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A war scythe or military scythe is a form of polearm with a curving single-edged blade with the cutting edge on the concave side of the blade. Its blade bears a superficial resemblance to that of an agricultural scythe from which it is likely to have evolved, but the war scythe is otherwise unrelated to agricultural tools and is a purpose-built ...
There are many similar polearms such as the war scythe, the Japanese naginata, the Chinese guandao (yanyuedao), the Korean woldo, and the Russian sovnya. A glaive typically consists of a single-edged blade approximately 45 centimeters long affixed to a pole measuring about 2 meters.
Scythemen, also known as scythe-bearers [a] is the term for soldiers (often peasants and townspeople) armed with war scythes. [1] First appearing in the Kościuszko Uprising of 1794, scythemen quickly became one of the symbols of the struggle for Polish independence and for the emancipation of the serfs.
George Silver, writing in 1599, stated that the black bill should be 5 or 6 feet (1.5 or 1.8 m) long, while the forest bill should be 8 or 9 feet (2.4 or 2.7 m). [ 2 ] During the early 16th century when most European states were adopting the pike and arquebus , the English preferred to stick with the combination of bill and English longbow .
The fauchard differs from the guisarme by the direction of its edge and its point, generally projected in the rear, and of the war scythe by the dimension and the nature of the curves. The very old fauchards generally carry on their backs horizontal bumps or hooks directed from top to bottom and used to pull people by the projections of their ...
The scythed chariot was a modified war chariot. The blades extended horizontally for about 1 m (3 ft 3 in) to each side of the wheels. The Greek general Xenophon (430−354 BC), an eyewitness at the battle of Cunaxa, tells of them: "These had thin scythes extending at an angle from the axles and also under the driver's seat, turned toward the ground".
War scythe, an improvised weapon that consisted of a blade from a scythe attached vertically to a shaft Welsh hook , similar to a halberd and thought to originate from a forest-bill Woldo , A Korean polearm that had a crescent-shaped blade mounted on a long shaft, similar in construction to the Chinese guandao , and primarily served as a symbol ...
This is a list of notable types of weapons which saw use in warfare, and more broadly in combat, prior to the advent of the early modern period, i.e., approximately prior to the start of the 16th century.