From around 1640, light swords with short, flexible, pointed blades appeared in response to new fencing techniques that emphasised thrusting at speed. They were worn increasingly with civilian clothes as ‘small swords’, offering a means of self-defence but largely denoting status for the well-dressed gentleman.

Small swords were items of male jewellery. By the 1750s, their elaborate gold and silver hilts, mounted with precious stones and fine enamelling, were the products of the goldsmith and jeweller rather than the swordsmith. They made fitting rewards for distinguished military and naval service. With their blades tucked away inside scabbards, it was their ostentatious and expensive hilts that carried their thrust.

This sword is decorated with the arms of James Hartley (1745-99) and the arms of The East India Company and is inscribed: 'Presented to Lt. Colonel James Hartley in Testimony of his brave & gallant Conduct by The Honble East India Company 1779'

James Hartley received this sword after saving the British army from destruction in India during the Mahratta Wars. The sword cost £105 and James Morisset, one of London's most celebrated makers of enamelled gold dress-swords and boxes, was commissioned to produce it. Morisset's swords were influential. With its urn-shaped pommel, this is one of the first to be produced in the Robert Adam style.