Halberds

The paper re-interprets the implement known as the ‘Towton Battle Axe’
allegedly found in the river which borders the Towton Battlefield (1461),
Yorkshire, England, and which now resides in Alnwick Castle, Northumberland.
The paper provides parallels, in the form of comparisons with other weapons,
in order that the Towton implement can be shown to be a modified former
halberd dating from the early sixteenth century. It is, therefore, highly unlikely
that the implement was used in the famous battle.
KEYWORDS Battle of Towton, Towton Battle Axe, halberd, medieval weapon, Alnwick Castle, 1461, Towton Battlefield Archaeology Project, Cock Beck.

The only Argaric halberd of the Meseta was recovered in the motilla of El Retamar in 2019. This find represents the first specialized weapon of the Motilla Culture. The find was retrieved from a non-funerary context (sondage A) in association with ceramic containers, an oven and seeds from cultivated species (free-threshing wheats, hulled barley, emmer wheat and flax). The 118 g and 15.7 cm weapon has two rivets and an asymmetric blade; no evidence of impact is observed on its edge. It can be classified within the San Antón type (Lull type 2), with similar formal parallels with the halberd from tomb 999 from El Argar and with another one from the Gómez-Moreno collection. The piece does not contain tin being made of arsenic copper (3.4% As) with significant percentages of lead and silver (2-3% Pb; 0.47% Ag). Lead isotopic analyses reveal its probable origin in the Linares mining area (Jaén). A radiocarbon date of wood remains from the shaft (Beta-591414, 3590 ± 30, 2010-1895 cal BC) places the halberd at the beginning of the second millennium cal BC. This finding confirms that the Argaric and Bronze Age populations of La Mancha established intense exchange networks, through which objects of high social value circulated, such as ivory, the Argaric cup of La Encantada or the halberd of the motilla of El Retamar

In this article, the collection of halberds of the National Military Museum is used to provide insight into the development of the usage of halberds during the sixteenth and seventieth century. This development in use is based on combining the development of the halberd design, dated using art, with historical sources describing halberd use. Utilizing this method, a pattern in development could be recognized. During the first half of the sixteenth century halberds composed of large blades with straight edges, deployed primarily during warfare as a striking weapon in infantry blocks. During the second half of the sixteenth century the blade of the halberd reduced in size, the edge became concave in design and the points became longer. The number of halberdiers in armies slowly reduced and halberds were more often handled by bodyguards. Halberds were no longer primarily used as a striking weapon but were used to gain control over the opponent's weapon and ending a fight by thrusting or hooking the opponent. During the transition from the sixteenth to the seventieth century halberd blades became thinner and a large portion of halberds lost their fighting capabilities. These halberds were primarily used as a rank symbol and were no longer a weapon of war.

ABSTRACT: Use wear analysis was carried out on fourteen halberds from the Danish Isles and the Cimbrian Peninsula. Rather than presenting a summary of the results, each analysis will be described in detail to give a sense of the complexity of the use wear present on each halberd. This way a sense of the scale of combat they were involved in can be conveyed. This challenges older ideas that see in halberds only ritual implements or signifiers of status. The analysis of the wear traces indicates their use in both, combat and ritual.

"The frequent deliberate destruction in hoards that L. Nebelsick has observed did not start at earliest in the Middle Bronze Age. In fact it can be traced to far earlier times. It occurs frequently on halberds not just in hoard, but in graves and single finds as well. The method to destroy the object was the violent separation of handle and blade. There are various causes to carry this out, but the underlying psychological structure for destruction as sacrifice remains the same. When the latter appears on weapons especially in pure weaponry hoards it is most likely interlinked with prehistoric warfare. The destruction is just one element
of the sacrifice and the deposition is another. If the latter element was not part in the ritual the whole sacrifice escapes archaeologists’ attention."

European halberds as the subject of research has been partly neglected in mainstream historical academic discourses. The research that has been primarily focused on trends in development of halberd design from the 14th to the 18th century. However, this research does not provide insight into the large variety of halberd design present in collections around the world. To examine this variety, this article offers a classification system for halberds and provides insight into the factors influencing their design during the 16th and 17th centuries. The first part of the article presents a halberd typology based on the collection of 131 examples in the National Military Museum, the Netherlands, to provide a system to classify and simplify communication. This typology is based on a hierarchical system, from classes, based on the design of the point and socket of the halberd, to types and subtypes, based on the blade and beak design. In total 4 classes, 14 types and 5 subtypes could be recognised. The second part of the article provides insight into the dating and use of the recognised types based on art and historical texts. Using this method, a trend could be recognised in halberd design: straight-edged halberds were presumably being used by larger groups of individuals, for example during battles. While concave edged halberds were probably used by smaller groups, for example personal guards, and were designed to control the opponent’s weapon and inflict trauma primarily with the point.

The paper presents a halberd that was recently found on the outskirts of Erfurt on the site of an Early Bronze Age settlement. It is the westernmost specimen of a type otherwise widespread in East Germany, Poland and Lithuania.

In: Sczech, K., Stadtarchäologischer Bericht über das Jahr 2019

Most archaeologists agree that the Hernando de Soto expedition crossed the Mississippi River into what is now Arkansas in the summer of 1541. The narratives make it clear that the members had suffered many tribulations along the way, and things were rough in Arkansas as well. Archaeological evidence of the expedition west of the Mississippi is sparse in terms of artifacts. This is undoubtedly due to the fact that they had given or bartered away most of the things they brought for that purpose, and they had lost some in calamitous battles like Mabila and Chicaza as well. A few artifacts have come to light in excavations at Parkin, and new studies of artifacts previously found have changed some of our interpretations.

"Twelve Copper Age engravings have been discovered on rock panels in the region of Mont Bégo, where the anthropomorphic figures depicted have two striking features: a specialized weapon and male genitalia. The weapon is a halberd, which has been proven in recent research to be a deadly and fully functional weapon. This paper investigates the role of warfare and combat in the construction of male identities. It is argued that the violence intrinsic to hierarchical societies leads not only to warfare, but also to an increased dependency of the construction of the male identity on that of the warrior identity. The discussed engravings are climactic in the representation of both identities and are therefore products of a highpoint of this interdependency. It is the aim of this paper to show that rock art representation, societal structure, psychological rationalization and reproduction are interwoven to a high degree and influence each other.

Keywords: Mont Bégo, rock art, masculinity, warrior, warfare, identity."

This chapter aims to analyse the adoption of halberds by the populations of the Northwest Iberian Peninsula (which includes Galicia and the North of Portugal), and its materialisation in rock art, as well as its social and symbolic role in the context of societies in the early Bronze Age (EBA).
The exercise of dating halberds and daggers from the early Bronze Age by drawing parallels with copper weapons has already been made (Peña Santos and Vázquez Varela 1979), whereas the accuracy of this chronology has been confirmed using C14 dating, according to the respective contexts of the halberds. The classification of these weapons in this period is based on radiocarbon dating available for halberds from Great Britain, considered to be predecessors to the Irish and Carrapatas-type halberds, wherein the latter are typical of the Northwest Iberian Peninsula. According to Needman et al. (2015), the halberds in Great Britain date from the third quarter of the third millennium BCE, but were only adopted in Ireland and on the Atlantic seaboard of the European continent, in the last quarter of the third millennium BCE, between 2294-1921 BCE. In fact this is the chronological interval used for their dating in the Northwest Iberian Peninsula.
Theoretically speaking and in relation to the Anthropology of Art and Symbolism (Layton 1990, Gell 1998) this paper defends the premise that “rock art” both results from symbolic thinking and also actively contributes to the symbolic conception of the world, the maintenance of collective memory and the creation and negotiation of identities.
Landscape Archaeology places emphasis on the notions of “natural” space, landscape and place. The first is understood as an active element, meaningful and animated, rather than a simple container of human action (Thomas 1993).  The landscape is perceived as a place impregnated with meaning and not a mere economic resource (Ingold 2000).
Also vital is the assumption that communities have created the building blocks of the past by using and re-using the same places over time, reinterpreting them according to their commitments and interests (Bradley 2002). The notion of “place” will be used as a synonym for “special space” - celebrated through emotions and senses, and related to histories, allowing the creation of a “sense/experience” of place, which is relevant to the construction and maintenance of individual and collective memories (Thomas 1996).  A place can be a natural element (a mount, outcrop and its features (Ingold 2000, Bradley 2000). This point of view eliminates the dichotomy between depictions and sites and focuses on  interaction. It is also important to emphasise the skyscape (Henty 2016) and the importance of special areas where celestial phenomena may be observed.

Archaeology tends to emphasise the new and revolutionary aspects of past changes. In Bronze Age (BA) research, bronze is always the new material that brings about fundamental changes by extending exchange networks and the range of mobility (Kristiansen and Larsson, 2005). The sword introduces a new ideal of the warrior complete with new bronze weapons, toilet sets and international networks (Kristiansen 1984; Treherne 1995; Harding 2007). Although this picture is not wrong, it neglects the fact that there is a long history of metallurgy and specialised weaponry in what is somewhat arbitrarily called the Late Neolithic (LN; see Vandkilde 1996). The emphasis on constant progress plays down one important issue in the development of Nordic Early Bronze Age (EBA) weaponry: What is the contribution of the past?