A hand-forged javelin with a pattern-welded Damascus blade on a wooden
shaft, 36 inches overall, supplied with a fitted leather
sheath. Short, light and balanced for one hand.
Specifications
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Overall length: 36"
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Blade: Pattern-welded Damascus, 352 layers
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Steel: 1095 high-carbon core with folded carbon steels
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Shaft: Wood
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Included: Fitted leather sheath
The oldest weapon that leaves your hand
Before the bow, before the sling, there was a sharpened stick thrown hard.
The oldest complete wooden weapons ever found are a set of ten hunting spears
recovered from a lignite mine at Schöningen in Germany — between about 1.8 and
2.5 metres long, worked from spruce, tapered at both ends and weighted forward
in a way that only makes sense if they were meant to be thrown.
Their age is still argued over. Early estimates put them near 400,000 years;
thermoluminescence dating brought that to roughly 300,000; a 2025 study argues
for closer to 200,000 and attributes them to Neanderthals. Whichever figure
holds, they are evidence of something that was not supposed to be there —
planning, cooperative hunting, and a real understanding of how wood behaves.
The javelin never went away because nothing replaced what it does. Greek
skirmishers built a role around it. Roman legions carried the pilum, designed
to bend on impact so it could not be thrown back. Hunters across every
continent used some version of it. A thrown spear costs almost nothing, needs
no mechanism, and works.
The Damascus
The blade is forged from a folded billet worked through five cycles to reach
352 layers, with 1095 high-carbon steel at its core. The 1095
carries the edge; the folding gives the blade its pattern and its resilience.
Every billet is worked by hand, so no two blades carry the same figure.
Care
Damascus is carbon steel and will rust if neglected. Wipe the blade dry after
handling, keep a light film of oil on it, and store it out of the sheath in damp
conditions — leather holds moisture against steel. The etched pattern softens
over years and can be brought back; our guide on
re-etching
Damascus steel covers how.
What it's for
Collecting, display and re-enactment. At 36 inches it handles comfortably
indoors and mounts easily. More in our guide to
types
of spear and their uses, or browse the full
spear collection.
