Help to ID double-headed eagle sword

I hope that this is the correct location for my question. I have picked up a sword today, but I am not sure of what I got. The hilt has a lion head and a cutout style basket, there is a crest on the hilt of a double-headed eagle, and the sword is also without a langet. The blade is marked “W K &C” and have both logo (the king w/ crown and the knight head) the blade is engraved and is in good (non-sharpen) condition. The old man who sold this sword to me said that it was his father and that it was German. I have never seen a German sword made like this one; with the double-headed eagle crest I was thinking that it may be Austrian, but I have been told that it is- Serbian-or- Russian-or- Romanian ??

By having both logos can any one gives me an approx. year of production? Any information on this sword would be very helpful

I have posted photos at :
http://new.photos.yahoo.com/geojanfranke@v...460762369017725

Hallo Georg

Welcome to the forum, the double eagle headed sword is for sure Serbian. I have seen the same style coat of arms on Serbian medals.

Kevin in Deva,

The crest on your sword appears to be that of Serbia (see the coat of arms below from Wikipedia). Romania did not use the double-headed eagle as its emblem.

It is a variant (with a lion head on top of the grip) of a M. 1895 saber for Serbian cavalry officers. Other variants had plain grip-caps. The coat of arms was for the Kingdom of Serbia, before 1918.

It was made by Wyersberg, Kirschbaum & Cie (WK&C) from Solingen. This model was typical for German cavalry swords and was also adopted by the Romanian cavalry troop in 1906, with plain hilt bars. The Escort Regiment had the Romanian coat of arms in the middle of the hilt.

(Source: Branko Bogdanovic, Hladno Oruzje Srbije, Crne Gore i Jugoslavije. 19-20 Vek, Beograd, 1997)