03-10-2008, 09:24 AM
You know, it's an interesting thread, as the accepted and almost exclusive Dacian use of the falx could be a classic example of, "Well, it just is, isn't it. Everyone says so, and has done for a long time."
Is there a specific reference in the primary sources to the Dacians using the falx? A quick search on Bill Thayer's website shows falx just means sickle or a similar instrument, and its use extends all the way back to the Greeks and Assyrians, and even inside Roman siege engines inside a testudo, like the asseres falcati (dragging hook for dislodging stones?) at Ambracia and the Dacian Wars.
This Romanian page on the falx has the following quote: http://www.gk.ro/sarmizegetusa/ranistor ... /arma.html
[quote]The shorter variant was called “Sicaâ€
Is there a specific reference in the primary sources to the Dacians using the falx? A quick search on Bill Thayer's website shows falx just means sickle or a similar instrument, and its use extends all the way back to the Greeks and Assyrians, and even inside Roman siege engines inside a testudo, like the asseres falcati (dragging hook for dislodging stones?) at Ambracia and the Dacian Wars.
Quote:The Geleni were noted for its use (Claudian, De Laud. Stil. I.110). It was the weapon with which Jupiter wounded Typhon (Apollod. I.6); with which Hercules slew the Lernaean Hydra (Eurip. Ion. 191); and with which Mercury cut off the head of Argus (falcato ense, Ovid, Met. I.718; harpen Cyllenida, Lucan, IX.662‑667). Perseus, having received the same weapon from Mercury, or, according to other authorities, from Vulcan, used it to decapitate Medusa and to slay the sea-monster (Apollod. II.4; Eratosth., Cataster. 22; Ovid, Met. IV.666, 720, 727, V.69; Brunck, Anal. III.157). From the passages now referred to, we may conclude that the falchion was a weapon of the most remote antiquity; that it was girt like a dagger upon the waist; that it was held in the hand by a short hilt; and that, as it was in fact a dagger or sharp-pointed blade, with a proper falx projecting from one side, it was thrust into the flesh up to this lateral curvature (curvo tenus abdidit hamo).http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/R ... /Falx.html
This Romanian page on the falx has the following quote: http://www.gk.ro/sarmizegetusa/ranistor ... /arma.html
[quote]The shorter variant was called “Sicaâ€
TARBICvS/Jim Bowers
A A A DESEDO DESEDO!
A A A DESEDO DESEDO!