(In Pics) Six Awesome Personal Weapons from History (That Aren’t Swords)

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In today’s modern world of missiles and rifles, airstrikes and torpedoes, warfare has become somewhat “at a distance”. Combat can be prosecuted from over the horizon, and people’s lives taken with the press of a button.

Putting aside the horrors that such casual destruction has wrought on our world, it is easy to forget that it was not always such a detached affair. For much of human history warfare was much more up close and personal, fought tooth and nail in the bloody fields of battle where you faced your enemy 1 on 1.

For such fights the pre-eminent weapon was the sword, and it is easy to understand why. Attacking your foe with a stick which was sharp and nasty everywhere but where you held it seems like a logical thing to do, and everyone from the Egyptians and Greeks onwards seemed to agree.

At least, almost everyone. Here are six weapons from history that some preferred to wield.

1. Mace

*Probably the most famous alternative to the sword is the mace, a shaft with a heavy, usually spherical weight at the business end. The mace was more effective against* *chainmail-armored* foes where a sword could not penetrate, trading speed for power and delivering crushing blows to the enemy. Another variant on the design was the warhammer, with both a flat and pointy option for dispatching your target (Metropolitan Museum of Art / *Public Domain*)

2. Morning Star

The morning star was for those who wanted their mace to flail about a bit more. Part of the shaft on the mace was instead replaced with a chain connecting the heavy weight to the grip, which allowed for far heavier blows to be inflicted, at the expense of accuracy and with the risk of becoming entangled with your opponent. The morning star comes with some controversy however, and some have suggested it was never truly used as a *weapon* *of war (Wolfgang Sauber /* *CC BY-SA 4.0*)

3. Bo Staff

*Meanwhile, Japan in her* *splendid isolation* was producing her own weapons and approaches to combat. The Bo Staff, a 1.2m (47”) staff of wood, is associated with the accompanying martial art Bojutsu which is still practiced to this day. The Bo Staff, despite having no sharp edges and requiring two hands, is a formidable weapon in the hands of a trained individual, allowing for lightning fast attacks which often leave the opponent prone and vulnerable to a *killing blow* *(Instituto Niten /* *Public Domain*)

4. Macuahuitl

Things start to get wild with the Aztec macuahuitl. A long wooden shaft which broadens to the end like a paddle, this weapon had teeth, specifically pieces of razor-sharp volcanic obsidian embedded into its length. These would provide devastating slashing attacks, perfect against the lightly armored foes of the *Aztec* *but less useless against armored Conquistadors (Arjuno3 /* *CC BY-SA 4.0*)

5. Kyoketsu-Shoge

*Back to* *Japan* *for more specialist fighting styles and fighting tools: the* kyoketsu-shoge, which roughly means “long distance lithe weapon” is a pair of connected blades, one straight and one curved, attached to a rope of chain. The weapons can be used both as an up-close finisher and a long distance stabbing weapon, launched from the user to their enemy. The rope end ensures that the weapon can stab at the defender and then quickly be retrieved by the attacker, creating a whirling dance which confuses and disorients. The kyoketsu-shoge was a preferred weapon of the ninja (Hyakuraiju / *Public Domain*)

6. Bagh Nakh

*These knuckledusters mean business. Originating from* *India*, the bagh nakh (“tiger claw”) is a series of curved blades designed to be fit over the hands of the attacker, being used as an easily-concealed stabbing or slashing weapon. Poisoned bagh nakh were the favored tool of the Rajput assassins, and the famous Bijapur general Afzal Khan was killed by such a weapon. “Claw Wrestling” using these weapons persisted in India even up to the era of *colonial rule* *(Lewenstein /* *Public Domain*)

Top Image: A tiger claw hidden in the palm of the user. Source: Parasnis / Public Domain.

By Joseph Green

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Joseph Green

Joseph Green is editor for Historic Mysteries, which combines his background in English Literature with a lifelong fascination for the strange and the unexplained. Read More