More Old Stuff: Spears!

Another weapon, known for its earliness, is the spear. The spear came about because you can’t club everything; in fact, some of the larger animals are almost completely immune to a good clubbing. But, most animals have a hard time getting out of bed the next day if all their blood is gone or there is a piece of track and field equipment stuck in one of their organs. The spear probably started as a sharpened stick much the same as Frank Sinatra did.

And, like Frank Sinatra, a spear can be used as a thrown weapon. Let’s say you like the taste of mastodon, but you don’t like being stomped into a puddle by one. Well then, a thrown spear is just the weapon for you. The mastodon will still stomp SOMEbody, but it will have to charge you one at a time. You’ve got to love those odds… compared to “inevitable” a thirty percent chance of a mortal injury was the neanderthal concept of “risk-free”.

It didn’t take very long for someone to reason that there was even less risk using spears to kill the guys who just killed the mastodon and take their bounty. And, it didn’t take long for the mastodon hunters to reason that they’d need to spear the pricks that took their elephant meat. This developed into what we now call “war” and it is a beautiful thing if observed from a great distance…

Spears were used during the bronze age, the iron age and throughout the Middle Ages. Why? Because practically ANYTHING can be used to make a spearhead. If mankind had a “Soap Age”, you can bet there’d be people running around with spearheads that smelled like Irish Spring or, to a lesser extent, Zest.

There are almost as many spear-types as there are varieties of spears. Some notable spears are:

• The Bohemian Earspoon: Yeah, it sounds like something W.C. Fields might’ve purchased in Cucamonga. And, it really wasn’t used for very long. But, you’ve gotta love that name…
• Ox Tongue Spears were weapons and NOT something you might order as an appetizer in an Israeli Applebees. They also fell out of use pretty quickly.
• Spontoons (or ‘espontoons’ if you are Antonio Bandaras) are half-pikes. You know how, sometimes, a pike is just too much for what you need and a quarter-pike isn’t nearly enough? Lewis and Clark carried them and, by their account, they worked just swell against bears.
• Gichang is a Korean spear with a flag attached. Like owning a paper shredder with bottle opener attached to it. I suppose it is more patriotic to spear someone with what is essentially a sharpened flagpole. “Happy birthday, Mr. President”…