To many with an interest in British military swords the name of Pillin will be very familiar. Yet, for a firm which traded for at least 65 years there is little information available about its activities beyond a few bare dates and addresses often quoted from the same sources. The original source of much of this information is unclear and some of this now appears questionable.

In writing this article my intention is to provide a more comprehensive account of the Pillin dynasty. By examining what new evidence may be available I hope to evaluate and revise contemporary wisdom regarding Pillin’s operations.

In conducting this research during a global Covid-19 pandemic, amid national and local lockdowns, I am restricted in source material but have relied heavily on sources available online. Such methodology carries its own risks, there are gaps in the available datasets and frustratingly, transcription errors can both hamper searches and offer false positive matches. Nevertheless, with the rise in popularity of ancestry research, new data sources are constantly being made available. In today’s world of social media and online resources we have ready access to data of which researchers even 15 years ago could only have dreamed.

Information regarding sword cutlers, such as their trading dates and addresses, is of particular interest as it can help to correctly date a sword. This in turn can assist with identifying an original owner. In the case of British blades, etched with the owner’s initials or a family crest, cross referencing with the Army lists will often provide multiple possible candidates over the lifetime of a sword pattern. Accurately identifying the year of manufacture can significantly assist in narrowing the field of potential matches against any one set of initials. A desire to identify the original owners of some of my own collected swords, and to assist others to do the same, provided the seed of motivation for my research into the Pillin dynasty.

I hope this article provides a useful platform for additional research.

对于许多对英国军刀感兴趣的人来说，Pillin 的名字会非常熟悉。然而，对于一家交易了至少 65 年的公司来说，除了经常从同一来源引用的几个裸露的日期和地址之外，几乎没有关于其活动的信息。大部分信息的原始来源尚不清楚，其中一些现在似乎有问题。

在撰写本文时，我的目的是对皮林王朝进行更全面的描述。通过检查可能获得的新证据，我希望评估和修改有关 Pillin 行动的当代智慧。

在全球 Covid-19 大流行期间、在国家和地方封锁期间进行这项研究时，我在源材料方面受到限制，但在很大程度上依赖于在线可用资源。这种方法有其自身的风险，可用数据集存在差距，令人沮丧的是，转录错误既会妨碍搜索，又会提供误报。然而，随着祖先研究的普及，新的数据源不断被提供。在当今充满社交媒体和在线资源的世界中​​，我们可以随时访问数据，而这些数据即使在 15 年前也只是研究人员梦寐以求的。

关于刀匠的信息，例如他们的交易日期和地址，特别令人感兴趣，因为它可以帮助正确确定一把刀的日期。这反过来可以帮助识别原始所有者。就英国刀片而言，蚀刻有所有者的姓名首字母或家族徽章，与陆军列表的交叉引用通常会在剑型的整个生命周期内提供多种可能的候选者。准确识别制造年份可以显着帮助缩小与任何一组首字母匹配的潜在匹配范围。想要确定我收集的一些剑的原主人，并帮助其他人也这样做，为我研究皮林王朝提供了动力的种子。

我希望这篇文章为进一步的研究提供一个有用的平台。