WEAPONSA man’s tools and weapons are extensions of his limbs. The warrior’s
weapons match his own virtues. As traditional narrative deals in warriors
of high quality, the weapons and armour are also excellent. Indra’s bow is
‘well-made’ (súkr
̇
ta-, RV 8. 77. 11), as are Mithra’s bowstrings and arrows
(hukərəta-, Yt. 10. 128 f.). Homeric helmets are likewise ‘well-made’ (Il. 3. 336
al. κυνην εOτυκτον), and spears are ‘well-shaven’ (Il. 10. 373 $Pξου
δουρο ́ , Od. 14. 225 Eκοντε $Pξεστοι). So they are in the Avesta
(huxsˇnuta-, Yt. 10. 24, 39). Mithra himself wields a ‘well-fashioned’ weapon
(huta ̄sˇt a-, Yt. 10. 141).^37
The hero’s fame is linked with his weapon. Odysseus and others are ‘spear-
famed’, δουρικλυτο ́ or δουρικλειτο ́ . In another type of compound
epithet the fame is predicated of the weapon itself: Apollo is κλυτο ́ τοξο,‘of
the famous bow’, a formation paralleled in the Vedic personal name and title
of Indra S ́rutáratha-, ‘of the famous chariot’. In Irish we have mac Ruide co
rind-blaid, ‘Mac Ruide of the famous spear’.^38
Certain heroes are associated with a particular, non-standard weapon. In
Homer most warriors fight with throwing-spears, and with the sword after
they have discharged their spears, but particular individuals such as Teukros
and Pandaros are archers, and we hear of one Areithoos the Maceman, so
called ‘because he did not fight with bow and spear, but used to smash the
battle-lines with an iron mace’ (Il. 7. 140 f.). He belongs to the generation
before the Trojan War, and the mace or club is an archaic, elementary weapon;
later it became associated with Heracles. The obsolete word wagro- ‘smasher’
remained enshrined in the name of Meleagros, another pre-Trojan hero.
The implement appears in other Indo-European traditions, but always as
something exceptional.^39 We have discussed the storm-god’s ‘smasher’ in
Chapter 6. In the Maha ̄bha ̄rata it is the special weapon of Bhı ̄ma; its nature
(^37) Bacchylides (18. 49) has ξεστο7 Eκοντα, which may be put beside the Eddic phrase
skafna aska (Atlakviða 4. 2), literally ‘shaven ash-trees’. The parallel would be more exact if
he had had *ξεστw μελα (as three times in Quintus of Smyrna we have $ϋξστηι
μεληισιν); μελη‘ash’ is routinely used in Homer for ‘ash-wood spear’, as are askr in Old
Norse, asck in Old High German, æsc in Old English (Beowulf 1772, Wanderer 99, Maldon 43,
etc.), and onn in early Welsh (Y Gododdin 316). Old English also shares with Greek the
metonymy ‘wood’ (δο ́ ρυ,wudu) both for ‘spear’ (Beowulf 398) and for ‘ship’ (ibid. 216, 298,
1919).
(^38) Edward Gwynn, The Metrical Dindshenchas, iii (Dublin 1908), 302. 57; Campanile
(1977), 122 f.
(^39) Cf. B. Schlerath, Orbis 24 (1975), 502–14; Campanile (1990a), 262 f., (1990b), 162 f.;
Sergent (1995), 288 f.
460 12. Arms and the Man