The Semispatha and the Saex

[Nathan Ross]

has anyone else spotted this later Latin reference to the semispatha as a saex and simply understood it as an anachronistic use of the word?

This thread has some interesting stuff at the beginning, including a reference to your Carolingian text, and details of what appear to be some later Roman shortsword finds. The possibility that in some cases a semispatha might refer to a single-edged weapon is noted (see also Eduard's post on p.2 about a later Greek translation calling a 'semispathium' a paramèrion).

Trouble is, Vegetius (II.15) is probably thinking of the old gladius and pugio arrangement as described in his source texts (although he gives his 'ancient' soldier plumbatae, so who knows?).

If the word was used, I would imagine it had a rather wide and inexact meaning - no more specific than our own 'shortsword' in fact - and so could refer to all kinds of weapons.

is not the term 'Saxon' used by the Romans in this period a direct derivative from 'Saex' and means 'people of the sword', as it were?

Isn't it more likely to be the other way around? It was called a 'sax' because Saxons used it? Simply because Saxon occurs much earlier in our sources than saex... But if there's a better idea of the etymology of either term I'd be interested to know!