Yes, Giant Swords Existed, BUT...

Part 2: Greatswords vs. pikes in battle:

You can find some astonishingly huge swords in museums, and even a few that look like they came straight out of Monster Hunter or some other fantasy game. Were they made for exceptionally tall and strong warriors, or did they serve another purpose, outside of the battlefield?

Let's delve into a few examples to get an idea of just how humongous the biggest ones are. This video also contains a brief look at the historical origin of the greatsword / zweihander / montante / spadone, and what distinguishes it from a longsword.

[Update] Correction for 13:53: Apparently it's not a Naga sword but a "Waitlam" or "Waitsum" from the Khasi & Jaintia tribes of Meghalaya, North East India.

Time stamps:

00:00 - 00:46 Intro
00:46 - 02:57 Terminology and history
02:57 - 03:43 Flamberge style wavy edges
03:43 - 04:58 Sawfish blades!
04:58 - 05:52 Other bearing / processional swords
05:52 - 08:23 The legendary Grutte Pier
08:23 - 09:58 Weight & functionality
09:58 - 11:19 The Norimitsu Odachi
11:19 - 13:20 Real-life gigantism
13:20 - 15:15 Conclusion
15:15 - 15:32 Outro

Various ceremonial greatswords for display of wealth and status:

Fully functional examples of zweihander:

Kiribati weapon with sawfish teeth at the Brooklyn museum:

Museum Mythbusting: No, this is not "The Sword of Grutte Pier"

The Weighty Issue of Two-Handed Greatswords

The Norimitsu odachi, possibly the largest sword ever made:

A great source for medieval depictions:

The reproductions shown in this video:

*** Music ***

Intro song:
"Illuminate" by Vindsvept
Used with artist's permission

Outtakes:
"Little People At Work" by Horrorpen
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license (CC BY 3.0)

Outro:
"Highland Storm" by The Slanted Room Records
Used with artist's permission

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[Leftyotism]

If you put a ceremonial sword in a temple: Just make it too big to steal. Good solution eventually. xD

[JamJestKesh]

i've always liked, how in Berserk, the Dragonslayer sword was made as flex by a blacksmith, with no intention of it being used by anyone, and everybody acknowledges Guts as crazy for using something like that

[Grigeral]

If the giant Odachi were often gifted to temples and linked with protecting samurai or other warriors, then I can only presume that they were designed and created in a way they believed 'only the gods themselves' could wield them.

[Agent]

"It looks like something from Monster Hunter. ... It was made with the nose of a sawfish."

So it IS from Monster Hunter.

[solucioness.a.s]

As soon as the video starts I see a message saying “you don’t have the stats to wield this weapon correctly”

[taylankammer]

If there are two 7 feet swords from that time, that must mean Grutte Pier dual-wielded them!

[GalvatronRodimus]

"Swords are cool, right?"

that's...why I'm here.

[purplehaze]

“It looks like something from _Monster Hunter”_
Given it was made with the parts of a sawtooth shark, it isn’t that far off.

[unitariansavage]

I get your points about the odachi being too big to be used "effectively", but I can imagine a feudal warlord giving one of his tallest peasants the biggest sword he could find for shits and giggles.

[uncabob]

Honestly as cool as giant swords are, the idea of a really big dude with a halberd is actually a little more intimidating to me.

[MoriShep]

The giant Odachie were created by smiths to show off their skill, as the blades were extremely difficult to make as they were composite blades made of two metals they would easily snap in the forging process if even 1 step was done improperly. if the smith could forge that thing they could make a normal-sized blade of good quality

[Citrakite]

Imagine forging a sword for a god and having people hundreds of years later argue if a man could have used it or not.

[GreatWightSpark]

So the Mountain that Rides was Dutch, not Icelandic.

[justinbell]

I'd imagine most warriors with gigantism probably just uses slightly above average weapons. When you're that big and strong and already have reach, you probably don't need much more weight to be effective.

Why swing around a huge sword at the same speed as everyone else when you could just swing a slight above normal sword with your gorilla arms FASTER than everyone else?

[DreadX]

A point you didn't mention.
Making bigger swords requires a higher skill of the maker. Making these big ceremonial swords is also advertising the skill of the maker.
I suspect some of them were actual masterpieces. By that, I mean, swords that were made by an aspiring blade-smith to receive the recognition to become a master blade-smith.

[sticktostick]

"Katanas are cool, right?"
"So what even cooler?"
"BIG KATANAS"
Sir Alonne

[Godzillawolf]

I actually do know of a historical example from my area, Skall:

Peter Francisco, the Virginia Giant or the Virginia Hercules was a Revolutionary War hero who was almost 7 feet tall and known for being incredibly strong, enough so he was able to carry a cannon at one point and there's artwork depicting him reaching up and throwing a British soldier off his horse with one hand. He was known as being one of the best soldiers on the American side to the point George Washington himself said “Without him, we would have lost two crucial battles, perhaps the war, and with it our freedom. He was truly a one-man army.” It is believed he had Gigantism, though unconfirmed.

Washington held Francisco so highly he commissioned a custom broadsword for him that was around six feet long, longer than most people of the time were tall, which he did wield as a traditional broadsword rather than a great sword. He did use it in actual combat, very effectively I might add, and is recorded as once having killed eleven British soldiers in a single battle with it. Not all that surprising given his size combined with the six foot sword would give him a huge reach advantage over most men of the time and his sheer strength combined with the weapon's heft would make it rather difficult to defend against him in close quarters. His descendant, Travis Bowman, sometimes portrays him in reenactments. Bowman is roughly equal in size and is capable of using a replica of the broadsword.

Unfortunately, the broadsword itself is lost. Years after his death it was presented to the Virginia Historical Society by his daughter, but it's since disappeared.

[cameronweaver]

I know that giant swords just aren’t useable but I still like to imagine someone strong enough to pick one up using more of a one shot kill strategy, you don’t need to recover and manoeuvre it if your opponent dies on the first swing

[CntBckt]

I thought pieces like that Norimitsu odachi were practical ads. "Omg this smith is skilled enough to make blades THIS HUGE without twists, cracks, etc."

Was that not a thing? Ceremony and decoration are the only reasons I've thought of that make sense. :\

[WikkeSchrandt]

Awesome to see Grutte Pier get a shoutout. There's still legends of the guy over here, including beers and places named after him.