OT: Book-Search & Help with Dark Ages Sword Names

beoram

beoram

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[1]Does anyone know of where I can find a copy of the

Weapons & Warfare in Anglo-Saxon England edited by Sonia Chadwick Hawkes. Oxford: Oxford University Committee for Archaeology, 1989??
I've tried various book-searches and even commissioned searches - but no luck. Or anyone have a copy I could buy? [please email slade@jhu.edu ]


[2]Also, does anyone know of any recent work on Anglo-Saxon sword terms/types? I have Davidson's The Sword in Anglo-Saxon England and also the excellent article by Caroline Brady "'Weapons' in 'Beowulf': an analysis of the nominal compounds and an evaluation of the poet's use of them", Anglo-Saxon England vol. 8: 79-141 (1979)

As you know -- I'm working on an online translation of Beowulf (visit it at http://www.cog.jhu.edu/~slade/beowulf.html ) and I'm trying to actually distinguish between the different types of swords the poet(s) refer to; unlike most translations -- the poem certainly makes distinctions, but they're not entirely clear to a modern reader as they stand (most translators gloss them all as 'sword', but from the poet(s)' use of them, they're as different as khukurees from katanas):

in addition to 'sweord' and 'ecg' as basic words for swords in general, the following specific types are also mentioned:

bill or bil - some sort of long, two-edged sword (possibly specifically one with a sharp point)

mece - another long, two-edged sword (possibly distinct from a bill in having a rounded point, but the distinction between the two is not clear; though the poets keep these two terms separate)

seax - usually a short, 1-edged weapon, though the word is also used to describe longer 1-edged blades sometimes

brond - another distinct type of short sword, but its exact description is elusive

secg - yet another type of short sword, but again, how it differs from a brond is unclear

any suggestions? both on the sword-terms and also the Chadwick volume?

best, Ben.
 
I'm no expert, but I have a couple of theories to trot out.

"Bill" usually refers to a polearm, often with a blade and a hook to dismount knights.

"Seax" might be a form of "scramsax" which is basically a large bowie in form and function.

That's all I've got. Don't know if it will help or not. Sorry.
 
Ben,

Here is a link that refers to the seax, which appears to be a smaller straight bladed utility knife. ... a symbol of being a free person I think. ...

http://www.regia.org/scram.htm

Somewhere off of this site, there is a big description page of weapons that were appropriate for a huge re-enactment of an Anglo-Saxon war that was done for TV. ... I'll try and find it, as I was surfing it last week (I forgot to bookmark it). It might be of some help on your terms...

Alan
 
Thanks Shrake & Alan -

Seax is pretty clear actually - though the term is used to refer to a number of different weapons - the seax in Beowulf seems pretty clearly to refer to the scramsax 'dagger' seax, not to the longsax.

Shrake, you're right that bill did come to refer to a sort of pole-arm (and/or hewing agriculture tool) later on, but the OE bil is some sort of slender 2-edged sword.

The regia.org site has some nice things, but nothing of the level of detail that I need.

The particularly obscure terms are bil, mece, brond, secg - the first two refer to long swords; the second two to short swords -- but there is an additional difference between a bil and a mece; and a brond and a secg. But what this difference is is unclear, but the poet(s) obviously knew what it was. Further, exactly what the weapons these terms applied to looked like is unclear.

It's unlikely that anything on this will be online; I don't think anyone has pinned down the bil, mece, brond, secg as of yet - but I was just curious if anyone knew --by any chance-- of recent articles which might have done. I'm getting a number of books on migration period + mediaeval swords, some older books, some quite recent; hopefully I'll find some clues in those. It's a trick of matching up the 'linguistic artefacts' with the 'archaeological artefacts'...

cheers, B.
 
Ben,

Well of course I was going to get the easy one!!! :D All those obscure ones are best left up to the experts like yourself. ... I know my limitations, and if it isn't on the net, then I haven't got a chance.

Good luck in your research.

Alan
 
This reminds me of a 7AM history class back in college. I was always too sleepy to do anything except try to stay awake.

It's 8:30 in Reno and I'm on my first cup of coffee. I'll come back later.
 
Weapons and Warfare in Anglo-Saxon England Sonia Chadwick Hawkes ~ January 1989 ~ ISBN: 0947816216 ~ Hardcover

Here you go Beoram :)

*Of course this is for delivery to Nevada. So redo the search for your local.
 
Originally posted by billpaxton
Weapons and Warfare in Anglo-Saxon England Sonia Chadwick Hawkes ~ January 1989 ~ ISBN: 0947816216 ~ Hardcover

Here you go Beoram :)

*Of course this is for delivery to Nevada. So redo the search for your local.
Click to expand...

Thanks Bill - but unfortunately though the book comes up on the Addall search, if one goes to any of the shops which 'carry' it, each one says 'unavailable'. :(

cheers though, Ben.
 
Thanks Yvsa. No I hadn't tried the Google search. When I do I find pages with the Old English text of Beowulf :) There doesn't seem to be anything online about these different sword terms (except at my site, which has a little bit in the notes).

cheers, B.
 
Originally posted by BruiseLeee
Is this sort of what you're looking for?

http://www.algonet.se/~enda/oakeshott_eng.htm

Or you can probably ask your question here...

http://www.netsword.com/forums.html

There's also a sword forum on this board.

:o
Click to expand...

Thanks Bruise - I've actually ordered a couple of Oakeshott's books (I don't know that they're what I'm looking for, but they're what I'm going to get).

Already posted over at netsword (and sword forum internation and the mediaeval forum at vikingsword and put a message on the ANSAX listserver).

The trick is to match up literary references, which often have little description and few clues (if you were writing about a frying pan, would you describe it?), with concrete objects which have been found. I know the Oakshotte books at least come up with some sort of rough categorisation system, whether I'll be able to make any educated guesses at which words go with which classes (if that's even the right way to go about it), I don't know.

cheers, B.
 
Ben,

You should try asking some of our BF guys in Europe. This could be a simple language/translation issue, or it might be a complete fantasy/cultural icon. Two thousand years from now somebody might run into the same problem when they try to discover what a "lightsaber" was. Nothing would come up under arms, or technology, yet multiple references would pop up under fiction. The connection might be closer with period mythology than an actual physical object.

n2s
 
Originally posted by not2sharp
Ben,

You should try asking some of our BF guys in Europe. This could be a simple language/translation issue, or it might be a complete fantasy/cultural icon. Two thousand years from now somebody might run into the same problem when they try to discover what a "lightsaber" was. Nothing would come up under arms, or technology, yet multiple references would pop up under fiction. The connection might be closer with period mythology than an actual physical object.

n2s
Click to expand...

That's a good point N2S, but it's unlikely methinks. We know that seax refers to a particular type of one-edged weapon (sometime dagger-size, sometimes longer; which seems to give people difficulties - but we call both a 12inch Tsimi-bane dhankuta and a 25inch AK 'khukurees', so it's really the same thing...). bill too, though it refers to a different weapon later on (a sort of pole-arm I believe) also seems sound, whether we know what it is or not. So brond, mece, secg I suspect are also names for actual (non-magical) styles of weapons. Your 'lightsabre' example is a good one--but notice that that's a compound; I think most fantasy/sci-fi weapons are compounds. Though a particular 'cultural icon' weapon might not be (e.g. Exclaibur, Gram)--but the weapons terms I'm considering re-occur in Beowulf (and there are named weapons in Beowulf too, but they're pretty clear - Naegling, Hrunting, Hunlafing, &c.). Plus the weapons terms can appear as part of a compound, which suggests that they're 'base' words (note that 'sabre', a term for an actual object, is part of the fantasy object 'lightsabre').

By the by, there actually is a sort of 'lightsabre' in Beowulf; not really, but there's a sword which is either named Hildleoma or described in kenning-fashion as hildleoma - which means 'battle-light'. OK, not really 'lightsabre', but it sprang to mind.

I might try over in one of the bladeforums, but from posting on various sword and knife forums (including ones specifically visited by mediaeval sword experts) and posting on the ANSAX list-server (which almost all of the professional Anglo-Saxonists subscribe to), my guess is that no-one knows exactly what these terms refer to, but that they are actual, specific weapon-terms. My plan is to try to see if I can extract any pattern from looking at various books on swords of the period (got the Behmer one today, slow going though, as it's in German) and then see if I can determine anything from the literary or other written references which would allow me to match words with objects....

B.
 
Ben,

Seax and bill are well defined weapons; but, brond, mece, secg might simply be a translation error. If these terms were known objects you would expect that they would turn up in other works. For instance "brond" actually translates to "brand" which simply means sword.

So that is three down and two to go.... :)

n2s
 
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