How were flails carried?

[Steverooo]

A flail is a flail is a flail. I has a handle with a hinge and a head. Never is a flail a mornigstar.

A flanged-headed flail is not a spike-headed flail, is not a Morningstar-flail. Grain flails (and most maces) had flanged heads. Many maces and flail heads were flanged, but with flat spikes coming out of the flanges. A Morningstar-flail had a ball head with many spikes (round in cross section) coming out of it. Morningstars and Flails were indeed separate forms of weapons, although some flails had morningstar heads... Hence the name "Morningstar-flails".

Most people (and even dictionaries) that write about medieval weapons have no idea what they are talking about. How many pictures of spetums have you seen labeled "halberd"? When Gary Gygax did up the D&D weapons, he did so as a pretty good medieval weapons expert, with a LOT of research. I have seen his charts on polearms from Unearthwed Arcana used on actual archealogy sites

And most people writing about people that write about medieval weapons know even less, eh?

A flanged flail (most common type) does blunt trauma damage. a spiked flanged flail or morningstar-flail would do blunt/pierce. The 3.xe version is blunt, only. Only the illustration in the book confuses people on this point.

And most flails had chains, not hinges.

 

[tarchon]

A flanged-headed flail is not a spike-headed flail, is not a Morningstar-flail. Grain flails (and most maces) had flanged heads. Many maces and flail heads were flanged, but with flat spikes coming out of the flanges. A Morningstar-flail had a ball head with many spikes (round in cross section) coming out of it. Morningstars and Flails were indeed separate forms of weapons, although some flails had morningstar heads... Hence the name "Morningstar-flails".

And most people writing about people that write about medieval weapons know even less, eh?

A flanged flail (most common type) does blunt trauma damage. a spiked flanged flail or morningstar-flail would do blunt/pierce. The 3.xe version is blunt, only. Only the illustration in the book confuses people on this point.

And most flails had chains, not hinges.

But what if you have a <b>fluted</b> flanged flail, with a <b>knurled grommet</b>?

 

[Imperialus]

I'm not even going to touch the flail/mace/morning star debate. Suffice to say I am talking about a peice of wood, with a short 6" to 10" length of chain with a reasonably heavy lead or iron ball at the end. It may or may not be spiked.

Records seem to indicate that most of a knights weapons was carried not on his person but on a series of loops, hooks and clips attached to his saddle.

This allowed easy access to whatever he might find himself in need of, mowing down pesants? Well golly gee his sword is right there. Up against another guy in gothic armour? well the mace will definatly be more useful and it's right handy by too. Loose the mace? Well at least your warhammer is there as backup.

Larger footmans flails would more than likely be carried over the shoulder like any other polearm.

 

[Wraith Form]

Sorry--I thought this was the post about how SNAILS were carried. I'll go elsewhere.

 

[isoChron]

Oh wait ! How were snails carried ?

 

[Christian]

Heh, he wrote a book on weapons and his name is Armour. How ironic.

If you're that easily amused, you should try to track down the book. Armour was a humorist, not a historian, and a darn good one ...

"The Mongol strategy under Attila the Hun was to sweep down on a village, loot it, and be gone again before defending forces could be recruited, armed, and trained."

His Twisted Tales from Shakespeare is pretty good, too.

 

[Harold as a Verb]

Thanks for all the replies folks.

I never intended to set of a discussion about terms, but I've found that discussion pretty interesting too ... always like to learn.

Anyway, my group loves doing this sort of *added flavour* stuff, and in the end this is what we came up with (just for the record) :

The flail holder comes in two parts.

Attached to the character's belt is a cylindrical "sheath" that holds about 3/4ths the length of the flail handle - which is inserted "upside down". That is, with the chain-attached end facing up. (The exposed 1/4 of the handle is for grasping to "draw".)

Fastened (strapped) around the lower right leg, or even latched atop the boot, is the other part, which holds the flail head. It's a heavily padded small bag with a widish open top (but threaded a bit like a duffle-bag (sp?) so that in circumstances where the flailhead might pop out of it's own accord (climbing, jumping etc) you can "tighten the noose" around the top of the bag). Of course, fastened between bag and leg there is also a metal plate to prevent spikes going into the leg in unfortunate accidents.

Now all we need is (a) a time machine and (b) decent medieval (sp?) patent laws, and we could all be rich.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Hmmm, I would picture a 'footman's flail' as being slung over your shoulder.

A 'horseman's flail', 'knight's flail', or 'todtschlagger' (who's spelling I have most likely mangled, I believe it means 'dead hitter' or something like that) might depend from a hook on the saddle. Being a weapon for when you dismount rather than for use from horseback.

The Auld Grump, who thinks the footman's flail is scarier looking anyway - but the word 'todtschlagger' is just so darn cool....

 

[Bran Blackbyrd]

A metal ring mounted on some leather with belt loops attached. Your belt goes through the loops, your flail handle goes in the metal ring and simply hangs there.

Axes are generally carried the same way.