Can anyone shed some light on the origin of this axe? The site that I found it on said that its a 6th-8th century frankish axe, but that just doesn't sit right with me. I'm thinking its more likly to be from the 13th-14th century, possibly german... If anyone else has info or period art with anything like it that would be awesome.

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Definitely not something that early - I would say that 13th century would be about right, a development of bearded axe.

AFAIK, axes of that shape were quite popular in the time, although most probably (?) hailed from Byzantium.

http://www.worldmuseumofman.org/display.php?item=7

Here you have one very similar one. Very broadly dated, but earlier date is way more probable.

Very rich Byzantium culture most probably influenced Slavs and other neighboring tribes and people, because somehow similar axes can be traced around the Eastern Europe. Obviously we can't really be sure how it went like exactly.

Here at least one roughly similar in shape axe from the Rus territory.

http://www.dzikibez.pl/uploads/images/artykuly/topory/15.jpg

And this thread:

http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=27047


My knowledge is very minimal, so not sure if those analogies make sense, but they should be of some help.

IMO, this axe may be easily 8th century, even if probably not 'Frankish'.

What makes me think about the later dating is the shape of the upper part of the pole-hole - it is very flat. The ones Bartek linked from Eastern Europe are generally rounded, not flattened.

Those are some awesome links guys :D , do we have any with more with those little ticks on the back of the beard/horn? Thats what sparked my interest in this axe in the first place.

Incidentally, I came across this in my searching, which pushed me further towards a later century.
http://www.ambroseantiques.com/armour/17thcenturyaxe.htm

Cheers Bartek, I will point my search in a more Byzantium direction.

Success, A Ukrainian friend of mine has pointed me towards 10-13th century Byzantium ruled Crimea

(I was going to link a russian forum that he showed me, but it came up as a banned website when I previewed it. PM me if you want the link)