I've read in several places of the existence of seaxes with handles long enough for two hands; for example, Peter Johnsson posted these comments here on myArmoury a year or two ago, in the context of a very informative seax thread (I saved it all):

Bigger examples often have longer/stouter tangs (leaving room for two hands in some cases). The way these blades are fashioned makes me think of some kind of migration era wakisashi, only a bit stouter.

A long sax (langseax) is a long bladed weapon that usually has a knife style grip (as a norm with hidden tang and not riveted on slabs) The Long seax can have a long grip, perhaps 25 cm or sometimes even longer. These weapons will have a blade of some 55 cm up to proper sword-length blades. They still do not have sword style hilts however: they are typically mounted just like very big knives: a hidden tang of almost the same width as athe blade secured with pitch and sometimes a rivet at the protruding end.

There are naturally variations to this, but these should not be regarded as typical examples ot the classic seax.

I'm very intrigued by this. Does anyone have a picture of a long seax with such a tang? Peter, if you see this thread, do you have any photos or sketches?

Thanks!

Here are two really bad pics that might give you some idea...

The first pic shows a recostructed weapon by the german smith Manfred Sachse (the grandfather of modern european pattenrwelding). The original has a rather normal length tang, but I cannot say if it was broken or why a long grip was decided for in the reconstruction. Anyway, it gives a rather good idea of what they oould have looked like when new. Note patternwelding in the fuller region, while the main part of the blade is non-patterned carbon steel.

The second really bad one is from the city museum of Ingolstadt showing three double edged migration era spathas on the left for scale. Note that some of the seaxes have very long tangs. In two cases longer than the blade itself. The blades look small compared to the double edged swords, but they are much more massive in thickness. While a migration sword might be around 5 mm in thickness, these seaxes can be 8 mm in the back and have a much more massive cross section.
One seax have traces of the wooden grip intact just behind the blade.
Hope this helps.

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Peter;

Just a question: Could some of these with very long tang have been mounted as polearms ? I'm sure that this would be physically possible but any hint anywere that it may have been done historically ?

Unless there is some design reason why not: Could one of these have been mounted originally as a knife and then after being passed from generation to generation , be remounted numerous times as either a polearm or as a knife.

In use these do distantly remind me of a Naginata and these were at times remounted as swords.

I would guess the long handle is merely an attempt to balance the weapon better, in lieu of a pommel.

There are a number of scandinavian "hewing spears" mentioned in the sagas, but unfortunately, we dont know exactly what they looked like.
But all the scandinavian spears I have seen have a "socket mount", not a tang.

Elling;

Yes the thought of hewing spears did cross my mind as a remote possibility.

I just think it can be usefull to sometimes ask a question even if the answer is probably already known to be in the negative: Sort of in the spirit of " has anybody ever considered this as a possibility " and it might bring forward other and better ideas.

Thank for your view that is probably 99.99% true. :cool:

Two-handed seax; weird dacian falx(or the other way around...). Just crossed my mind...

Johan Schubert Moen

Maybe it's an ancester of our old friend from the M.B.

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Thank you, Peter! Those pictures give me a perfect idea.. :D

Very interesting weapon. I can imagine how it might have been wielded...

I'll use this thread as an excuse to post a couple of more pics from the British Museum. The first seax is obviously the standard one-handed. The second... I cannot tell, for the life of me. In the photo the hilt looks quite long (in comparison with the other), but it's hard to say.

Both are stunners either way.

David

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