Hand Weapons by Andrew Regnerus

All men in the Middle Ages had to know how to fight. They had to be ready and available when called to fight for the King. The weapons they used may look like very low tech weapons, but they are very powerful. One of the weapons they used is sword. The sword is made of steel. Steel is made of iron and carbon. When iron is heated the right way over a very hot fire it becomes steel. There are four parts of each sword, the blade (the long piece of steel that forms the blade), guard (protects the hand of the person using the sword), hilt (the handle of the sword) and the pommel (the end of the sword that the hilt is on). Another example of a Middle Ages hand weapon is a flail. A flail is made of a short wooden handle connected to a chain, at the end of the chain there is a metal ball with sharp spikes on it. Some of the most dangerous hand weapons in the middle ages were swords, arrows, knifes and axes. During the Middle Ages a knight's weapon was the most important part of their gear. Below are pictures of some of the hand weapons I have talked about.  

Middle Ages hand weapons      

Examples of what swords looked like during the Middle Ages   

Here is what a flail looks like