Wednesday, July 30, 2025

J. Alden Mason Calling the Macana/Macuahuitl a "Sword"

  

After the first stone-hurling, the Inca warriors closed in for hand-to-hand combat. The main arm of the common solider was the club, generally with a doughnut-shaped with a number of points, especially in club-heads made of copper or bronze. A double-edged sword of hard wood which has given its Quechua name macana to this weapon was another arm; this was a heavy two-handed sword, and the wielder carried no shield. There were also various types of battle-axes and poleaxes, with blades of stone or copper. The long wooden spears had fire-hardened ends, or tips of copper or bronze. (J. Alden Mason, The Ancient Civilizations of Peru [Middlesex: Penguin Books Ltd., 1957], 196)