A VERY EARLY TRANSITIONAL 1st LUFT/DLV DAGGER.

I’ve had quite a few of these very interesting ‘transitional’ Luftwaffe daggers over the years, but I think this is one of the earliest I’ve had, and in my opinion there are bits of this dagger that were on the 55cm DLV.
The original 55cm DLV was far too long to be practical, and whilst it looked great, was too cumbersome to carry. The 1st Luftwaffe was shorter and much easier to use. The companies who made the DLV 55cm sensibly used up their stock on the initial run of 1st Lufts. Mainly on the scabbards and possibly blades as the crossguards, some grips and pommel were totally different. This one is most interesting. The pommel and crossguard are solid nickel and the swastikas are cast into them. No infill disc etc. Grip is slightly longer than normal and has early triple twisted wire. Scabbard has a soft body covered with blue leather and the three scabbard mounts are affixed to the soft shell body with nickel silver staples. Totally DLV. The chain again is solid nickel and has 14 lower rings and 9 upper ones. Early solid nickel snap clip. The blade is polished steel, not plated. It’s in very good condition with a couple of surface scratches near the tip. Shortened from a longer one? Possibly. The riccasso has the very early small oval Eickhorn trademark from 1935. Overall a very interesting original dagger, with historical features from early Luftwaffe history.

Code: 4637