Spear
Humanity's oldest weapon
The spear is the oldest and most universal weapon in human history. A simple thing of a wooden shaft about 150 to 250 cm with a metal head, or in the Stone Age a head of stone or bone, it was so easy and cheap to make that it was the first weapon any civilization took in hand. The simple act of thrusting alone was enough to be effective, so the training was short, and used in a dense formation it let the strength of the group make up for the want of individual skill. Above all, the essence of the spear lies in distance: the long shaft reaches first, before the enemy can close, mastering by reach a foe armed with sword or dagger. From the Greek phalanx to the Viking shield wall to the medieval militia, it was the core weapon of nearly every army in history.
Origin
The spear is among the earliest weapons humankind ever made, used for hunting and for war since the Paleolithic. The wooden spears about 300,000 years old unearthed at Schoningen in Germany are among the oldest wooden weapons preserved, and the spear point found at Clacton in England is thought to be older still, about 400,000 years. Humans wielded the spear, then, from a time before the bow, the sword, or any metal. The spear was not the invention of any one culture but arose independently on every continent and in every civilization, and being the oldest weapon, it was also the longest-lived, carried on in the form of the bayonet into the age of gunpowder.
Features
- A total length of about 150 to 250 cm in the infantry form
- The cheapest and most easily mass-produced weapon
- Effective in combat even with short training
- Collective power maximized in a dense formation
- Chiefly for thrusting, with some also for throwing
- The oldest weapon type in human history
Stories
The true worth of the spear came from distance and formation. Infantry stood in ranks behind shields and thrust their spears out together to raise a wall of points, stabbing first, before the enemy could close, to bar the approach itself. The Greek phalanx, the Germanic and Viking shield wall, and the spear formation of the medieval militia all worked on this principle. One man's spear was strongest at a distance, and many in a row became a seamless forest of points that halted even the charge of cavalry. There were variants made for throwing, the javelins, but the true element of the infantry spear lay always in holding it to thrust and keep distance.
Weakness
The weakness of the spear lies in the moment its length is made useless. Once an enemy pushes inside the point and closes to the body, the long shaft becomes a burden and is outmatched by a sword or dagger quickly drawn. The spear, moreover, leans on the strength of the formation rather than on individual skill, so its power falls off sharply in the broken press of a melee. The wooden shaft can break in a violent clash, and in single combat its range of use is narrow compared with the versatile sword.
Cultural Significance
The spear is the most fundamental and universal weapon of humankind. Throughout history what the common soldier held was not the costly sword but the spear: where the sword was a precious weapon, a symbol of wealth and rank, the spear was the true mainstay of armies that anyone could be equipped with. The spear recurs, too, as the weapon of gods and heroes in unrelated mythologies. Gungnir, the never-missing spear of Odin in Norse myth, the Amenonuhoko that stirred heaven and earth in the Japanese creation myth, and the Spear of Longinus of Christian legend all show how old and universal a weapon the spear is in the human imagination.
In Popular Culture
The spear is the most basic weapon appearing in nearly every work of history and fantasy. It commonly appears as the standard weapon of the infantry or an early-game piece in strategy and action games, and the spear formation of the phalanx and the shield wall is a scene never missing when ancient and medieval war is drawn. In works of myth, famed divine spears such as Gungnir and the Spear of Longinus are drawn as powerful emblematic weapons. In fiction, though, it often yields the leading role to the flashy sword, so the real standing of the spear, the most common and important weapon in history, is treated relatively faintly.
Trivia
- The wooden spears about 300,000 years old unearthed at Schoningen in Germany are among the oldest wooden weapons preserved, and the spear point at Clacton in England is older still, about 400,000 years, showing the spear to be the oldest weapon type, far ahead of the bow, the sword, and any metal weapon.
- For most of history the common soldier's weapon was not the sword but the spear: cheap, quick to make, and effective with little training, it was the mainstay in the Viking shield wall and the Greek phalanx, while the sword was a costly, symbolic sidearm.
- The spear recurs as the weapon of gods and heroes in unrelated mythologies: Odin's never-missing Gungnir, the Amenonuhoko of the Japanese creation myth, and the Spear of Longinus of Christian legend show how universal and ancient this weapon is in the human imagination.