Thought I would list some of the sites I've found useful when working on jewelry and forging designs. Please share any other resources you use as well.

Jewelry

• Glossary of heraldic terms, I used the entry on crowns quite a bit for terminology.
  http://www.heraldsnet.org/saitou/parker/Jpglossc.htm
  
• Illustrated crowns and helms.
  http://www.rarebooks.nd.edu/digital/herald...ges/crowns.html
  
• Images and backgrounds on individual gemstones, useful for determining color as well as terminology.
  http://www.gemstone.org/gem-by-gem/
  
• This is actually more of a safety article, but it's where I got the idea to use sulfur as a comm in a crown design (public design 331) and get some use out of it.
  http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/patination-safety.htm

Forging

• Overview of a variety of weapons. More importantly, at least one illustration accompanies each type.
  http://members.aol.com/dargolyt/TheForge/WPNMAIN.HTM
  
• Commercial site with lots of enlargeable images of weapons and armor. Good for browsing to get ideas.
  http://www.loveleaf.net/sword/main.html
  
• A concise guide to the anatomy of a sword.
  http://www.historicalweapons.com/swordparts.html
  
• Very thorough article on the katana.
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katana
  
• For that matter, the general Wikipedia entry on swords is great too.
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sword

Other

• Chemical formulae for various metal patinas. Very technical but it summarizes the finishes pretty well. Some can be applied towards jewelry items, some towards weapons or armour. Could also be useful for furniture.
  http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/patina-formulas.htm

Interesting! This should be pinned!

That's great. Thank you!

Here's one for forgers: http://www.howstuffworks.com/sword-making.htm

You know, I was just reading through the one about the crowns and the word esquire struck me as unusual so I looked it up. Apparently the term esquire is the title of a squire. So instead of Squire Ithylar, I should be properly called Esquire Ithylar. How... odd.

Nay, Squire. *g*

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=squire - #4. I think either will work.

On dictionary.com the main defintion for an esquire is one who is a candidate for knighthood; such as a squire. What I had gathered is that I would be called a squire, but if you were saying it as a title it would be Esquire Ithylar. Dunno, this all goes way too far back for anyone of us to know what the proper usage is.