Help? Central European War Axe?

[littleknife]

[QUOTE="jake pogg, post: 17522321, member: 442153"
The russian schematic in Steve's post #4 though is entirely ....erroneous...(as is evident by inclusion of obvious broad-axes in a table of "military" related objects...).
Russian materials of this sort are Particularly questionable,alas,the archaeology in that unhappy place have long been plagued by politics,lack of funding,misguided nationalism and just plain romantic vision....alas and alack.[/QUOTE]

Jake is most certainly right regarding the “accuracy” and ethnic assignment of this “Mongol battle axes”.

The region was inhabited by numerous steppe nomad groups, and many of them used very similar if not identical tools, weapons.
E.g. some of the fokos-type battle axes (No. 1, 4 and 5 in the pic posted by Steve) have existed until very recently in Hungary and are described now as “kun fokos”, i.e. “Cuman fokos”:

http://www.meska.hu/img/product/normal/a/d/adithiel_product_131492_140827161100_1.jpg

Similar weapons were/are ascribed to Avar, Bulgar, Hungarian, Alan, Cuman etc. groups in the region (Southern Russia, contemporary Ukraine, Hungary).
As far as I know the Mongols these were not typical Mongol weapons, but have been used by people conquered by the Mongols. One question is, were they still typical after the Mongol conquest or not?

 

[jake pogg]

Bravo,Littleknife,an excellent,substantiated analysis of the subject.

Thank you for this responsible,balanced view.That's what really makes it interesting-information...(vs my own mad ramblings...)

Very true that,about the battle-flails.Another example of similar effect is that well-known engraving of an armourer during a peasant revolt in Poland,where you can see a pile of scythes on one side of the anvil,and another pile of same already straightened for handling as pole-arms...
(no dates or links for you,in my usual scatter-brained style.......

In any case,just to underscore the danger of attribution of an object as military equipment....

 

[jake pogg]

Of all the cool links by Littleknife i liked this one the most:
http://kara.allthingsd.com/files/2008/10/medieval-battle-ax.jpg

Quality(-ish) reproduction,where we can see how complex and laborious in execution the socket for the like tool was,and really needed to be...

However,the Physics of similar objects were(in my opinion)based on this Austrian-German side-ax:
https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/...0002/lot-4fc7b4c4-0e70-45fc-a49f-a3f7015a0046

Since this type(sorry,i've not the exact name for it) was handled very short,it was for some very close,precise work,therefore the eye didn't need to be overly developed.
Possibly,when it needed to evolve(de-volve)into militaria,then the socket,as in the reproduction above,had it's structural elements borrowed from the more familiar to us,the boxier "goosewing" side-axe.....
(more speculations...really ought to leave this poor topic be......)

 

[Steve Tall]

...that well-known engraving of an armourer during a peasant revolt in Poland,where you can see a pile of scythes on one side of the anvil,and another pile of same already straightened for handling as pole-arms...

Is this the picture:

Artur Grottger, "Kucie kos" ("Forging of Scythes") during the January Uprising

On this topic, I recently read that a blacksmith caught straightening the tang of a scythe blade (or otherwise converting it to a weapon) would get the death penalty. Sorry I forget the exact place/ time/ source.

 

[Kevin Houtzager]

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[Kevin Houtzager]

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[jake pogg]

Thanks,Steve,it's the right uprising,but i think there's a picture where the straightened tangs are depicted in a more anatomically correct detail

But yes,this is the principle at work.And a "battle-scythe" is not a joke,to many.
And invariably at some point some re-enactor or other would develop a technique of using it in battle...

Much of history was studied by the academia(quite naturally),who, along with all admirable traits,have too often made the (necessary)assumptions unencumbered by much common-,practical sense...

I can't help noticing such shortcomings in history/archaeology,that could've easily been rectified have the gentlemen consulted to "mechanics",as the hands-on tradesmen were known.
And in this manner they'd have learned that forging something like an axe or a scythe,in a mass manner for an army,would be Uber impractical...just plain too complex and time consuming...(vs something like a spear,in it's cruder form,a super easy and quick solution to arming multitudes).

And REDESIGNING something,with all that it spells for the smith as far as re-tooling and re-training help,is a rather tall order for Any craftsman...Smiths were very conservative for reasons having to do with practicality,first and foremost..

 

[littleknife]

Much of history was studied by the academia(quite naturally),who, along with all admirable traits,have too often made the (necessary)assumptions unencumbered by much common-,practical sense...

I can't help noticing such shortcomings in history/archaeology,that could've easily been rectified have the gentlemen consulted to "mechanics",as the hands-on tradesmen were known.

There is a lot of unsubstantiated tradition in archeology, historiography, ethnography etc. - a carry over from the 19th Century.
At that time archeology was a hobby of wealthy gentlemen, mostly noblemen, who had variable (or frequently not at all) hands-on knowledge and practical understanding about many things they described, discovered or wrote about. Most of their knowledge was based on written sources only, and their interpretation distorted by class and national stereotypes and prejudices.
At the end of the 19th Century Europe witnessed the expansion of higher education (the birth of professional academic researcher), the rapid disappearance of the traditional agrarian and accompanying craftsman culture (described and catalogued by ethnographers and historians), and appreciation (but not necessary a true understanding) of the material culture and technology of people of different eras or locales. Still, as Jake Pogg mentioned it above, romantic and nationalistic myths or notions are difficult to confront, sometimes even today.

That is why it is very useful to have forums, like this around, because thanks to its many knowledgable members, they can be real eye openers regarding the complexities of material culture and can provide educational opportunities the official academia of the day and given locale might frequently neglect or miss.
That is why it is very fortunate to have here people like Jake who can substantiate their quite unique inter-cultural perspective with practical and technical knowledge of the crafts they are practicing.
Their involvement in this forum, I think, is just as important aspect of their craftsmanship, as the creation of physical objects, the discovery-rediscovery of technologies and its transfer to others.

 

[littleknife]

Kronckew’s axe resembles the much larger voulge, a medieval pole arm:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voulge

https://sep.yimg.com/ca/I/yhst-138463016558931_2413_539211144.gif

http://previewcf.turbosquid.com/Pre...0655fdba-3c80-41af-9eba-d58d8c83a60cLarge.jpg

Unlike the voulge though, it has a single socket.

It also resembles the pole arm in a Geneva collection described as ‘German battle-axe of the fifteenth century’ (No. 53 on the picture below):

http://members.iinet.net.au/~rmine/temp/halberds/Polearms-Geneva.jpg

It appears that whoever made that fantasy axe (I still suspect a Pakistani or Indian maker) just scaled down and modified/re-interpreted the medieval pole arms to create a modern “medieval battle axe” for the Renaissance fare & mall ninja crowd.

 

[Square_peg]

Regarding the mis-interpretation of archeological artifacts, I'm reminded of an ethnographic survey of primitive people in Papua New Guinea.

For years archeologists have been finding dozens of small 'scrapers' strewn throughout dig sites. These are stone tools re-touched from a round edged flake of flint, chert or other suitable stone. Many of them are too small to really be of use as a scraper of hide or arrow shafts. And their prevalence was baffling - just too many for the amount of work that needed done.

Then while observing the primitive society they found these tools were simply used as spoons. Prevalence accounted for.

 

[Steve Tall]

my axe appears to be similar to one listed at lutel.com, the czech replica makers, as a 'central european war axe 13-15c. rather vague. theirs, unlike mine, has the blade riveted to the socket and sharpened on all sides. can anyone shed any light to pin it down a bit more on area of origin and time frame, on mine? lutel must have gotten the design from somewhere, a museum or castle display?...

View attachment 777413 View attachment 777414 View attachment 777415

Here's a potential answer for kronckew, when he asked where lutel (the replica makers) got the inspiration for their war axe design (from a museum or castle display?)...

Here's the lutel product:

Here's kronckew's acquisition:

Here are some axes supposedly from a museum in Croatia:

The listing for the axe on the right (#312) looks like it's referring to the 16th century.
The book is said to show "the collection of arms and armour in the Museum of Gornja Stubica, Croatia."

"It takes only an hour to get from busy Zagreb to the green and peaceful villages of Zagorje. We go to Gornja Stubica where we visit the Peasants’ Revolt Museum situated in a baroque castle that used to belong to the family Oršić. The museum displays the life of the peasants and aristocracy in the times of feudalism, from the 15th until the mid-19th century, and tells us about the 16th century peasants’ revolts and their legendary leader Matije Gubec."
from http://aurarustica-travel.com/excursions/zagorje-gornja-stubica-marija-bistrica/

 

[Kevin Houtzager]

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