Yesterday I failed to make a
certain note. This was about the Lord of the Nazgul’s weapon, a mace. Many
people will think of the overblown thing from the Jackson film, a prop that
Jackson admittedly made bigger and bigger for cinematic effect. It was invented for the films. Technically it
is not a mace, but a weird chimera of a weapon that I have seen dubbed a mace
flail. In most illustrations made before the movies, it is depicted in a more
traditional manner. As I noted in my other blog, many years ago:
“The mace was a club-like
weapon popular through many centuries and in many countries. Shapes, sizes, and
patterns varied a great deal, but mostly had a long handle with a flanged,
knobbed, or spiked head. They were popular with churchmen or clerics of military
bent, because they were crushing or bruising weapons, and thus circumvented the
scriptural ban on the shedding of blood by the sword.
“The flail, as a weapon, was
based on the agricultural instrument for threshing corn, and thus favored by
lower orders. This devastating weapon, consisting at its simplest as a weighted
end suspended from a handle by a chain or leather strip, besides landing
painful blows, could strike around shields or entangle the enemy's weapon.
Sometimes called, in grim humor, a 'holy water sprinkler.' It could have
several heads which made it more deadly but harder to handle.
“The morningstar (or
'morgenstern') was a spiked ball that could be used as the end of a mace or as
the weight on the end of a flail. So-called because of its resemblance to a
star.”
--Power of Babel, Jan.1,
2013
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