Swords & Knives (also: spies and jam)
Feb. 6th, 2012 09:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bunn1) People in Britain didn't usually get buried with their stuff in the fourth century, so we don't know how common it was to carry a knife
2) But we think possibly there might be more knives found in comparison to other tools in Britain in the C4th.
3) There are very few swords, but that's OK because iron things don't survive well in Britain
4) Anyway, swords were dead high status things and almost nobody had one.
5) therefore everyone was re-arming like mad, only with knives because swords were so hard to make.
Is it me, or does that not entirely make sense? If iron things don't survive well, how come there are all these knives (if there are loads of knives, which seems unclear). And if swords don't survive well, how do we know almost nobody had one? And how big does a knife have to be before you can call it a sword anyway? OK, big souper dooper pattern welded watchercullums are probably hard to make, but at what point during the process of taking some iron and giving it a pointy end does it become 'a sword'...?
While I'm at it, why do people assume that making horseshoes, by comparison to swords, would be dead easy? I would have thought making shoes for animals that all have different feet and gaits and are liable to get expensively and dangerously injured if you get it wrong would actually be quite hard. And I speak as one who tried to make her greyhound wear rubber boots, with a striking lack of success. :-D
Skipping back a couple of centuries, I am intrigued by Hadrian's Frumentarii secret service, but wish to put a cherry on the top. Would it be ridiculous to invent a Senatorial secret service working in parallel and sometimes at cross purposes with the Imperial one?
In other news, I am unconvinced by rhubarb jam. It doesn't seem to be very... jammy. It is more like a pie filling in a pot.
2) But we think possibly there might be more knives found in comparison to other tools in Britain in the C4th.
3) There are very few swords, but that's OK because iron things don't survive well in Britain
4) Anyway, swords were dead high status things and almost nobody had one.
5) therefore everyone was re-arming like mad, only with knives because swords were so hard to make.
Is it me, or does that not entirely make sense? If iron things don't survive well, how come there are all these knives (if there are loads of knives, which seems unclear). And if swords don't survive well, how do we know almost nobody had one? And how big does a knife have to be before you can call it a sword anyway? OK, big souper dooper pattern welded watchercullums are probably hard to make, but at what point during the process of taking some iron and giving it a pointy end does it become 'a sword'...?
While I'm at it, why do people assume that making horseshoes, by comparison to swords, would be dead easy? I would have thought making shoes for animals that all have different feet and gaits and are liable to get expensively and dangerously injured if you get it wrong would actually be quite hard. And I speak as one who tried to make her greyhound wear rubber boots, with a striking lack of success. :-D
Skipping back a couple of centuries, I am intrigued by Hadrian's Frumentarii secret service, but wish to put a cherry on the top. Would it be ridiculous to invent a Senatorial secret service working in parallel and sometimes at cross purposes with the Imperial one?
In other news, I am unconvinced by rhubarb jam. It doesn't seem to be very... jammy. It is more like a pie filling in a pot.
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spears
Date: 2012-02-07 09:55 am (UTC)Though apparently a type of spearhead which has been identified as Anglo-Saxon is an awful lot like the pre-Roman British spearhead, and so possibly in some 4th-century contexts is being misidentified...
Thank you for the sword-thoughts, they sound convincing to me!
no subject
Date: 2012-02-07 10:06 am (UTC)Mind you, if there are no swords and no knives and no spearheads, it's no wonder they had to invite Hengist and Horsa in :-)
I'd reckon that either the spearheads are being misidentified, as you say; or else that the iron spearhead rusts away and the wooden shaft rots, and you have nothing else left to suggest the presence of the spear in the way that a brass-bound bone grip would tell you there was once a knife around.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-07 10:10 am (UTC)It struck me as odd too. I have another book by the same author about this period, will see if that adds any further details.