The sword is noted for its hilt, decorated with magical formulae,[7] Christian symbols, and floral patterns, as well as for the narrow slit in the blade which holds a small shield with the coat of arms of Poland.

The legend links Szczerbiec with King Boleslaus I the Brave who was said to have chipped the sword by hitting it against the Golden Gate of Kiev during his intervention in the Kievan succession crisis in 1018.

It is rectangular in cross-section and its hard edges make it difficult to handle and impractical for fighting, which is indicative of the sword's purely ceremonial usage.

[10] The niello designs include inscriptions written in late Romanesque majuscule (with some uncial additions[11]), Christian symbols, and floral patterns.

[13][14] On the chamfered edge around this design runs a circular Latin inscription in two rings which reads: Rec figura talet ad amorem regum / et principum iras iudicum ("This sign rouses the love of kings and princes, the wrath of judges").

[13] The crossguard bears the following Latin inscription: Quicumque hec / nomina Deii secum tu/lerit nullum periculum / ei omnino nocebit ("Whoever will carry these names of God with him, no danger will harm him").

These lost inscriptions are partly known from graphical documentation made by King Stanislaus Augustus's court painter, Johann Christoph Werner, in 1764 and by Jacek Przybylski in 1792.

One of the plates had already been broken by that time with only part of the inscription preserved: Liste est glaud... h Bolezlai Duc... ("This is a sword of... Duke Boleslaus...");[2][18][16] the inscription on the other plate continued: Cum quo ei D[omi]n[us] SOS [Salvator Omnipotens Salvator] auxiletur ad[ver]sus partes amen ("With whom is the Omnipotent Lord and Savior, to help him against his enemies.

The current composition, with the symbols of the Evangelists duplicated on each side of the hilt, matches that known from the earliest preserved depiction drafted by Johann Christoph Werner in 1794.

[25] Szczerbiec is owned by the Wawel Royal Castle National Art Collection (inventory number 137)[28] in Kraków, the former capital city of Poland.

The sword is suspended horizontally inside a glass case in the middle of the Jagiełło and Hedwig Vault located on the ground floor in the northeastern corner of the Wawel Castle.

This account, written three centuries after the events it describes, is implausible not only because of the customary reference to the sword's supernatural origin (compare Excalibur), but also because Boleslaus's intervention in the Kievan succession crisis took place in 1018, or about 19 years before the actual construction of the Golden Gate in 1037.

[33] Although Boleslaus the Brave's notched sword has not been preserved and even its very existence is doubtful, its legend had a great impact on Polish historical memory and the treatment of its successor, the modern Szczerbiec.

After his Polish coronation in 1370, King Louis I of Hungary took the crown jewels with him to Buda; his successor on the Hungarian throne, Emperor Sigismund, rendered them to Poland in 1412.

In 1733, during the War of the Polish Succession, supporters of King Stanislaus I concealed the jewels in a Warsaw church for three years to prevent Augustus III from using them in his coronation.

At the same time, he recited a formula which asked the monarch to use the sword to rule justly, defend the Church, fight evil, protect widows and orphans, and to "rebuild what is damaged, maintain what is rebuilt, avenge what is unjust, reinforce what is well managed," etc.

The king stood up and, facing onlookers, withdrew Szczerbiec, made three times the sign of the cross with it, and wiped it against his left arm before replacing it in the scabbard.

[43] Throughout the period from Casimir the Great (r. 1333–1370) to Stanislaus Augustus, Polish crown jewels were commonly believed to date back to the times of Boleslaus the Brave.

The power of tradition was so strong that when Stanislaus Augustus's court painter, Marcello Bacciarelli, who had made detailed studies of Polish crown jewels, painted an imaginary portrait of Boleslaus the Brave, he chose to depict Szczerbiec so that its appearance agreed with legend rather than reality.

In the following year, on King Frederick William II's orders, the treasure vault of the Wawel Castle was looted and the crown jewels taken to Breslau (now Wrocław in Poland), then to Berlin, and finally to Königsberg (now Kaliningrad in Russia).

The prince did not disclose the actual source of the sword and claimed to have bought it in Moscow from an Armenian merchant who had found the weapon somewhere between Belgrade and Rusçuk (now Ruse in Bulgaria) during the recent Russo-Turkish War.

[2] On 3 September 1939, two days after Germany invaded Poland triggering the Second World War, began the evacuation of the most precious national treasures, including Szczerbiec, from the Wawel Castle.

[52] Karol Estreicher, who oversaw the evacuation, decided then to remove Szczerbiec from a chest and sandwich it between two wooden planks, and to attach to them an explanatory message in a bottle – so that in the event that the ship was sunk, at least the coronation sword could be salvaged.

[54] After the war, one of the custodians of the national treasures, who remained loyal to the London-based Polish government-in-exile, was reluctant to return them to Poland, which had fallen under communist rule and Soviet influence.

[51] A treasury inventory of the Radziwiłł family's Nieśwież Castle (now Nesvizh in Belarus) made in 1740 includes a detailed description of a sword decorated with symbols of the Evangelists and inscriptions identical to those on Szczerbiec.

An inventory made in 1738 of the treasure vault of the Sobieski family's Żółkiew Castle (now Zhovkva in Ukraine) mentions "an estoc (koncerz) covered with golden plates bearing images of the Four Evangelists; Skanderbek's."

Based on this record, historian Aleksander Czołowski hypothesized that a replica of Szczerbiec was forged as early as 1457 and awarded to George Kastrioti Skanderbeg, the national leader of Albania, in recognition of his victory over the Ottoman forces (see Battle of Ujëbardha).

[59] In the interwar period, a simplified image of Szczerbiec wrapped three times in a white-and-red ribbon was adopted as a symbol of Polish nationalist organizations led by Roman Dmowski – the Camp of Great Poland (Obóz Wielkiej Polski), the National Party (Stronnictwo Narodowe), and the All-Polish Youth (Młodzież Wszechpolska).

Additionally, Szczerbiec is the title of a periodical published since 1991 by a minor radical nationalist party, the National Revival of Poland (Narodowe Odrodzenie Polski).

The catalog, co-authored by independent anti-fascist organization Never Again (Nigdy Więcej), listed the Mieczyk Chrobrego as one of the extreme right symbols that are often displayed at the Polish stadiums.