Weapons are valuable to understand societies, as they not only respond to specific issues regarding fighting techniques, but also, they present a social aspect: all soldiers did not have the same equipment. The possession and use of weapons are related to the fighting skills and the social claims within a group of warriors, which was an important way to highlight a social status in the society. To understand the impact of weapons in society, we must carefully observe the deposition of these artefacts. For example, discovering ancient weapons in sanctuary contexts, in houses or in graves.
From the latter to the former, the deposition of high value weapons in burials brings us, on one hand, the value of specific objects for the travel to the afterlife; on the other, the funeral was organised by the persons close to the dead, to honour the person and to show social position to the other participant at the ceremony. In this case, depositing weapons is a way to exhibit to the community the warrior status and the wealth of the deceased, and so, showing their power will continue through their descendancy.
The discovery of weapons within households or agglomerations may be associated to the last moments of the settlement existence, which maybe were marked by fights and culminated in losses. It can be related to the gathering of weapons to be ready to preserve the community in case of emergency. It can also be related to the highlighting the specific status, as it is the case of exhibited weapons.
Weapons in sanctuary contexts are difficult to apprehend because they serve several purposes. The first aspect is to devote them to the divinity and assure the protection of the dedicant. The weapons can be offered complete, in a good shape as a gift of an enemy equipment or a symbol of devotion of the dedicant’s equipment, or be destroyed to defunctionalize it. The treatment of weapons in the sanctuary’s changes regarding each society: for example, in the Greek temples, the weapons were carefully preserved to honour the divinity, but could also be used in a specific moment, such as in the defence of the city and temple. In other cases, the deposited weapons were only dedicated to thanking the divinity. Such practice leads to the development of smaller votive objects, as miniature weapons, or “fake” ones, which look like real, but not made to be used. Therefore, the discovery context is important to comprehend the use and value of weapons in each society and how those societies dealt with warfare.
Weapons are important to understand the exchanges of objects and ideas, as well as warfare practices. However, most of the time, it is difficult to fully understand the shape and use of these objects. The remains of weapons are related to non-perishable materials, such as stone during Prehistory and metals from the metal ages to nowadays. But the non-perishable materials are only a part of the weapons. For example, the most used weapon until the Modern Era probably was the spear, of which we can only find its specific parts, like the head, due to the disappearance of its wooden shaft. Therefore, it becomes more difficult to know the size of the weapon and to understand its specific use. Even for weapons entirely in metal there are some conservation issues because the suspension parts involve perishable materials. The archaeological remains of weapons are partial, and this fact led us to compare several analyses to fully understand their use.
This is important to understand the association of weapons to get a better idea of the equipment and its use in combat. It can be approached through grave goods, but we must keep in mind that the deposition of objects in graves is conditioned by several factors. Even for some wealthy graves, we rarely find all the pieces of military practices. Defensive weapons are rarely deposited in military graves, because they bring much more prestige to the lineage by remaining in use or exhibited.
The weapons and their analysis allow us to observe fighting techniques. To do so, we firstly and usually address their morphological aspects. 3D tools have recently shown to be efficient to this purpose.1 With 3D models of archaeological weapons and reconstructing their original form, including its perishing material parts, we can make specific analyses, such as the weight or centre of gravity which allow us to comprehend how each weapon was used. Through different analyses of complementary weapons, we can also infer how the adoption and/or adaptation of some weapon in each society fit with a specific habit or changes in fighting techniques.
To these analyses, other sources can be joined, such as iconographic or textual ones, to broaden our comprehension of warfare in ancient societies.
References
- Bertaud, A., 2020: “Des épées laténiennes aux glaives romains : interactions guerrières et évolutions tactiques en Europe occidentale à la fin du Ier millénaire a.C.”, in: Le Cozanet, T., Moulin, C. & Nordez, M. (ed.), Interactions et échanges durant la Protohistoire, Actes des IIIe rencontres doctorales internationales de l’École Européenne de Protohistoire de Bibracte, Bibracte collection EEPB, Glux-en-Glenne, p. 15-19.
- Molloy, B., Wisniewski, M. Lynam, F., O’Neill, F., O’Neill, B., O’Sullivan, A. & Peatfield, A., 2016: “Tracing edges: a consideration of the application of 3D modelling for metalwork wear analysis on Bronze Age bladed artefacts”, Journal of Archaeological Science, 76, p. 79-87.
