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Spear

From Wikiquote, the free quote compendium
Don't want no jailhouse, shotgun, fish-hooks, golf clubs, I got my spears. —Bob Hilliard

A spear is a polearm consisting of a shaft, usually of wood, with a pointed head. The head may be simply the sharpened end of the shaft itself, as is the case with fire hardened spears, or it may be made of a more durable material fastened to the shaft, such as flint, obsidian, iron, steel or bronze. The most common design for hunting or combat spears since ancient times has incorporated a metal spearhead shaped like a triangle, lozenge, or leaf. The heads of fishing spears usually feature barbs or serrated edges.

Spears can be divided into two broad categories: those designed for thrusting as a melee weapon (including weapons such as lances and pikes) and those designed for throwing as a ranged weapon (usually referred to as javelins).

A

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  • Ἐν δορὶ μὲν μοι μᾶζα μεμαγμένη, ἐν δορὶ δ᾽ οἶνος
    Ἰσμαρικός, πίνω δ᾽ ἐν δορὶ κεκλιμένος.
    • My spear wins bread, my spear wins Thracian wine:
      To drink it, on my spear-head I recline.
    • Archilochus, fr. 2 (ed. M. L. West) tr. C. M. Bowra, OBGVT (1938) p. 184, no. 103
  •    Rustum...hurl’d
    His spear: down from the shoulder, down it came,
    As on some partridge in the corn a hawk
    That long has tower’d in the airy clouds
    Drops like a plummet.
  •   His spear,
    Whose fiery point now in his mail’d right-hand
    Blaz’d bright and baleful, like that autumn Star,
    The baleful sign of fevers.
    • Matthew Arnold, "Sohrab and Rustum"
  •   The steel-spik’d spear
    Rent the tough plates, but fail’d to reach the skin.
    • Matthew Arnold, "Sohrab and Rustum"
  • The anguish of the deep-fix’d spear grew fierce,
    And he desired to draw forth the steel,
    And let the blood flow free, and so to die.
    • Matthew Arnold, "Sohrab and Rustum"

B

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  • And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
    When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.
    • Lord Byron, "The Destruction of Sennacherib", Hebrew Melodies (1815)

F

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  • And the Spear was a Desert Physician who cured not a few of ambition,
    And drave not a few to perdition with medicine bitter and strong.
  • The western tribes of British New Guinea employ a charm to aid the hunter in spearing dugong or turtle. A small beetle, which haunts coco-nut trees, is placed in the hole of the spear-haft into which the spear-head fits. This is supposed to make the spear-head stick fast in the dugong or turtle, just as the beetle sticks fast to a man’s skin when it bites him.

H

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I'll fling a spear myself and leave the rest to Zeus. —Homer
  • Christ-side-piercing spear.
  • The son of Enops, Thestor next he smote.
    He in his chariot with his body bent
    Sat cow’ring low, a fear-distracted form,
    And from his palsied grasp the reins had fall’n.
    Then came Patroclus nigh, and through his cheek
    His teeth transpiercing, drew him by his lance
    Sheer o’er the chariot-front. As when a man
    On some projecting rock advanc’d, with line
    And splendid hook draws forth a sea-fish huge,
    So him wide-gaping from his seat he drew
    At his spear-point, then shook him to the ground
    Prone on his face, where gasping he expir’d.
  • "I'll fling a spear myself and leave the rest to Zeus."
    • Achilles, in Homer, Iliad, bk. 17, l. ~511 (tr. Robert Fagles, 1990)
  • He...poised his far-shadowing spear and hurled it, and smote upon the shield of Aretus, that was well-balanced upon every side, and this stayed not the spear, but the bronze passed clean through, and into the lower belly he drave it through the belt. And as when a strong man with sharp axe in hand smiteth behind the horns of an ox of the steading and cutteth clean through the sinew, and the ox leapeth forward and falleth; even so Aretus leapt forward and fell upon his back, and the spear, exceeding sharp, fixed quivering in his entrails loosed his limbs.
  • And nigh to him came Achilles, the peer of Enyalius, warrior of the waving helm, brandishing over his right shoulder the Pelian ash, his terrible spear.
    • Homer, Iliad, bk. 22, l. 131 (tr. A. T. Murray, 1925)

J

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  • Fierce as they seem, some bold Plebeian spear
    May pierce their shield, or stop their full career.

L

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One of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. —Luke 19:34 (KJV)
  • The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true: and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe. For these things were done, that the scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken. And again another scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.

M

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  • His Spear, to equal which the tallest Pine
    Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the Mast
    Of some great Ammiral, were but a wand,
    He walkt with to support uneasie steps
    Over the burning Marle.
  • A Forrest huge of Spears.
    • John Milton, Paradise Lost, bk. 1

N

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  •    Again we breathe
    Fresh air and sun through lanes your lances made.

P

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  • The thick-sprung reeds, which wat’ry marshes yield,
    Seem’d polish’d lances in a hostile field.
    • Ambrose Philips, A Winter-Piece: To the Earl of Dorset", in The Tatler (5-7 May 1709)

S

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  • Trail’st thou the puissant pike?
  • Odin rides first with the gold helmet and a fair birnie, and his spear, which is called Gungnir. He shall go forth against Fenris-Wolf, and Thor stands forward on his other side, and can be of no avail to him, because he shall have his hands full to fight against the Midgard Serpent.
  • Loki went to those dwarves who are called Ívaldi's Sons; and they made...the spear which became Odin's possession, and was called Gungnir...Then Loki gave Odin the spear Gungnir, and...the spear would never stop in its thrust.
  • I will bury this my lance, this hateful thing,
    Deep in some earth-hole where no eye shall see—
    Night and Hell keep it in the underworld!
  • A gentle youth, his dearely lovèd squire,
    His speare of heben wood behind him bare,
    Whose harmefull head, thrice heated in the fire,
    Had riven many a brest with pikehead square.
    • Spenser, The Faerie Queene, bk. 1, c. 7, st. 37

T

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  •    Lynceus stept into the ring,
    And at his shield’s rim shook his stalwart spear.
    And Castor likewise poised his quivering lance;
    High waved the plume on either warrior’s helm.
    First each at other thrust with busy spear
    Where’er he spied an inch of flesh exposed:
    But lo! both spearpoints in their wicker shields
    Lodged ere a blow was struck, and snapt in twain.

Anonymous

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  • Hwæt. We Gardena in geardagum,
    Þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon    .
    • Lo, praise of the prowess of people-kings
      Of spear-armed Danes, in days long sped.
    • Beowulf, sec. 1 (tr. F. B. Gummere, 1910)
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  • Encyclopedic article on Spear on Wikipedia
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