Were glaives widely used in the 12th century?

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Well, that source was a professional historian, but he admits, as do the rest of the sources, that the evidence is a bit muddled, simply because so few specimens have survived and the folks of those times weren't exactly organized or using a fixed terminology.

But the arguments against just plain fails the common-sense test.  We know that the Assyrians, the Greeks, the Romans all were familiar with bladed staff weapons, and their European enemies used them, like the falx.  It's just not plausible to say that all these cultures miraculously forgot about this idea, then invented it again centuries later.  This wasn't rocket-science, even by medieval standards.

The bill-guisarme is referred to as a weapon from the 10th century onwards.  It just seems incredible that such a specialized weapon would be around, but not a simpler blade-on-stick like a fauchard (which is pretty much just a minor variant on war-scythes, which have been with us since the early Greeks).
 
Yeah, but like Bohemond said, it was cheaper, easier and smarter to get and use a spear, so it's logical that those would have been more common, therefore, glaives and the like could have been around, but not have been widely used. Certainly not as widely as stabbing spears.
 
You also have to look at the cultural branch that most influenced medieval Europe.  The Germanic barbarians used the spear prolifically...even their war god(s) Tiwaz and Wotan had the spear as a totem.  The Falx, on the other hand, was used by the Dacians who were essentially wiped out in the time of Hadrian.
 
always be weary of items described as being from 400 years. most historians can pin point a weapon from ONE place and ONE time hehehe thats like says swords were used from 500 bc to 17th century ad and showing a 2 handed claymore.
 
I found a wiki on it don't know if its good but here t is. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glaive also i've been looking at some pics of the the glaive and all the pics i saw look nothing like what they do in the game.
 
Dahobo24 said:
I found a wiki on it don't know if its good but here t is. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glaive also i've been looking at some pics of the the glaive and all the pics i saw look nothing like what they do in the game.

Other than the shiny decorative bits?
 
Skot the Sanguine said:
You also have to look at the cultural branch that most influenced medieval Europe.  The Germanic barbarians used the spear prolifically...even their war god(s) Tiwaz and Wotan had the spear as a totem.  The Falx, on the other hand, was used by the Dacians who were essentially wiped out in the time of Hadrian.

What?

Can you explain that rather absurd statement? How were the Dacians wiped out in the time of Hadrian?
 
Agent Griff said:
Skot the Sanguine said:
You also have to look at the cultural branch that most influenced medieval Europe.  The Germanic barbarians used the spear prolifically...even their war god(s) Tiwaz and Wotan had the spear as a totem.  The Falx, on the other hand, was used by the Dacians who were essentially wiped out in the time of Hadrian.

What?

Can you explain that rather absurd statement? How were the Dacians wiped out in the time of Hadrian?

He probably meant how the Dacians were wiped out as a potential threat to the Empire in the days of Trajanus, not Hadrianus.
 
Well, as a potential threat yes. But the people lived on and their descendants still inhabit the same area. And, only a quarter of the territory inhabited by the Dacians was conquered by the Romans. Very large areas remained free and, as a consequence, were populated by the free Dacians who weren't quite as open to Roman influences as their conquered brethren. Hence why it is very possible that the Falx remained in use and popular conscience. The odd thing is that we don't exactly see any illustrations of it or written accounts about it during the Middle Ages. That, I find quite strange.
 
Thank you, Trajan, not Hadrian.  Well seeing how the valley around the Carpathians/Transylvania was a primary settlement of the Dacians during their civilization yet about a hundred years after the Roman conquests it was described as being deserted (and later given to the Goths) it would suggest that the effect of the Roman conquest was a bit more comprehensive than you think.

I doubt there was much Dacian blood left after the Goths, Avars, and countless other invaders settled the land in the time between Dacia and the middle ages.
 
I haven't the time to properly answer this now but you are still advancing incorrect theories. You are holding on to some antiquated and outright wrong chronicles and accounts so the Roman occupation and the subsequent migrators actually had less of an effect than you seem to believe.

For the moment, I think I shall build my argument step by step and you will help me.

Answer me this, first of all, and we can go on from there. What kind of language is the language spoken by modern day Romanians? Answers are Romance, Slavic, Semitic etc.
 
Archonsod said:
Agent Griff said:
The odd thing is that we don't exactly see any illustrations of it or written accounts about it during the Middle Ages. That, I find quite strange.
It likely fell out of military use at the same time as the quarter staff.
I sense much sarcasm, but I'm not sure why...
 
Yeah, it is a Romance language.  That doesn't mean all that much though, look at France and Spain (both heavily settled by invading Germanics and even Moors).  The Goths I mentioned being settled in those lands eventually migrated out (famously) around the time of the Hun invasions...but more people came and settled the area.
 
Llew2 said:
I sense much sarcasm, but I'm not sure why...
Wasn't being sarcastic :lol: A glaive is fundamentally a staff with a sword tied to the end. As a result, it's effectively a quarter staff with a little (blatant pun) more edge. By the middle ages it's the kind of thing you're more likely to see in the hands of the common citizen who wants a cheap means of discouraging robbery than a professional soldier, since the (another blatant pun) cutting edge in the weapons-on-a-stick field has moved on to doing interesting things like repelling cavalry and dealing with armour.
 
Skot the Sanguine said:
Yeah, it is a Romance language.  That doesn't mean all that much though, look at France and Spain (both heavily settled by invading Germanics and even Moors).  The Goths I mentioned being settled in those lands eventually migrated out (famously) around the time of the Hun invasions...but more people came and settled the area.

Yes, France and Spain were both heavily settled, as opposed to the lands where the Dacians lived. A lot of peoples passed through, yes, but their stay was never long enough that they could have more than a superficial effect on the people living there. Everyone came, stayed a bit, levied some tribute and gifts from the local populace then moved on. The Goths did so, the Huns did so, the various Slav peoples stuck around for a bit more but they still moved on in the end. The only people who joined the party, so to say, were the Pechenegs and the Cumans but they were assimilated with ease and did not have much of an effect on the people living these lands.

Effectively, by the Eighth century, the Dacians had already evolved into the Romanian peoples (the Moldavians, Transylvanians and Wallachians, Romanians all who inhabited different parts of the areas formerly inhabited by the Dacians).

The most effective way through which you can see how much of an influence the various migrating peoples had on the Dacians is by analyzing the provenance of the words in modern-day Romanian. The base stratum of the language, the oldest one basically, is Dacian in nature, with about 200 Dacian words still being used in the Romanian language. The next layer, the main stratum, is Latin. That is where most of the words in Romanian come from, for more than 70% of our words are Latin in provenance. The last stratum, with the newest additions, so to say, is Slavic. 20% of Romanian words come from the Slavs who inhabited these lands from the middle of the Fifth century to 602, when they crossed the border across to modern day Bulgaria, where said Slavs settled permanently and combined with the local people there to form the Bulgarians.

One other factor you are leaving aside is the fact that the Romans conquered basically 30% of the territory resided by the various Dacian kingdoms, conquering only the kingdom of Decebalus in 106 A.D. This left very large areas still inhabited by the Free Dacians and, in 274 A.D. after the Aurelian withdrawal (the Roman abandoning of Dacia with their administration and the legions stationed here retreating to the South, to Moesia Inferior) these Dacians came back in the areas previously held by the Romans and started mingling once more with their kinsmen.

The fact that the Romans left behind a rather sizable Latin influence in these parts is also proved by the many relics found with Latin inscriptions. Latin inscriptions referring to the locals believing in Christianity, no less. Thus, the proof for Daco-Roman continuity in the area near the Carpathian mountains is overwhelmingly strong when compared to the rather weakly-founded accounts of a deserted land. Try and think where those accounts come from and perhaps that will answer your question.
 
Agent Griff said:
Yes, France and Spain were both heavily settled, as opposed to the lands where the Dacians lived. A lot of peoples passed through, yes, but their stay was never long enough that they could have more than a superficial effect on the people living there. Everyone came, stayed a bit, levied some tribute and gifts from the local populace then moved on. The Goths did so, the Huns did so, the various Slav peoples stuck around for a bit more but they still moved on in the end. The only people who joined the party, so to say, were the Pechenegs and the Cumans but they were assimilated with ease and did not have much of an effect on the people living these lands.

Well, I think that many Roman colonists moved to at the time of Roman province of Dacia, bringing Latin and assimilating (romanizing) the local Dacians.
 
I was talking about the time after the official Roman withdrawal from Dacia.

Of course that after conquering the kingdom of Decebalus the Romans moved in with two Legions (XIII Gemina and V Macedonica if I'm not mistaken), their own administration and a load of colonists and auxiliaries from all across the Empire. They founded several new cities and refurbished many of the old Dacian holdings, many of the cities founded by the Romans surviving until today as quite prosperous population centres. Hell, Romania's reigning football champions hail from a city the Romans founded.
 
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