Southern tribal weapons.
Possibly 'Ba' or Dian culture ge-halberds . Eastern Zhou period. The upper one is very similar to a Dian culture ge shown in 'Weapons in Ancient China' even down to the detail on the tang.

This style of dagger axe is similar to a Chinese archaic form, more in appearance like the Shang (17th-12th centuries BC) or the Western Zhou 'ge' or 'ko', yet in border areas like Sichuan & Yunnan the shape persisted as late as the 8th-3rd centuries BC.
Like the Shang & West Zhou blades it has a possible connection to the stone battleaxes of the neolithic period and still these pieces cannot be accused of being crude or backward when the fine detaill on them testifies to the skill of regional bronze smiths.
See ba culture ge from Richard Nable's collection
http://www.youngmuseum.com/the_richard_nable_collection.htm



Details on tang, tribal weapons are typically quite decorative compared to weapon produced en-mass for fuedal state armouries in Zhou 'China' of this period.
The weapons of ancient tribal peoples in the modern provinces of Yunnan & Sichuan in particular illustrate the individual & more personalised nature of warriors in tribal societies.

As noted in the thread on Dian culture swords the tribal-periphral 'non-Chinese' peoples had a sense of personal identity in weapons not seen in the mass produced weapons outfitting Zhou fuedal armies. In the Central Kingdom decorated weapons were a feature of rank and status and an exception to the rule whereas in tribal groups certain motifs are almost standard features, i.e cloud motifs on Dian axes.




Large 'tribal' halberd/ge



Anthromorphic figure. (man-animal)

Half man & half beast creatures can be seen on bronze vessels and even decorating coffins in the East Zhou. In some cases the creatures are interpreted as gaurdians for the deceased. Given the shamanistic nature of religions outside the Zhong-guo 'Zhou' cultural area the meaning of this odd human-like figure cannot be said for certain.





Liaoning province style sword.
This is a 'non-Chinese' type which disapears from the region after expansion by the state of Yan. After this time 'Chinese' style halberds are found in graves, and this is similar to the decline and eventual extinction of local cultural weapon types in the south which were later replaced by Han dynasty style weapons.



http://www.koreainfogate.com/beautykorea/c...itle=Prehistory




http://www.blinkbits.com/en_wikifeeds/Liao..._dagger_culture





These weapons are made of two pieces . Hilts are heavy and have in-cast details , binding on blades tang can almost be seen.

It is also possible these 2 parts are not even of the same sword.



Variations of the swords as elaborated on in the extracts above;

Warring States era spears,
some of these here were decorated. The appearance is otherwise quite 'typical' for this periods spears. One has silver-like spots on the blade (far right) while another had branch-like cast designs at the base of the blade (far left) the second from right has a symbol cast on to the socket but unfortunately I expected the picture to be clearer and I only viewed them briefly.


Decorated spears. Sichuan or Yunnan (Ba/Dian cultures) 8th-3rd centuries BC. Border peoples weapons are visually distinct to the Chinese of the central plains. While present politics includes an expanded modern concept of a Chinese nation at this time there were many diverse groups, whom later are defeated or assimilated.
These very long spears are similar to an example displayed in the Taipei NPM which I had seen the day before.


Loops. non-functional.
These loops are a feature on much earlier Shang culture spears. As noted by Jessica Rawson many archiac features on weapons persist in the areas outside the then 'central plains' China. This is not the only time I have seen these loops cast solid, as the late John Piscopo had a similar spear in this type.
It may be the loops after many centuries were retained by these tribal cultures for decoration but were no longer functional for lashing, and hence cast solid on occasion.


Broad spear. The widening of the blade on this spear is quite different to the more typical appearance of Warring States spears like the 4 shown earlier.
The original golden lustre of the bronze can still be seen, as well a mass of probable cerrusite patina near the base.


Binding in socket. Plant fibre, cording, wrapped around the wooden pole to help secure this spear socket can be seen here. This is similar to the looks of the binding in a socket in Tony Allen's book; "Allens Authentication of Ancient Chinese bronze". If the material was removed there may be the end of the wooden pole still inside this spear.





Combination weapons;
Multiple weapons attached to a single polearm are more common in the late East Zhou (8th to 3rd century BC) period than earlier or later periods. For combination weapons to be cast as single piece items, i.e a true combination weapon, instead of multiple mountings of different tools, are rarer still.

A halberd from a seperate spear and dagger axe combined (then called a 'ji') likely existed even in the Shang 17th-12 century BC) yet in the Western Zhou period some true one piece castings of this style exist.

More commonly it is a ge (dagger axe) with a spear blade cast attached, i.e 'ji' but rarer examples of socketed spears with a ge blade cast atached to a socket also occur.

By the Warring States period many varieties were created, mostly 2 or 3 piece combinations of seperate items. Multiple mounted ge blades on one pole, serated blades, extra rear hooks large and small, spears & ge (ji halberds), sharpened tangs making extra blades, etc.

These 2 pieces are unusual examples being both atypical forms and cast as single pieces.

Spear .
Some features of this, such as the broad blade and (crude) loops give this an earlier style appearance and so dating this one is difficult. The hook is a little like a fishermans gaff and looks suitable for snagging an enemy.





Polearm mounted halberd .
This dagger axe is in a Spring & Autumn or Warring States style (8th-3rd century BC). The addition of a like sickle-like blade on the rear tang is the stand-out feature.

For use from or against chariots this extra blade, instead of cutting or piercing in the style of the normal ge blade, could be used to trap a limp or incapacitate.




The sharp inner edge of this large hook is intended for cutting during a pull.

Hello Kenneth,

much appreciation for sharing, you took time out of your life to show us all something neat. I have a question about the Ge with the hook, where did it come from? How come it never became mainstream?

Hi Bayou,
I really liked that hooking ge in particular. It did look nasty to be used on a limb or neck.
I cannot say precisely where it came from, it is Eastern Zhou and apart from the rear it is unremarkable and quite typical for a dagger-axe used by the ancient fuedal states armies.
One reason it may have never became popular is the shape is not versatile even if it is intimidating and unusual. The addition would only be useful in one action, to trap and cut and enemy with a pull...yet it is not as useful that the usual straight upturned point mounted at 100' from the pole. The normal point can pierce and drag and cut so gets 2 actions instead of 1.
There are other hooks and barbs and serations on strange dagger axes, but not quite so unbalanced looking as this.
There was one 'ge' sent to me in a picture from Zhengzhou which had a rear hook about ¼ the size and looked more nimble.
This larger type of hook could almost mean the weapon would get tied up on the enemy if tangled on a limb and not extracted and so smaller cutting hooks seem to have been more common than something quite imposing but potentially awkward like this.

---------------------------------------------------------------


Possible arcuballista point.
While socketed like a spear, and with a comparible pole diameter, the swallow tail barbs are quite unlike any spear I have seen. This weapon could not be extracted from the body and so would be a weapon that would be lost after a killing strike. The point is quite like arrows of the type used as standard untill the Eastern Zhou period, when triangular cross sections became more common.
I have wondered whether this might be a point from a giant siege crossbow or bed crossbow. Some of these could be arrows in the region of 10 feet long according to a Warring States period text, the Mozi. Bronze tips from arrows once 1.8m long have been found in Shaanxi, looking like an upscaled crossbow bolt. While in 2004 I was told this was from a 'lance' for killing horses, in 2007 the same owner considered it from a crossbow. Previously he had not believed in ballista-like weapons in ancient China a few years ago yet must have revised his opinion over the last few years (as have I, on many points).

Untranslated character . Mr. Lin has translated some ancient Characters on Zhou & Han bronzes yet does not recognise this. Given that many regional characters must have existed before the imposing of uniformity under Qin ShiHuang there may not be a direct modern Chinese version of some symbols.


Decorated ge, with openwork pattern on the tang. Spring & Autumn or Warring States period.
A fairly typical looking dagger axe ‘ge’ but with the extra embellishements that a ranking persons weapons might have.
An upturned angle of the blade (normally at 100 degrees), and its extension down the pole, were both improvements on the earlier ‘ko’ style halberds of the Shang and used by the Western Zhou. This type of dagger-axe became the most widely used from the 8th-3rd centuries BC with a few extra modifications in the last period of its use.


Detail on the tang

Very early dagger-axe 'ko'. Shang dynasty/perhaps Western Zhou. This is quite a crude weapon compared to the form of later East Zhou halberds & has a connection directly to the stone age. This bronze is likely to be in the region of 3,500-3,000 years old. This is much earlier in form than earlier than other ge-halberds on this thread.
Early stone battle axes (or jade ritual/rank axes) have a circular hole through the centre of the axe. The same archaic feature is suggested in this circle here.



The neolithic 'battle axe' below shows how such weapons are the ancestor of cast bronze weapons , like these early 'dagger-axes'. This circle or hole through the blade would likely be connected to the earlier era, it occurs only on the triangular type of dagger-axe and persists longer in tribal groups .



Shang (or possibly later 'northern' minority) ge.
Shang dynasty halberds can have small details, symbols added to the tang or 'nei'.
Some similar weapons are attributed to steppes people in the north of China as late as Eastern Zhou. Similar dagger axes with horses, or crude animal forms, are identified as such in 'Ancient Chinese Weapons; A collection of pictures'.
The form itself is very ancient, although the socketed method of attachment in the Shang period was perhaps influenced by steppes people and in this way explain its persistence on the steppe after Chinese weapon evolved into lashing type halberds.



human figure on tang/nei. This was called a 'tribal symbol' by Mr. Lin and depictions like this are more fitting on tribal peoples. The rather nievely depicted human here does bear a resemblance to the despiction of animals on other examples from northern non-Chinese peoples.
This is quite unusual either way as the Shang seldom represent people in bronze and the steppes cultures tended to favour animal motifs or predator/prey scenes.

Inlaid marking on archaic style ge

This style of dagger axe is a very early & rather undeveloped type (without the blade extending down the pole, and only one hole for binding) Regional varieties can have such early forms like this persist while the weapons in central Zhou fuedal states took on a series of refinements for greater effectiveness.
The markings here Mr. Lin said related to a tribal symbol. I had not seen this sort of surface marking, which was another type of alloy to the item itself (cleaned to reveal the distinct symbol). When I remarked on how odd it was I was shown a near identical example in a reference book. If this is from a border area, and a 'non-Chinese' culture maintaining an archaic obsolete appearance it could be Eastern Zhou. I didn't think to check the dating in the reference book unfortunately as I could have gotten it translated at the time. The form, in general, could be Western Zhou, 12th-8th century BC but either way the inlaid symbol is the notable feature.

Socketed axes. One has a net-like decoration, another a zig-zag or triangular band, the spade shouldered type is discussed below.

enormous spade shouldered axe . Sichaun province 'Ba' culture.

http://www.youngmuseum.com/the_richard_nable_collection.htm

My guess is it said 雲矢 arrow of clouds or 雨矢 rain of arrows.

any one can confirm what it says?

Mystery items; non-weapons
large pheonix fixture.
What this attached to can not be said for certain. In the house on furniture, or part of a battle standard?
It has 2 extensions at the base to slot into or fit over another object.



Officers baton?
This obviously fits into the hand and this explanation seems right. Think of an officers or Sargeant Majors baton in the modern army.
When giving orders this would be just the thing to point in the direction that minions are to be directed.
The ring at the bottom is similar to the base of a nobles sword I showed on the East Zhou bronze swords thread. This is likely for a tassel, and was seen on one ancient sword which such a ring.



horned dragon ...isn't he beautiful?
Quite a character.
By the late East Zhou & Han period the 'classic' Chinese dragon combining the attributes of many animals has taken shape.
While jade forms in the neolothic are sometimes called 'dragons' I find this more psycholgical than likely really a continuity.
One late Shang design seems to show a 'dragon' on a vessel much like a taotie face with a coiled body and surrounded by water creatures, like fish.
It is not untill later still that a real clear 'dragon' appears as would be recognisable to anyone on the street, and these bronze items (and dragon, sometimes with horns, often shown on belthooks from the 4-5th century BC onwards) would be some of the earlier.
This fellow here is still looking good after so many centuries.



Beastial face .
This is probably a dragon too, although not quite as aesthetically pleasing IMO.
A one horned dragon is supposedly 'immature' in traditional understanding, yet another possible reason for the varied appearance is that dragons also come in many types.
"The dragon king has many sons".

I'm sorry to bother you kenneth, but I can't see any of the pictures.

It may take some time for pics to appear since there are dozens. They are there though, attached by imageshack.
I haven't had troubles with this before.
If you wait for a time and check it should be fine. Otherwise PM an administrator for ideas.


Edit; imageshack has problems recently. I am reducing file sizes to avoid a choke, and browser failing.

Spring & Autumn period knife
Similar knives with complex hilts have been found in Spring and Autumn period (8th-5th century BC) sites. In some cases the hilts are cast with the lost wax method and are very complex (here the detail is obscured by mineral corrosion). In the case of these knives they were declared ceremonial objects since the gold is too soft for a durable weapon.

In this case the item is cast as one, of bronze, and likely by a lost wax mold also.


hilt detail



...see http://www.staff.hum.ku.dk/dbwagner/EARFE/...E.html#Heading5 Donald B. Wagner



One of these 3 shortswords I saw while at Xian, as it is identical to a line drawing in the above paper.

Pyramid spear from a heavy polearm.


While Yang Hong in 'Weapons in Ancient China' calls this weapon a 'shu' two other texts showing the same object (refering to the examples from the Eastern Zhou/Marquis of Zeng's tomb also/5th century BC IIRC) call the weapon an 'e' {unsure of how to write this in English}.
The width of the socket is very broad showing a very solid pole mounting. The original weapon seems to be a mixure of bronze tipped club with spikes, and these 'pyramid spears' go atop this as a robust stabbing point. Bronze tipped clubs on poles also exist amongst the terracotta warriors, being a lesser known type of weapon. These were also called 'shu' by Y. Hong although the appearance was not sharp & pyramidal then and were more like tubular caps with blunt right angled edges atop.
211.155.231.165:82/gate/big5/www.bmy.com.cn/index_eng.htm - 9k
"Some 30 bronze Shu weapons were unearthed in pit 3. Shu weapon in Qin Dynasty was used for ceremonial purposes and a symbol of authority. It is shaped in a cylinder with the head looks like a triangular cone. "

2nd century BC;


The best example of the East Zhou pyramid spear is shown in these examples showing the mounting as a bashing and thrusting weapon. This explains the unusally broad socket on this item since the item was meant to be heavy.


5th century BC and much like the version in the Taiwanese collection in the 'pyramid spear' atop the broad pole.




Traces of feathers were imprinted on the sides of this bronze and by the orientation suggest attachment to the weapon itself below the point.
In other weapons like spears or other arms, i.e the Maori tiaha, a bunch of feathers or other tassel at a point during a flicking motion confuses the eye, breaks up the outline of the weapon in a flash of movement and hopefully gives an advantage in getting past an opponents defenses.
Traces of wood could be seen in the socket also, although not as clear in the picture.



+++++++++=====
Note; I am still editing in accompanying descriptions for earlier pictured items by adding a little at a time.

^Boy, and I thought those wierd spears shown in "Battle of Wits" were made up, but apparently they existed.

Hi Anthrophobia,
The movie never came to NZ, so apart from hearing about it I am unlikely to see it. I couldn’t tell much from the few promotional pictures. Most films get a few things right. They just need a library card after all.



Shang ‘yue’ (axes).

17th-12th centuries BC.
These axes are associated with human sacrifice. While I am unsure if they were used in battle they were certainly used to decapitate prisoners.
Many example exist with grinning and leering faces, and decoration on these weapons often sets them apart from other shang weapons. This may be because of the use in ritually killing captives or slaves.
The examples here are plainer than many museum pieces, although the one on the left has taotie eyes as a decorative feature.



colour adjusted to make the eyes clearer, two raised bumps almost in line with the central hole.
This is the Taotie, a ‘greedy spirit’ or ‘bodiless spirit’ that can be seen on almost every Shang object, such was its importance in ritual. It was theorized as an internmediary between the worlds of spirit and living although the actual meaning is lost. I have written more on the Taotie on China History Forum previously.



Bronze vessel, the earlier ritual vessels just have the bold and disembodied eyes. The purest form, perhaps dating to Neolithic motifs.
Later Shang Taotie began to represent jaws and horns, etc, and later in the Han when the Shang religion was forgotten the taotie becomes just a decorative feature on mundane vessels.



Yue, or axe.
The Taotie can be seen here, in inlaid turquoise. The eyes again are bold and piercing. Another axe for ritual executions.



Human sacrifice.

Multiple victims have been found at Shang burials. Some captives were killed and buried en-mass, the skulls used for drinking.
In the case of burials like this some may be slaves, rather than immediate prisoners of war. The axes are found positioned on the ramps of tombs nearby.



Human sacrifice, to serve the deceased & not for practicing the mysterious Sang rituals, occurred in China until it was banned in the Qin period. In the late East Zhou the practice was already being questioned and replacements made for humans in wood, later ceramics.
One of the last cases of human sacrifice was the defiant king of Nanyue (Guangdong), who defied the Han Emperor and was buried in the 2nd century BC like an Emperor, in a jade burial suit and with several attendants.

Collection of knives (non-weapon) and daggers (weapons/double edged) Eastern Zhou to Han.

Ancient Chinese knives of the most common type have an origin to the north of China. They take the form of a sometimes ring pommelled & more typically inwards curving knife. These can be called 'Ordos' (region) 'steppes' or 'Xiongnu' (nomadic culture) knives.
(***see CHF link below)
Even from the Shang period, alongside unique Shang weapons, there is some suggestion of influence of this style of knife in decorated charioteers knives.
From the Warring States period, Qin to Han, these knives are quite common in China.
The utility of these small knives, which to be clear are mundane, like pocket knives rather than weapons, is shown by the adoption of early Chinese cash coins which are called 'knife money' and resemble the Ordos knives clearly. Even today in observing nomadic peoples like the steppes Altai the use of small curved knives to cut meat, or cut felt, can be seen.
As a unit for barter, and a valued object for exchange, they are represented in early Chinese money before the standardisation of Qin currency. The knife money is thin and non-funtional but reflects the value of a real unit of barter. This is representational only just like 'spade' cash which is in the shape of the full sized ancient Chinese spade.
These knives here are the real items (not money) and some are more clearly Chinese.
In the tomb area of Qin ShiHuang in recent years a pit of terracotta scholars have been found, much like the buried army but unarmed.
These scholars have bamboo slips tied to their belts and the ring pommel knives tied in the same fashion.
In the ancient version of a correction pen these knives could be used to scrape the bamboo clear if corrections needed to be made.

A very similar style of knife to the Qin scholars can be seen here http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php?showtopic=7440 in post #5 which is Han in dating IMO.
***True Xiongnu knives (Ordos style) which presumably led to such Chinese knives can be seen in post #8 They are rather small in comparison to this 'Han' knife.

2 knives that are actual weapons are the double edged daggers in this same set (# 1 & 4). These are possibly from the region of Inner Mongolia.
Of the 2 culturally non-Chinese types of weapons Yang Hong outlines in the north of China one is the 'Tungus' (which here was shown on left earlier in the line drawing with the Liaoning & Korean dagger style swords) and the other is 'Hun'.
The Tungus style swords seem to be the precursors to the 'Liaoning' or mandolin culture swords, but have a simple "pillow shaped"pommel of stone instead of the bronze hilt. The blade is much the same.
The weapons Yang Hong calls 'Hun' (certainly the English 'Eastern Hun' or Chinese Xiongnu) are comparible to the double edged daggers shown here.
2 examples in 'Weapons in Ancient China' are from the late Spring & Autumn and late Warring States period. They have more embellishment than the central plains daggers/short swords and have a 'winged' flat pommel instead of the almost universal disc-like or flared trumpet look of Chinese sword pommels.
These swords do support the idea of steppes cultures having much in common in material culture as they loosely resemble the form of other nomads double edged short swords and daggers in the ancient period. See Osprey "Mounted Archers of the Steppe" Tagar culture dagger, Southern Siberia, page 29.

Left to right; 1-11 my impressions of the knives.
1; possible 'Hun' (Xiongnu)
2 & 3; Late Warring States/Han
4; possible 'Hun' (Xiongnu)
5 Warring States period
6; Han
7; Warring States period
8; Xiongnu/Ordos
9; Xiongnu/Ordos
10 & 11 Warring States period




Shang dynasty blade. A heavier style of knife. There is a casting flaw on the pommel.
The early Shang pictographical character 'dao' carries down from such rather crude beginings as cleaver like knives (whose use died out) and was later applied to straight single edged sabres in Han, and then the curved form of dao/sabre
which come from the later Chinse dynasties. True sabres in our 'modern' understanding are apparently a Turkic/Central Asian development and spread both East & West after the 8th century AD.
The Shang 'dao' can only speculatively be compared with later weapons because of the origin of the character. The 'dao' cleaver-like knife was not used in the West Zhou and true single edged sabres only come into use with the Han dynasty. I consider the so-called Qin 'Wu hook' as something of an oddity but not connected to either, being a dead end weapon.
While this knife here is not the clearest example of the Shang cleaver-like knife style its heavy construction and slight upturn at the tip connects it to this original tradition.
The connection of form to a more decorative Shang 'dao' can be seen on http://www.geocities.com/ycgf/museum.htm

Oh MY GOD, I bet with other forumers in Historum that this weapon is imaginative from the movie, if not I would be banned 1 week.

decorated ge, 'tiger grasping hawk'

Here a 'tiger' appears to be seizing the hindquarters of a prey species, the head can be seen under the tigers rear feet.
Such motifs orginate in the steppes, being 'Ordos' in style and adopted by Chinese in use like belt buckle/plaques and weapons.
The predator-prey (grasping and devouring) motif repears many times in ancient art. This tiger & eagle design seems to be on a numer of this type of socketed ge.
see Richard Nable collection for a nearly identical example; http://www.youngmuseum.com/the_richard_nable_collection.htm

(the ge on page 71 is so similar, apart from a little detail on the blade, the design must have had a certain signifigance, it dates from the Eastern Zhou 8th-3rd century BC.***see edit)
The socketed method to attach this dagger-axe again suggests an influence coming from the northern regions of China. Mr. Lin called this 'tiger grasping hawk' and below is another similar piece which was in {Prof.} Gary Todd's collection; his comments;



Edit;***
BTW Yesterday when I had the passage from "Ancient Chinese Weapons" translated it said, "Warring States, Tiger design, possibly influenced by northern styles."

Large ge / Late Warring States period.
In the later period of the use of the dagger axe the blade developed an inwards curve, and the rear tang or 'nei' was sometimes made sharp. Both Qin & early West Han dagger axes have this inturn and the Qin dagger-axes have well developed rear blades.
The classic dagger axe had a straight blade set at 100 degrees of the pole to allow a dragging cut, and the blade was extended down along the pole in a manner that the earliest Shang & West Zhou versions lacked. When in the late period the rear tang was made larger and with a sharpened blade the weapon was made more versatile again.
The Qin dagger axes are perhaps the most refined of all, being at the end of a mellenia and a half of gradual improvements to the design.
The dagger-axe however did not see use much beyond the archiac/ancient period of China. With the use of steel weapons the bronze ge is only rarely seen in the Han period and was replaced with a different form of halberd, the 'ji'.
(** see more details on this at http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php...&p=4894027).
(more pictures of dagger axes attached to SFI thread http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.ph...;threadid=44473 )
The dagger-axe only finds usage today in modern Chinese when written, the traditional script using the character for 'ge' in modern combination-characters over 2,000 years after the weapon was no longer used.
This shows the signifigance of these items in the early period of Chinese weapons, being perhaps the definitive weapon of the period



Ge with warhammer-like rear
This halberd/ge is very unusual, firstly the socket itself is atypical since classic 'ge' have a tang for hafting by cord, but the oddest feature is a rearward three pointed spike.
The rear spike, split into three, looks much like a type of warhammer used in Europe in later times. A single spike might glance off body armour but a warhammers sort of split spike with the 3 points 'bites' into armour instead of bouncing. While the purpose of this bronze might not be armour piercing it is not something I have seen shown on another such weapon.
The socket again may suggest this comes from the northern parts of ancient China, being influenced by non-Chinese style. Southern-tribal socketed weapons are not in the form of the dagger-axes with blade down the pole like this one, and so are different again.
Socketed ge seem quite highly represented in this collection, mainly because they are unusual and have decorative features so this reflects collecting tastes rather than it being 'common' . The vast majority of ge in ancient China were hafted like the 'late Warring States ge' and were made for usage by common soldiers. In this way there is a uniformity in Chinese weapons cast by the Eastern Zhou states, and weapons that are unsual would be likely in the hands of important people & not common soldiers.
The only socket quite like this I have seen in any text, in 2 sections as we see here, was Western Zhou
This ge here may either be earlier than Eastern Zhou then , before standardisation of the classic 'ge' or else be from /or be influenced by one of the distinct tribal groups that existed outside, and in some cases within, the border states of the Zhou. .



The warhammer-like spike has clear traces of imprinted fabric. Covering items in tombs with silks and textiles was a common practice in ancient China, and imprints often survive as mineralised (converted into non-organic) 'psuedo-forms'. The weave here looked slightly more coarse than some of the finer weaves I have seen, so may be a plant fibre textile. Both hemp and cotton was used in ancient China for fabric.

To Kenneth,

With the Ge with warhammer-like rear, do we have any evidence of its shaft, I mean was it shaft made from wood or iron. since I have seen there is a ruler in the photograph, could you provide me some measures of this prototype. It is very interesting topic and I am very appreciated your post here.

It helps me to expand my knowledge to Chinese Ancient Weapons.

The weapon may well be Western Zhou, which pre-dates iron by quite some time.
It is about 23cm long by my eye. It is in Taiwan so I only have the pictures at present

Shafts of such weapons are wooden.
The remains of the pole, or more commonly wood grain pseudo-forms can be seen in sockets quite often. I have shown pictures of this before, and there are some clear examples earlier on the thread.
Solid wooden poles, bound then by strips of bamboo and then lacquered (shock resistant and tough) were some of the materials weapons poles were made from in one Spring & Autumn period tomb I have information on.
Of course they didn't all need to be treated so elaborately, but to answer your question....wood.

Yunnan- Dian culture axe
The axe as a weapon is closely associated with 'Yue' peoples of tribal identities in the south of China. 'Yue' is a blanket term much like 'Celt' was in Europe as the people were comprised of numerous tribes. Decorated battle axes, with tribal symbols of curvi-linear styles, occur in some numbers with weapon assemblages from these areas. An individual character is more apparent in each weapon, and animal and other creatures sometimes worked into designs. Common motifs in the south, such as 'Dian' weapons of Yunnan, are cloud patterns, and bands of art, sometimes showing mountain, land & sea also as a stylised band.
Such items can be seen in 'Weapons in Ancient China' including some with animal details comparible to this axe.
The flared appearance here of this axe is quite typical of these axes, and they were attached to short poles with a right angle at the socketing point.
Chinese battle axes of the same period were more robust, and simpler. In the Han period plain axes mounted on long poles are depicted carried by cavalry in more than one instance. They seem to be rarer weapons in the Chinese arsenal and were very plain in contrast to the earlier Shang period axes.



Han weapons (on right) spear, tsah (trident spear) & ji.
Spring & Autumn ge and Shang-Zhou ko on left
As I have written on the early dagger axe and provided a link ( http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php...p;#entry4894027 )discussing these other items evolution (with another picture of this set) where I discussed the 'late Warring States period ge' there is not much to add, other than the tsah (trident spear) seems to be a rare weapon. I have only seen one other example, and it is also mentioned in 'Ancient Chinese weapons; A Collection of Pictures' yet very little else can be said about it. It is essentially an unusal type of spear and plainer versions in iron/steel such as appeared at the end of the Warring States period were more typical types of Han spears.

shang polearm dadao
Such heavy blades were attached to pole-arms and are a rare form of Shang Weapon. Yang Hong refers to 'pole axes' and uses a different name for them. The dagger-axe was the most common infantry weapon in the Shang period and the dadao in quite this form was not used in the following Western Zhou period . Heavy slashing polearms of the Shang period can display variation, i.e.
see the Richard Nable collection; http://www.youngmuseum.com/the_richard_nable_collection.htm

The version below is quite conventional looking by comparison.
The original of these Shang weapons is again directly related to neolithic stone bladed weapons. A certain thin stone blade with drilled holes for lashing to a handle occurs in the late stone age. It is also rendered in jade being described variably described as a harvesting knife (therefore ritual and mimicing smaller mundane knives) and even supposedly chimes in the unwieldly largest examples, thin and 50cm accross for example. The concepts are not mutually exclusive, but what is linked to these early bronze daodao are another version reproduced in texts as such a stone blade attached to a long pole in the manner of a chopping weapon. How common or practical the weapons were in the stone age is not very important, but such objects are likely precursors to weapons that were first made in bronze, such as the item here.



Decorated ge . Tiger design, Eastern Zhou, Steppes motif influenced, in a similar way to the other socketed ge I elaborated on .


Wood in socket . This is a short section of the original pole that the blade was mounted on. Such surviving wood is not especially common but some small traces of wood can often been seen in sockets of weapons and other items like chariot fittings. Most often the wood is entirely mineralised, and more like a fingerprint. With close examination wood grain can be seen directly on the surface of items even if nothing remains to the naked eye.



Note; Boleslaw I, I have moved this item from before your post to after your post, and it shows the remains of a wooden pole still inside the socket of a halberd.

Very nice prototypes,

I have a question Kenneth, did the Trident became popular in Ancient Chinese Warfare?

Back to the shaft, it is clear like crystal that these shafts must be made by wood, right? So in your own experience, which kind of wood the Chinese used to manufacture their shaft? So far I only acknowledge one possibility: Bamboo, very abundant in China. Also, to the end of the shaft, is there any extra component attach to it to increase the force of inflict, for both Ge and Spear.

And also, could I ask who own this collection, very impressive!!!

the tsah/trident spear seems to offer the advantage of a little protection to the spearman according to 'Ancient Chinese weapons' comments but the design does not seem common.
There were a great variety of modified weapons used during the bronze age like hook-halberds and combination fittings, but only with established dynasties like the Han was there much uniformity in weapons.
A trident spear is not very prominent alongside other conventional halberds and spears in bronze age times, although after the Han period there are halberds with one extra upturned blade, these are not true 'tridents'.
Somebody with more knowledge of later dynasty weapons or martial arts style polearms would be more useful to ask about post-Han evolutions. The history of China is very long and I focus on the ancient.

Poles are just said to be made from 'Wood or bamboo'. Of course Chinese could select from solid woods to make poles just like other cultures, but had the bonus of the solid types of bamboo to draw on also.

At the end of the polearms shafts are bronze fittings that are called 'dhun/zhun' and are only ornamental. It is not like the rear of the hoplite spear. They are blunt and simply cap the end of the shaft on some poles.
They can have animal/dragon designs, or bands of art, inlaid silver and gold etc. or just be simple bronze tubes. Some mimic the ridges on bamboo and so the short cap has the look of sections.
The link to Richard Nables' collection I gave earlier on this thread has a good example of another type of dhun with silver inlay.

The collection shown here belongs to a person I know in Taiwan, Mr. Lin, who I visit when I am in the country and has been very helpful (even arranged a friend to guide us in Xian who took us off the typical tourist trail).

Wow, very interesting indeed!
I also wonder whether are there evidences of Flanged Mace in Chinese History?
What is the difference between Trident and Spetum

For the warharmmer Ge, Kenneth, did they go under any test?
The warharmmer head seems to be three-pronged. If so then are there any special effects in piercing armour?

The only vaguely 'trident' object I know of in ancient China is the tsah. (**see edit)
There are true tridents in later periods, like Ming & Ching.
Actually when I look at pics of a 'spetum' it is more like a tsah. The tsah is not really a trident after all.

There are ancient mace-like weapons, ridged mace heads of bronze. A little like the spiked club below the pyramid spear I showed earlier. They instead have edges on them like ridged teeth on a large machine gear, and they existed from the West Zhou IIRC. I don't have any pictures on my PC though.

The 3 spiked halberd head only roughly resembles a warhammer on the rear, but I don't assume it was used as such. It may entirely be for show since it is a small feature compared to the weapons proportions.
I have never seen anything like it, but there were numerous non-Chinese tribal peoples around in the Zhou period from whom it might come from. The various Jung and Ti/Di people for instance. While it feels rather exotic for a Chinese weapon there were so many different people around that no book can comphrehensive represent all the unusual types of weapons found in peripheral regions of non-Chinese types. Chinese style weapons also influenced 'foreign' (non-Zhou) peoples so mixtures like socketed halberds occur in the north. As many tribal people were absorbed by various means into East Zhou states and so disapear it would only be when I see a mention of something like this being found in a certain province, or held by a museum, that I could know anything beyond it 'may be' West Zhou, and is likely from the north of China.
I doubt any tests were done on the piece. The vast majority of pieces I know of held by ordinary private collectors are not laboratory tested as the cost for a truly authorative metallurgical testing is prohibitive even if the service was availible. For the high end items & first class relics worth a small fortune this would make sense, but is not practical or probably nessecary for many others. The end results would tell a competent & cautious collector what they should already have deduced, except there would be science to back it up. The guy who has this halberd has handled masses of bronzes, as that is his business, & the particular piece looks entirely authentic to my eye.


** edit;
I did just remember there were bronze trident 'standards' found in one tomb (the king of Zhongshan IIRC), these were not weapons but seemed to be the character for mountain 'SHAN' to be attached to poles. They were large, broad and cast thin, but the character for mountain would resemble a trident when lifted as a banner. They dated from the Warring States period, but no actual bladed weapon was made in that form.

Thanks. very informative for such a post indeed.
Do we have enough knowledge to study decorations and inscriptions that we normally find in many piece of Ancient Chinese weapons? For the Tiger design in the Ge shown above?

I found some cool cool picture of chinese warriors I wanted to share, is it a realistic interpretation of chinese armor and weaponry?

BTW is there a section devoted to modern day Chinese Art (especially about Ancient China), I know there is a thread for Chinese art but it seems to be mostly Ancient Art.

kenneth, I was watching a documentary and it showed a Ge with a lacquered sheath. Have you come across any of those before? I didn't know they came with sheaths.

They got some things right and some things wrong.
At least it is a better attempt than many. Considering it appears to be from a comic book then it need not be held up to high standards as a historical reconstruction.

The picture is apparently set in the Warring States period based on the features of weapons and dress (i.e one head gear of the archer is taken from the Qin soldiers). There are errors in the mix though.
Given that the weapons include types that could not date at the latest to the first half of the Western Han period the use of riders with stirrups is quite incorrect. There is not evidence for the use of riding stirrups anywhere near this early in history.
Mounting stirrups have been found in the post-Han period and there is some literary implications for ealier use (maybe) but even this is from the Han period. The balance of evidence is that stirrups use began on the steppes and all Han riders to date are depicted without such objects, hence even more wrong in the East Zhou.

The method of carring a bow strung accross the chest like this is not practical in combat if you were to be wielding hand weapons and what evidence there is for mounted archery does not show this practice.
Mounted archers more often used bow sheaths where the strung bow was carried in a container ready for use, on the saddle. Even early steppes nomads carried weapons at the ready in this way and as mounted archery (and clothing) was adopted from nomadic 'Hu' warfare the same bow case & quiver combined (Scythian examples called 'gorytos') would be a more sensible method to depict on cavalry.

The ring pommeled sabre as carried by one rider is an incorrect style, this dates from the Han and was not in this form and neither curved nor broad like this Kung Fu looking thing. It is fantasy.

The helmets would be more likely made of lamellar construction and made of leather as finds of bronze helmets are rare.

What they got right;
The ji halberd being carried by a warrior is comprised if a united spear and dagger axe, in a fairly correct style.
The lozenge ring hilted short swords are of a correct style.
Both these are classic Warring States weapons.
The uses of bells on horse gear is basically correct, as small bronze bells and fittings for harnesses exist at this time.

Hi Jieming,
There are examples of blade sheaths on East Zhou halberds in 'Weapons in Ancient China'. Some are quite well preserved and fit the blade shape exactly.
I have seen pictures of examples where the traces of the sheath are still fused to the bronze too.
I believe Richard Nable has one example of a bronze covering, that one covers the rear 'nei' (tang) cover.**
This one looks to be late West Zhou or Spring and Autumn period in form.
When covering the nei they may have protected the lustre of the bronze, or maybe inscriptions.
Close-ups can be seen here;
http://www.trocadero.com/pricelesspast/ite...store.html#item

Oh, how about swords in the picture, its length looks a bit excessive to me. The bow is hung in a ostentatious way.