Akinakkes?

[jonwr]

Stefanos, thanks for setting me straight on that. I should have looked a little more carefully before jumping to conclusions.
No fear of tattoos. I made it this long without getting inked.Maybe some nice woad painting!
Is there any evidence of Scyths wearing leather scale Armour?Reason I ask is that a fellow near me makes a good set for about half of what a Linothorax will set me back(Even selling a horse )
Anyone got a pic of another horseman's axe? I do like a nice axe...
I am lead to believe it was more ice axe style than what would be normally thought of as an axe.
Thanks for your forbearance with all these ???
Jon Ractliffe

[Sean Manning]

Stefanos, thanks for setting me straight on that. I should have looked a little more carefully before jumping to conclusions.
No fear of tattoos. I made it this long without getting inked.Maybe some nice woad painting!
Is there any evidence of Scyths wearing leather scale Armour?Reason I ask is that a fellow near me makes a good set for about half of what a Linothorax will set me back(Even selling a horse )
Anyone got a pic of another horseman's axe? I do like a nice axe...
I am lead to believe it was more ice axe style than what would be normally thought of as an axe.
Thanks for your forbearance with all these ???
Jon Ractliffe

Leather scale? Later nomads like the Mongols and Turks often used it, but I doubt there is any evidence from Scythia. Aren't most of the well-preserved graves from the poorer north?

There was one Scythian-style bronze piercing axe found in the ruins of Persepolis. (Alexander's men looted and burned that place very thoroughly!) Erich Schmidt's Persepolis II (1957) has the archaeological report with a scale drawing. A British Museum publication, Forgotten Empire or something like that, on the Achaemenid period has a colour photo and perhaps weight and measurement of the head. I think some of the reliefs from Persepolis show the axebearer of the King of Kings with the same style of axe.

Edit: Well-preserved graves with organic material, that is- I know there are plenty of Herodotus' Scythian grave-mounds further south. I think another style of axe, with a curved blade and a back spike, was also used, but I can't think of any sources.

[jonwr]

One pic on the vase/plate looks like one of the old Naval boarding axes albeit with a longer haft.
It reminded me of the short spiked fighting hatchet I used to see in my French and Indian war re enacting days. In fact I have one made from a railroad spike. Maybe have to fire up the charcoal and see if I can knock one out.
Jon Ractliffe

[hoplite14gr]

Is is not beyond doubt but some people describe those with "narrow bladed" axes as "Skythians" and the those broad bladed axes as "Phrygians" or "Paphlagonians". I cannot rule out the possibility of Skythians with broad bladed axes but the narrow bladed axe is considered traditionally Skythian.

Narrow bladed axe with back spike is considered as weapon of the "Saka with the tall hats" (Saka Tigrakhauda) because it was mostly found in the locations were Herodotus and Strabo and Ptolemy say that the Sakas lived.
One book I have about Marathon quotes the "Soviet Encyclopedia" and other Russian Sources about the Sakas.

Kind regards