Plate X.
These were the usual weapons of the Northern nations: these are seen in their pictures, are named in their laws, are described in their Sagas, are found in their graves. But other arms appear to have been of occasional employment: the mace, the pike, the sling, the stone-hammer, the "morning-star," the fork, and the bill. The Mace is seen in the hands of the Anglo-Saxons (as well as of the Normans) in the Bayeux tapestry; and it seems not unlikely that those dentated hoops of bronze[94] which have been found both in England and on the Continent were the heads of similar weapons; for it must not be forgotten that, even in the "Iron Period," objects of bronze continued in use. From the inexhaustible Wace we learn that the "vilains des viles" who joined Harold's army,—
"Tels armes portent com ils trovent:
Machues portent è granz pels[95],
Forches ferrées[96] è tinels[97]."—Line 12840.
It will be remembered that the mace is a weapon of the most remote antiquity, and is found, almost identical in form with those of the Northern nations, among the monuments of the ancient Egyptians and Assyrians.
No 11.
The Stone-Hammer appears to have been employed by the troops of Harold. William of Poictiers says: "Jactant cuspides ac diversorum generum tela, sævissimas quasque secures, et lignis imposita saxa[98]." Of the Bill, an example occurs in the fine Anglo-Saxon Benedictional of Rouen: it closely resembles the common long-handled hedging-bill of our own day. The Morning-star, an instrument formed of a ball of metal (sometimes spiked) attached by a chain to a short staff, after the manner of a whip, is believed to have been another of the arms of this period. Dr. Bähr found the head of one of these in his Livonian researches; a complete one, of bronze, (here engraved) was discovered at Mitau. Professor Thomsen mentions also a bronze specimen, in his account of the Copenhagen Museum. The Sling, according to the opinion of the Père Daniel, was employed by the Franks in intrenched positions and beleaguered towns[99]. This ancient instrument, which is found in Egyptian[100] and Assyrian[101] monuments, was certainly in use among the Anglo-Saxons, whether for warfare or the chase alone, it is not easy to determine. The figure here engraved is that of David, from the Anglo-Saxon and Latin Psalter of Boulogne. See also the slinger in Strutt's Horda, Plate xvii., from Cotton MS., Claudius, B. iv., and Plate iii. of Stothard's Bayeux Tapestry. In the Copenhagen Museum are sling-stones, "either with a groove cut round the middle, or with two grooves cut cross-wise; having, in the latter case, the shape of a ball somewhat flattened." It does not appear that the Northern nations used leaden pellets; as the Greeks and Romans did, inscribing them with a thunderbolt, or some quaint sentence, as "Take this."