Medieval flanged maces - some more detail

Medieval flanged maces - some more detail

[tsgillespiejr]

Wow, that "molar teeth" analogy was perfect! Even though I'd never thought a flanged mace would be used against anyone other than a heavily armored opponent, I'd always assumed the flanges WERE sharp, but for purposes of PIERCING armor.

Well, that's what happens when us laymen have only ever seen replicas and drawings...

Thanks, Matt. Great video as always!

[cryoshakespeare]

A very enlightening video, thank you for this! It annoys me when I see fantasy-mace designs with these tremendous spikes or blades on them, that in reality would glance off or break on armoured plate, or would simply get stuck in an unarmored foe's body.

[chadwizick]

Wondering why you passed up a chance to title this video "A short point on flanged maces"

[Leo.]

It may not be quite as optimised as a sword, but it is still a good unarmoured weapon. If you hit someone with it and they didn't have armour, it would do devastating damage. The disadvantages are more to do with range, defence and inertia.

[BrentODell]

A good modern comparison(sorry if this has already been mentioned) would be the texture on a 'framing' hammer, which is meant to prevent the nail from being deflected out to the side when driving it into wood.

[edi]

IMHO the mace has more sides to prevent overpenetration. Otherwise they could have come up with a blunt, teethed axe. The maces have typically 6 sides, thus if one side digs in it is stopped by two neighbours. Each of them could break bone again thus doing considerable damage on less armored opponents.

[SuiseisekiRozen]

hey man, any idea how they actually managed to forge flanges maces? or were they cast in something?
its something that iv never been able to figure out
and so many people in the comments dont seem to be actually listning to what you say, subbed and liked in hope that you reach an audience with more attention to detail like lindybeige's audience

[TheBaconWizard]

Yeh, those flanges would make an unholy mess of any flesh they hit, but we're not talking about internal organs or even major arteries without a LOT of luck. Just a ragged and painful but relatively shallow and non life-threatening wound which you'd struggle to ever land in the first-place. 
Of course, a head-blow might well be fatal. But try and land one, vs a much longer and faster, sharp, sword (which in the meantime has neatly removed your spleen, hamstrung you, and given you a decent shave ready for the funeral)

[ReichenbachEsq]

Have you examined any 20th Century examples of maces employed the trench warfare common during the Great War & considered their usefulness & effectiveness therein? Modern mace videos would provide education comparisons of value when compared to maces of antiquity. If you’ve already made those videos I’d appreciate a link to those but if not perhaps you may consider adding the additional content as time & resources permit. We love your work here in the states!

[emceha]

Bottom parts of flanges were usually sharpened

[opmdevil]

Are you sure that the flanges are there to give more tracktion? I would think that they are there to direct all the force for relatively small area, something as big as your thumb-tip. If you would have a weapon with the same mass but with an egg-shaped smooth head, it would give the same force but for a much larger area. Same force on a larger area means that on plate armour, the effect might be not a dent or a very small dent. With heavy flanges, you will make a deep dent or deform helmets and brestplates, causing disconfort, injury, lack of moment etc or a total failure of the armor by cracking it.

[LaserTSV]

Whoa... wait a minute... at 0:50 1) You went to a museum, 2) studied & measured a historic weapon, and 3) had a replica custom-made? That is really cool.  Please do a video on replica building! Thanks!

[WarbanderLasty]

I love the River Thames flanged mace, the shape of it and the wooden handle.
also as i side thing, were there longer maces for use on horseback? and just why is a mace less effective to an unarmored or lightly armored foe?

[sparrowhawk]

Yes, and they work well in Mount and Blade for taking prisoners :-)

[dukeofburgundy]

Hey Matt!  Could you do a video on flails?

[Metallerryz]

despite not being the most effective weapon against an unarmoured opponent, it will still do some serious damage to anyone unfortunate enough to be caught by a good swing of one of those things. I do agree though, against an unarmoured foe I would take a longsword/equivalent any day.

[pallabbiswas]

Make a video on weapon you would prefer against a tiger, lion, cheetah, leopard, panther, Jaguar, gorilla, chimpanzee, anaconda, python while you are facing one of them singlehandedly. You can't choose firearms or bows & arrows. Would your choice change as per the animal? Would it change whether you are in an open space or closed one? Would it change whether you are in land or in water?

[AltruisticAlbatross]

Whatever the case, I would NOT want one of those hitting my head.

[IAmMyOwnApprentice]

Ok. I can reconcile this *much* better with what you said previously about maces and early constables/ law enforcers.

[harjutapa]

Do you happen to have a link to images of the British museum original? Or perhaps a catalog number or the like?