The best mediaeval weapons for women

Dave - you are making valid points, and there is interesting detail on sword handling, but you are not entirely answering the points I have made. Also, at no point have I said it is "just technique". To summarise what I have said I think technique and strength are both important, and that I think you are over-estimating the importance of strength and also the impact of differences in strength. Provided someone has enough strength to handle a given weight of weapon - the 4lb longsword in this discussion - then additional muscle for handling that particular weight of weapon is not that much of an advantage for the reasons I gave earlier. Having heavier swords are also not necessarily an advantage outside of an arena, where you'd get breaks between the fights. On the road, you have to carry the extra weight, on a battlefield you may have to keep fighting for many hours and despite additional upper body strength that extra weight in your weapon that seemed such a good idea because you have extra body strength, will tell on your stamina.

Now, broadening the discussion again. Polearms. I'm a bit unconvinced by them as a weapon outside of line of battle. Yes, a whole row of spearmen or women, each guarding the other's flank, not a bad weapon in a mass - which is how the video at the start was describing its use. (Not as a personal defence weapon.) But as I said earlier, even in a mass it has a weakness - it can be grabbed and pushed aside. A sword is tapered with sharp edges - grab that in your bare hand and you'd regret it and it can be pulled back out of your hand. Grab a spear on the wooden pole behind the sharp bit on the end and you have a lever on the person at the other end, you don't cut your hand and it is hard for them to pull it back out. If they are flanked either side by more spearmen, then while you are mucking around holding onto the end of the spear, presumably their mates would be sticking their spears into you - unless of course you are flanked by your mates who have grabbed hold of their spears. And so it goes.

I've also been thinking about writing fight scenes and I think the first question ask is what are you trying to achieve. Is it a duel to the death or the survival of your character? So are you trying to kill the opponent, or slow them down enough so you can escape? Are you trying to be mean enough that you'd do damage as you went down and both of you know that - so they know that you can be beaten, they know that they will be injured by you - so are you worth robbing or is it better to rob someone else. And so on.

Moving onto more general weapons for women and Riff's mention of a rock on a stick. The discussion on here about a) strength, and b) rocks and sticks made me think of the story of David and Goliath. So Goliath is big and strong and beats trained champions who are not as strong. Along comes David who brings a rock to a sword fight. Knocks out Goliath and then uses Goliath's own sword to cut off his head. That is the point I was making earlier about guile. Also, David didn't even have to carry the whacking great sword to the battle in the first place.

Which makes me think of the slingshot as a weapon for a woman. Never used one, am aware that you have to whirl it around a few times, so it would be something to use on someone charging at you before they arrive.

Rocks on sticks - if you want to kill someone with one weapon, then a jagged rock on a stick is better than a stick. But you have to get the darn thing fastened on the stick in the first place. Or you could kill the opponent by stages - slingshot or knocking them out with the stick and bashing in the head with a bigger rock and so on.
Also thinking about bolas - rocks on strings - tie their legs together, then run in and kill them or knock them out.
 
Further to previous (too late to edit) that should be addressed to RX not Dave - my bad.


And edited to add a link - got curious and took five minutes I shouldn't have done :) to look up David's Slingshot.


Only watched the first couple of minutes, but that was and is an impressive thing especially given its simplicity. Must watch more of the film to find out how you aimed it. That could be something that you practised as part of your daily life. Walking along a road, try and hit a tree further along, retrieve stone when you reach the tree, try and hit another target further along and so on. And most medieval women would know how to braid cords, so they could easily make one.
 
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I don't think it's a simple matter of basic strength. No doubt most medieval peasants were quite strong (presuming they were prosperous enough that they had a healthy diet). But hand-to-hand combat involves very specific muscle groups, and specialized development and training of those muscles. A Japanese peasant may be strong from hauling water and pots of rice around all day. Doesn't mean he can apply that strength to wield a sword the way a samurai can, a samurai who has been rigorously developing specialized muscles and movements since childhood.

Or look at slingers. They could be highly effective weapons in the hands of experts. But experts didn't grow on trees. The men of the Balearic Isles trained relentlessly to employ slings as weapons, and became highly-paid mercenaries around the Mediterranean. Why wouldn't the Carthaginians, Romans, and Greeks just train their own peasants to use slings effectively? Because it's bloody hard, and takes the dedication of years and years - the kind of dedication that only comes from a narrow background or training.
 
Dave - you are making valid points, and there is interesting detail on sword handling, but you are not entirely answering the points I have made. Also, at no point have I said it is "just technique". To summarise what I have said I think technique and strength are both important, and that I think you are over-estimating the importance of strength and also the impact of differences in strength. Provided someone has enough strength to handle a given weight of weapon - the 4lb longsword in this discussion - then additional muscle for handling that particular weight of weapon is not that much of an advantage for the reasons I gave earlier. Having heavier swords are also not necessarily an advantage outside of an arena, where you'd get breaks between the fights. On the road, you have to carry the extra weight, on a battlefield you may have to keep fighting for many hours and despite additional upper body strength that extra weight in your weapon that seemed such a good idea because you have extra body strength, will tell on your stamina.

Now, broadening the discussion again. Polearms. I'm a bit unconvinced by them as a weapon outside of line of battle. Yes, a whole row of spearmen or women, each guarding the other's flank, not a bad weapon in a mass - which is how the video at the start was describing its use. (Not as a personal defence weapon.) But as I said earlier, even in a mass it has a weakness - it can be grabbed and pushed aside. A sword is tapered with sharp edges - grab that in your bare hand and you'd regret it and it can be pulled back out of your hand. Grab a spear on the wooden pole behind the sharp bit on the end and you have a lever on the person at the other end, you don't cut your hand and it is hard for them to pull it back out. If they are flanked either side by more spearmen, then while you are mucking around holding onto the end of the spear, presumably their mates would be sticking their spears into you - unless of course you are flanked by your mates who have grabbed hold of their spears. And so it goes.

I've also been thinking about writing fight scenes and I think the first question ask is what are you trying to achieve. Is it a duel to the death or the survival of your character? So are you trying to kill the opponent, or slow them down enough so you can escape? Are you trying to be mean enough that you'd do damage as you went down and both of you know that - so they know that you can be beaten, they know that they will be injured by you - so are you worth robbing or is it better to rob someone else. And so on.

Moving onto more general weapons for women and Riff's mention of a rock on a stick. The discussion on here about a) strength, and b) rocks and sticks made me think of the story of David and Goliath. So Goliath is big and strong and beats trained champions who are not as strong. Along comes David who brings a rock to a sword fight. Knocks out Goliath and then uses Goliath's own sword to cut off his head. That is the point I was making earlier about guile. Also, David didn't even have to carry the whacking great sword to the battle in the first place.

Which makes me think of the slingshot as a weapon for a woman. Never used one, am aware that you have to whirl it around a few times, so it would be something to use on someone charging at you before they arrive.

Rocks on sticks - if you want to kill someone with one weapon, then a jagged rock on a stick is better than a stick. But you have to get the darn thing fastened on the stick in the first place. Or you could kill the opponent by stages - slingshot or knocking them out with the stick and bashing in the head with a bigger rock and so on.
Also thinking about bolas - rocks on strings - tie their legs together, then run in and kill them or knock them out.

"Half sword" techniques involved grabbing the blade of your own sword, leading me to believe that being able to grab a polearm isn't much different. What a polearm does offer is a handle that can be easily held up close to the blade or much further away. It also offers tremendous leverage if your hands are placed far apart. Anyone who has used a garden implement will quickly understand the advantages.

As far as your points about swords go, I'm not following what distinctions you're making about "handling". 4 pound long swords are heavy. They are pushing the practical limit for controllable mass on a short handled weapon, and they went away. Swords continued to be useful battlefield weapons even after the civil war, not no one ever issued something as unwieldy again. Such a sword was a weapon for very strong people, not just anyone.


David brought down Goliath by shooting him at a distance. I doubt Goliath's buddies saw it as anything but a violation of the understood rules of the time. David would not have gotten away with this twice.
 
Slingers - it is a nice, cheap, simple weapon you can practice as you go about your daily work. Shepherds use them to chase off wolves. You can use them to kill rabbits and other small game. I think that ordinary people could become reasonably good - not necessarily up to the level of the massed Balearic slingers, but good.
Having now watched the video of the recreation, the killing of Goliath was very, very difficult - agreed.

But as I keep saying, it doesn't always have to be top use of a given weapon. Someone defending themselves out on the road - it might well be enough to drive off whoever is attacking them or injure them - not kill them. So being able to slingshot stones at them from say 10 or 20 feet as the bandit comes leaping out the bushes, so they get a fast moving stone in the mouth, or ricocheting bruisingly off their rib cage - its offputting. Driving off wolves - stones smacking into their ribs, bouncing off the ground around them - that drives them back. And in terms of defending yourself on the road - no rules of war there.

Polearms - as I have said, I have successfully grabbed the business end and deflected it. Maybe the other person wasn't that great at using it - but whatever the reason, I have beaten polearms barehanded on several occasions. It wasn't a "stage play" re-enactment - it was a real attack (as real as you are allowed to get) and a real defence. Leverage goes two ways - I had leverage against the person at the other end of the weapon. Presumably I had a better spaced grip than they did.
And the trouble with shortening your grip on a polearm is that you have a length of pole waggling around behind you. OK if you are on your own, really hacks off the people in the rank behind you if you are part of a squad. Again, been there, seen that, heard the swearing.

Longsword - you are saying "short handled weapon" the video Brian posted was recommending it for women as it could be used two handed. So not quite sure if we are talking the same weapon here. Hhm, now thinking about the video of women using longswords I posted which had them successfully using them one handed. So this is getting a bit confusing.
 
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4 pound long swords are heavy.

Certainly, so far as swords go - aren't normal arming swords around 1.2 - 1.5 lbs?

IMO there's no problem in terms of strength for a mediaeval woman using a sword - she would likely be stronger than most modern Western men due to a lifetime of hard manual work.

The difficulty is getting the training - in mediaeval times it's very limited to upper class men. IMO that's by far the biggest barrier for anybody outside of that social group.
 
Longsword - you are saying "short handled weapon" the video Brian posted was recommending it for women as it could be used two handed. So not quite sure if we are talking the same weapon here. Thinking about the video of women using longswords I posted had them successfully using them one handed.
Swords have short handles compared to blade length, polearms have long handles compared to blade length. Even a "two handed" sword will have 2/3 of its length in blade, which requires a very different technique.

As far as you overcoming your polearm opponent bare handed - congrats! Do you think that would have worked with a Spartan or samurai? Polearms are frontline weapons, and people have been creating methods for their use for probably 10,000 years. They aren't romantic or popular for re-creators, so I wouldn't expect anyone to have a lot of expertise these days, but there are more than enough Japanese and Chinese martial arts films that depict their use to at least get an idea of actually dangerous it would be to step into their radius.


This article illustrates a lot of the reasoning I've been trying to present:
Naginata - Wikipedia

In many ways it is like a hockey stick, where the shaft length lends leverage and control that a short handled implement would not.
 
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The polearm I beat was a halberd - much shorter sharp bit than a naginata. And the other advantage I had was years of fencing training so I have a lot of practice in observing the path of a weapon and timing my response.
The discussion we are having here, starting from Brian's posted video, is the idea that a polearm would be a good idea for a woman (and I was picturing a halberd not a naginata) and I was pointing out that they have a flaw, particularly if you are not that well trained in them. All through this thread some people have been saying that women wouldn't have the time for much specialised weapon training. And what you are saying RX is that a polearm is not that good an idea if you don't have time to get properly trained.
So a naginata style polearm might work for a woman with time to be trained.
If you don't have time to get trained, then the weapon you'd use the best, would be something closely related to your daily work, or that you could "fit-in" as you worked.

The longbow was not included as a good weapon for women, because it requires too much strength. However, there are hunting bows that were the pre-cursor of longbows which were used by women. There are images of medieval women using shorter hunting bows Medieval hunting - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
So I think I'd bring the bow back in as a weapon for women, just not a long bow. And most men used shorter (than longbows) for forest hunting because in woodland you didn't have long clear views.
So if you were battling, ranks of bowmen vs ranks of bowwomen - then the men would have greater range and power. But if you are positing defence on a road running through woodland, the advantage of the longbow is reduced because you are at a much closer range.
 
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The polearm I beat was a halberd - much shorter sharp bit than a naginata. And the other advantage I had was years of fencing training so I have a lot of practice in observing the path of a weapon and timing my response.
The discussion we are having here, starting from Brian's posted video, is the idea that a polearm would be a good idea for a woman (and I was picturing a halberd not a naginata) and I was pointing out that they have a flaw, particularly if you are not that well trained in them. All through this thread some people have been saying that women wouldn't have the time for much specialised weapon training. And what you are saying RX is that a polearm is not that good an idea if you don't have time to get properly trained.
So a naginata style polearm might work for a woman with time to be trained.
I don't see how any medieval weapon is effective without training, but I think a sword - particularly a heavy one - requires the most training given its low leverage.
 
Fair enough.

Interesting thread this. Wonder how much will percolate on into the fantasy books we write :). The balance of probabilities and usefulness, length of training and so on. Also the perils of words which mean different things to different people.
For completeness, the halberd was multi-purpose and had a feature for hauling horsemen to the ground. Here is wiki on halberds and the like.
Halberd - Wikipedia
And having followed a link from there, I have learnt for the first time of a war scythe - looks quite a bit like a naginata and apparently could cut through helmets.
War scythe - Wikipedia - though that article lists the disadvantages as being weight.
 
Wonder how much will percolate on into the fantasy books we write :).
Probably my last post here because you seem to be arguing round in circles. My own point, which I didn't appear to get across, was not that women were too weak, or too stupid, or never fought under any circumstances. My point was that social conventions and the sheer amount of work involved running a household, would mean that they were unlikely to get the training to be able to. Sure, you can quote exceptions, but the very fact that you can quote recorded exceptions is proof that those were very exceptional women. I just thought that for historical accuracy you might want to take that into account, however, on thinking more about this, no one wants to read a fantasy book about very ordinary people. So, carry on.
 
Probably my last post here because you seem to be arguing round in circles. My own point, which I didn't appear to get across, was not that women were too weak, or too stupid, or never fought under any circumstances. My point was that social conventions and the sheer amount of work involved running a household, would mean that they were unlikely to get the training to be able to. Sure, you can quote exceptions, but the very fact that you can quote recorded exceptions is proof that those were very exceptional women. I just thought that for historical accuracy you might want to take that into account, however, on thinking more about this, no one wants to read a fantasy book about very ordinary people. So, carry on.
Who would be the men in an medieval adventure story, for that matter? Why would Dave have time for quests if Darla does not?
 
Montero, seem to recall a Lindy Beige video suggesting the idea of a scythe used in war was pretty unlikely, given it's structure. Something like a fancy spear, poleaxe or naginata would be so different from an actual scythe that the use of the name would be misleading.
 
War scythe - they took the blade off the handle and turned it round by 90degrees so it is in line with the pole like the naginata - but yes, agree - unless you start your story with the peasants busily turning their scythes into war scythes (which they did) then it would be hard to understand.

@RX-79 - Thank you. Yes, exactly.

@Dave - in terms of historical accuracy, you appear to still be ignoring the myriad forms of work in which women engaged which was far more varied and extensive than running a household. This comes from guild records - it is not "exceptional women" there are numbers per type of job - read Alice Clark's book. As I also said, the social conventions of the period are seen through the distorting lens of the Victorian period and the industrial revolution. In terms of the examples I provided of women who fought - they are recorded by the society of the day - and in some cases rewarded by that society. Yes they were a minority, but they were not non-existent.
It wasn't that you were not getting your point across, it was that I was disagreeing with it - and still do. In terms of learning to fight, as I said earlier in the thread, I see no reason why women wouldn't have basic self-defence training in the same way they do today and the rougher the area the more value there is in them spending time learning how to fight. Not at the level of a professional man at arms, but at the level of driving off an attacker, slowing down an attacker and running like crazy. Hunting bows, good solid broom, belt knife, sling shots....

And reading Wikipedia about the myth of Amazons it seems there is a historical basis from a nomadic people where some of the women also learned to fight expertly so they could defend the herds while the men were off at war - with women warrior graves being uncovered by archaeologists.

And finally, if social conventions were 100% effective in limiting women's behaviour, how come there have been so many changes in their role? Owning property, voting, wearing trousers.....
 
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