French left hand dagger

The inscriptions on this left hand dagger tell us a lot about its creation. The ricasso of the blade is inscribed with 'VIVE LE ROY', meaning 'long live the King', and the inscription of 'ANNO 1635' along the length of the blade tells us just who exactly that King is: Louis XIII of France. This type of parrying dagger would have rarely been used to cause injury, instead providing a material symbol of devotion to the King to civilian gentlemen in the upper class.   The parrying dagger has a cruciform hilt with a broad handguard emerging from the quillon and reaching upwards to the pommel. The handguard is decorated with a simple palm frond design and 23 piercings and the slim, long quillons feature an undulating twist as ornament. The rear of the ricasso has an indent for its user to rest a finger in use, and they are also given the choice to loop their finger through the figner loop for further precision. One side of the blade is straight, for slahsing, and the opposide side has rivulets cut into it to act similarly to a sword breaker, by catching the edge of their opponent's sword.