Talk:List of premodern combat weapons

Árije?

The section on "Hand-and-a-Half and Two-handed Greatswords" mentions the "Árije," which is not a hoplological type that I've ever heard of before. I've also been unable to find any further information (aside from fictional fantasy role-playing game statistics) for this type of sword. So, unless somebody can provide a source for the appearance and statistics of the "arije" as a real-world typological category of swords, I propose to delete the line from the list. Lay (talk) 09:05, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

• Since no one has stepped up with a reference, I've gone ahead and deleted the line. Feel free to discuss any disagreements here. 114.58.89.82 (talk) 14:28, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Redundant?

This page seems to be unnecessary with many other extant pages such as "List of Melee Weapons", "List of Swords", "List of Polearms" etc. Also, there seems to many irrelevant entries such as fictional weapons, and section at the end of article which discusses categorization, categorization made by unrealistic video games were mentioned. I suggest this article to either be cleaned up, or even deleted. SirTwilight (talk) 15:23, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

One of the purposes of the creation of this list was to provide information on large variety of weapons that would be useful to those interested in role playing or game design. For that reason, fictional weapons and video game information was considered pertinent to the topic. This may not seem to be a scholarly enough topic for wikipedia, a decision left to the wikipedia community to decide, but it is helpful to some. As for redundancy, it is currently the most complete, referenced, and linked list of weapons on wikipedia. It allows users to look at weapons based on their use without browsing multiple pages, and is the only list of weapons from the premodern world. Some students of weapons, especially of weapon based historical martial arts, may wish for a list to turn to that does not include modern firearms and missiles. For these reasons I suggest that the list is useful as is. uroscion (talk) 14:40 10 Oct 2010 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.246.183.225 (talk) 19:43, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

Modifying format to table

A few years ago I created this table Components of medieval armour. I didn't want just a list, I wanted an at-a-glance summary that told me how an armet was different to a close helm. I'm thinking of doing something similar to this list. Keep the structure as it is and add columns for: Name of sword; Area of origin/use; Date of usage; Perhaps a very brief description of the weapon and, particularly for swords,a note of similarity or family. For ease of use I'd alphabetise the list rather than arrange it chronologically or geographically.

I wouldn't be looking at making extensive notes and I wouldn't, in all likelihood, reference much myself. I'd just copy the references as they stand.

I've several things going on and I might lose my interest so I don't know when I'll get around to this if objections aren't forthcoming. Waerloeg (talk) 09:17, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

cleanup and merge/split

The list is rather chaotic and eclectic (showing a long history of unchecked additions I assume), but it was still the best compared to the even more terrible list of martial arts weapons and list of melee weapons, which now redirect here.

I don't understand how such lists can exist in complete isolation for years. You would assume that anyone sitting down to compile such a list would begin by collecting information already there. There is types of swords, list of daggers and list of ranged weapons, all equally terrible.

My suggestion would be to split this, at least into list of melee weapons and list of ranged weapons, as it does nothing for anyone to keep these on a single page.

the "melee weapons" should probably be further divided (swords, knives/daggers, polearms), but this should probably not be done until a stable structure emerges.

I widespread problem with this listcruft is that it mixes up articles on generic weapon types with articles on very specific martial arts dedicated to such a weapon type.

For example, []] is the generic article about the weapon type. Qiang (spear) is just the Chinese word for "spear". There is not one weapon called "spear" and another called "qiang", they are just translations of one another. But the Qiang (spear) article will of course focus on use of the spear in Chinese martial arts. The same goes for Staff (stick) vs. Gun (staff) and Bō. Or for halberd and Ji (halberd).

This means there should be a section in the list called "spear", which links to spear as its {{main}} article. It can then go on to list articles on specific types of spear such as the Migration period spear, the Viking Age spear, Yari, Qiang (spear), etc.

At the very latest when you list "la canne" or "lathi" or "silambam", you have ceased listing individual weapons and are now either listing various combat systems instead (List of martial arts), or you are doing the job of wikt:stick#Translations, as these terms simply mean "stick" or "staff" in assorted languages. --dab (𒁳) 09:06, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I will agree that some clean-up would be preferable, but care should be taken to avoid removal of links to the more specific weapons(even if these may be little more than translated names). At the very least the listing should be such that the main weapon type is obvious.62.238.182.126 (talk) 23:27, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I've done some cleanup of the lists by putting them in alphabetical order. I also removed the table formatting that was started in the first few sections, but ultimately discontinued for the rest of the page. I combined redundant links (variants of the same weapon all pointing to the exact same article) in each section, and updated a few others to point to the proper pages when appropriate.

I agree that this list needs to be reorganized/restructured, and that it could benefit from being split in two (melee vs ranged). I also agree that the links that point to martial art styles (which specialize in the specific weapons being listed here) should be removed. However, I believe that translations of weapon names (halberd = ji, spear = qiang, staff = bo) should still be referenced if they have their own articles (possibly listed under the pertinent section heading as "Further information" or "See also" or "Related topics"). Wrathkind (talk) 14:46, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Just to further clarify my opinion on translations (e.g. Staff [stick] = Bō, Gun [staff], etc): I believe that this list should just subsume the other lists whose only purpose is to compile translations of a particular weapon. Unless those pages are merged into their main articles (e.g. Staff [stick] gets merged into Staff, which itself is a disambiguation list), then such lists are just better off being integrated into this one. The strength of this article lies in its aggregation of weapon names, not just weapon types, serving as an index to disparate pages and scattered lists.

For example, while this article references Spear, it would be better off just absorbing the List of types of spears entirely. Should that happen, this list should explicitly state that these are translations of the same weapon. Not only would it reduce clutter by absorbing other lists, it would strengthen the value of this page as a reference index.

The other option is to break off these translations into their own separate lists (which is already the case in a few of these), but that leads to the terribleness that you initially brought up. Having such lists exist in isolation devalues them because they have very little context and/or purpose on their own. I'm not even sure why such lists are being separated from their main articles in the first place. Wrathkind (talk) 03:23, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

I highly disagree with splitting this list into the individual lists. I, the author, was fully aware of the other individual lists, and used them extensively to create this one. I saw the smaller lists as nice, but not meeting the needs of a reader trying to browse a large range of weapons. In addition, the connection of this article to realistic fictional weapons and role-playing games was to provide a place for role-players to browse all the weapons that might be used in combat in a given cultural context (hence the area of the world listing), not just ranged weapons, or spears, etc. The smaller lists are fine as they stand, but given to much redundancy and hence data discrepancy. Ideally, the wiki software would allow us to mirror those lists on this page, keeping the data on those pages and just displaying it here, but as that isn't possible, this was the best I could do. This list allows you to see the incredible range of weapons that were used in combat prior to modern warfare, spanning across time and culture. It would be even better if it could have a time reference on each weapon and a place, and a listing of length and size for each one, placed in a sortable table, allowing users to sort and browse by area of the world and those criteria. As for the listing of different translations of weapon names as separate weapons, I simply don't know everything. That's what wikipedia is for, those that are truly just different culture's names for the same implement should be merged as sub-lists or on the same line as the most familiar term. If the words imply different lengths or sizes, then those should be kept separate. No martial arts should have been listed here, only weapons. uroscion (talk) 15:50, 08 October 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.246.178.49 (talk)

While I understand wanting to index all these items on one page, I think that an ever-lengthening list of links will eventually prove unwieldy. Long lists tend to lose semantic value when section headers cease to fit within visible screen dimensions. Forcing users to use their browsers' "find-in-page" search function just to make the article functionally useful is really poor structuring.

Dbachmann suggested splitting off the ranged weapons onto their own article, and I tentatively agreed it could be a beneficial split because of one thing: the inclusion of gunpowder weapons as late as the 18th century belies the idea that these are premodern weapons that "existed before the invention of the true flintlock gun around 1610". There is a thematic disruption that happens within the ranged weapons section, which I think comes from this article's objective of going up to the Renaissance, while still encompassing the pre-Victorian era (presumably using the Steampunk timeframe as the cutoff point). A more fastidious criteria for the inclusion and organization of items within this article is recommended, or the article's theme should just be explicitly pre-Victorian weapons (rather than the more vague premodern terminology).

However, as I said, I do understand the usefulness of having all of these in one article. Unfortunately, this entire page needs an overhaul into something tabular, so that entire sections can be collapsed, and columns can be sorted. Waerloeg attempted to do this, but only managed to get through the first four sections.

Also, the overall intent of this page needs to be clarified, restated, and reinforced. Going through the edit history (and uroscion's comments), it seems this article initially included fictional armament, yet over time such items were removed (an editor noted their inclusion as vandalism). This gradual shift away from fictional paraphernalia culminated in a massive edit of this page's opening paragraph, which now seems to implicitly exclude fictional arms, magical weaponry, and other mythological items. I'm ambivalent about which way this discrepancy gets settled, but it needs to be resolved. Wrathkind (talk) 12:55, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I think having this list in one place is useful, so I do not recommend deleting it. However, as a student of burmese martial arts, I do question categorizing kukris as axe-like swords. They are used extensively for thrusting, slashing and hammering and in other ways that are not consistent with classifying them as axe-like. So I don't think characterizing them as axe-like is accurate. I would recommend to reclassify kukris as "Curved one-handed swords". I would assume the same holds true for the greek makhaira (which the kukri is often compared to) but I'm not familiar with that weapon. Mike-c-in-mv (talk) 23:26, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I applied the changes you suggested. Please feel free to make immediate changes on items about which you are knowledgeable. The advantage of wiki is the ability to quickly update with correct information, rather than wait for a concensus. Wrathkind (talk) 02:19, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Subsume: List of types of spears

List of types of spears currently has a similar format to this list of pre-modern combat weapons. That list divides the spears between melee and ranged, and groups them by region. It originally broke off from the main Spear article because it came across as needless clutter.

Separate from its main article, that list has even less purpose out of context. Adding it to this list of pre-modern combat weapons gives both lists more value (there is already considerable overlap in the items listed on both lists). I propose merging that list into this list. Wrathkind (talk) 16:43, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Pre-Modern/Modern

there should be a section for weapons that are still used today that aren't guns.--99.101.160.159 (talk) 04:11, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

I think that would further clutter the list. It would mean that some weapons would appear twice: once in their form-and-usage category, and then a second time in the still-in-use-today category. A better alternative would be to just add a notation next to the pertinent entries, indicating that they are still actively used in modern times (ex. Combat Knife - still used by modern military). — Wrathkind (talk) 01:58, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

a notice

the Dolne Apache revolver was a 1869 construction and not a pre "modern" construction

the snaplock, matchlock, flintlock, wheellock, caplock and doglock were firing mechanisms and not the firearm itself such as the smoothbored barrel or rifled barrel early pistoles, early carbines, muskets, musketoons, arquebuses, blunderbuses

also to the list the early hand mortar, the musketoon, the Bajozutsu matchlock revolver arquebus, the Tanegashima matchlock arquebus, the Heilongjiang hand cannon, the Shou Chong hand cannon, the San Yan Chong three barrel hand cannon, the Xun Lei Chong spear revolver musket and the Che Dian Chong musket are somehow not included

a suggestion

since this list seems to be of conventional and unconventional infantry weapons how about to include and other weapons that don't use electricity or gunpowder such as early portable airguns and early portable flamethrowers

Japanese Kunitomo air rifle of 1820

Austrian Girardoni air rifle of 1780

https://postimg.cc/fSY50FZ4 Byzantine portable flamethrower of 900

"Indian Parrying Weapon" = Haladie?

The list cites "Indian parrying weapon", but does not link to anything, and seems frankly generic. Does it mean, by that, haladie, and, if so, wouldn't it be better to just say "haladie (Indian)"? (Or possibly "haladie (Indian, Scythian)")

If "Indian parrying weapon" ≠ "haladie", I would suggest 1) better identifying what an "Indian parrying weapon" is and 2) adding haladie to the list (possibly under "daggers and knives"?).

Anime

Something really cool from Japan. A type of Japanese animated drama that is not very good live action. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:649:100:7C80:AC93:F341:F3F6:6F6A (talk) 03:35, 27 November 2018 (UTC) 0 July 2020 (UTC)