent of this post is simply to bring you up to date about what's going on.

The Sword(s)

I would like to see the mystery of the Fake Hercules Swords solved. Even though they're not Roman, I still find them a fascinating problem. Who started making these things? What was the "original"? How and why did they change through time?  I think I find this to be an interesting challenge because historic data seem to be few and far between, requiring that we address these questions through archaeological methods and techniques: build an assemblage, try to understand and organize variability, gather information about the intrinsic characteristics of the items, construct and test hypotheses, etc. To that end, I began a Fake Hercules Sword database yesterday, and I started a group on Facebook to keep a line in the water there. 

In other sword news, I will have a statement from Dr. Christa Brosseau to publish on this blog first thing Monday morning. (Update 1/25/2016: here is Brosseau's summary.) Dr. Brosseau will be able to speak publicly about her analysis after the "sword" episode of The Curse of Oak Island airs tonight in Canada. She has indicated to me that she's been following this blog and will try to respond to questions here.

Boltgate, We Hardly Knew You
​
The new piece of "smoking gun" evidence for a Roman visit to Nova Scotia wasn't much of a mystery and didn't last long. The "Roman crossbow bolts" that were featured to us in the latest laundry list of nonsense turned out to be modern logging tools called Peavey points. This one was quickly cracked by Nova Scotians who understand what the remnants of their own material culture look like. Have a look at this post, this post, and this one from Oak Island Compendium.  I feel pretty comfortable saying that the most plausible explanation for the "crossbow bolts" doesn't have anything to do with ancient Rome, Iberia, a 1000-year-old tree, a U.S. military testing lab, and a conspiracy to hide the truth.

Don't rewrite your history books just yet: the "crossbow bolts" are pieces of logging tools.

​So much for Boltgate.

I Just Assumed We Had All Graduated From Third Grade

As more pieces of the "evidence" for the Roman occupation of Nova Scotia have failed to stand up to scrutiny, we've been treated to a bizarre online temper tantrum that has included some person or group of people trying to disrupt various Oak Island groups on Facebook by creating fake profiles, reporting pictures as containing nudity (when they don't), and who knows what else. In a blog post on Friday, J. Hutton Pulitzer revealed that Facebook has apparently placed him on Double Secret Probation until Monday. He adds Facebook to the growing list of conspirators (e.g., academics like me, the Catholics, the media, The History Channel, etc.) that are trying to keep the world from knowing the truth about modern Fake Hercules Swords and logging tools that have allegedly been found in Nova Scotia.

This is all very juvenile and has nothing whatsoever to do with an objective assessment of the quality of the "evidence" that's being put forward. I'm going to stay out of the nonsense as much as I can and stick to looking at the nuts and bolts (I wonder how long will it be until we are actually shown a picture of nuts and bolts and told they're Roman).

Complete insulation from the idiocy, unfortunately, may not be possible.  Certainly these shenanigans are actually a part of the story: the case of #Swordgate makes it clear that battles over ideas, evidence, and opinions are multi-leveled and occurring in many different ways and places across the internet.  I have neither the time nor the appetite to fight them all, and I'm not planning on getting drawn into silly playground squabbles that will make no difference to the outcome. The arguments matter, sure, but my arguments are going to be based on things that are relevant to the questions at hand.