User blog comment:KevlarNinja/Highlander vs. Landsknecht/@comment-422690-20110424175209/@comment-422690-20110424201955

So after reading that, a couple things come to mind:
 * 1) Weight has nothing to do with how unweildy it is. It's more in how you hold it.
 * 2) While greatswords may be less cumbersome to swing than I thought, thanks to the proportions of the hilt to the blade, of which I was rather underinformed, the length means that holding it by the hilt still requires a lot of force to change the direction. This is why the Khanda uses rotational inetria to strike rather than linear.
 * 3) One of the quotes the author uses to demonstrate that reproduced swords are heavier lists 5 lbs as unwieldy

Now for a demonstration of my point, which involves a more practical demonstration than just taking someone's word for it: find something long and slightly heavy, with its mass uniformly distributed on its length. A rolled-up carpet (not a small throw rug, a proper carpet) works great for this. First, pick it up near the middle. Then, try to lift it near one of its ends. It's harder to get both ends of the carpet off the ground when you're lifting near an end, right? This is why it's difficult to use a greatsword properly. The balance of any large sword is, almost by nature, top-heavy, unless the pommel is dense as s---, which is why I think they are unwieldy. My opinon is probably colored by my fencing experience, but the fact remains that greatswords are difficult to use well.