Римская спата: история и эволюция меча

Roman longsword

The spatha was a type of straight and long sword, measuring between 0.5 and 1 m (19.7 and 39.4 in), with a handle length of between 18 and 20 cm (7.1 and 7.9 in), in use in the territory of the Roman Empire during the 1st to 6th centuries AD. Later swords, from the 7th to 10th centuries, like the Viking swords, are recognizable derivatives and sometimes subsumed under the term spatha. The Roman spatha was used in war and in gladiatorial fights. The spatha of literature appears in the Roman Empire in the 1st century AD as a weapon used by presumably Celtic auxiliaries and gradually became a standard heavy infantry weapon by the 3rd century AD, relegating the gladius to use as a light infantry weapon. The spatha apparently replaced the gladius in the front ranks, giving the infantry more reach when thrusting. While the infantry version had a long point, versions carried by the cavalry had a rounded tip that prevented accidental stabbing of the cavalryman's own foot or horse. Archaeologically many instances of the spatha have been found in Britain and Germany. It was used extensively by Germanic warriors. It is unclear whether it came from the gladius or the longer Celtic swords, or whether it served as a model for the various arming swords and Viking swords of Europe. The spatha remained popular throughout the Migration Period. It evolved into the knightly sword of the High Middle Ages by the 12th century.

The word comes from the Latin spatha, which derives from the Greek word σπάθη (spáthē), meaning "any broad blade, of wood or metal" but also "broad blade of a sword". The Greek word σπάθη was used in the middle archaic period for various types of Iron Age swords. The word does not appear in Homeric Greek, but it is mentioned in the works of Alcaeus of Mytilene (sixth century BC) and Theophrastus (fourth century BC). It is likely that spatha is the romanization of the Doric Greek word σπάθα (spáthā). The word survives in Modern Greek as [[:wikt:σπάθη and [[:wikt:σπαθί. The Latin word became the French épée, Catalan and Occitan espasa, Portuguese and Spanish espada, Italian spada, Romanian spadă and Albanian shpata, all meaning "sword". The English word spatula comes from Latin spat(h)ula, the diminutive of spatha. English spade, from Old English spadu or spædu, is the Germanic cognate, derived from a Common Germanic *spadō, ultimately from a Proto Indo European stem *sph2 dh .

During the Second Punic War, Celtic mercenaries introduced the spatha to the Roman army. The spatha was a weapon used by the cavalrymen, while the auxiliaries and legionaries of the infantry used the gladius instead. Eventually, the Roman infantry would adopt the spatha in the 2nd century. In the imperial period, the Romans adopted the original Greek term, spáthē (σπάθη), as spatha, which still carried the general meaning of any object considered long and flat. Spatha appears, first in Pliny and then in Seneca, with different meanings: a spatula, a metal working implement, a palm leaf and so on. There is no hint of any native Roman sword called a spatha. Referring to an actual sword, the term first appears in the pages of Tacitus with reference to an incident of the early empire. The British king, Caratacus, having rebelled, found himself trapped on a rocky hill, so that if he turned one way he encountered the gladii of the legionaries, and if the other, the spathae of the auxiliaries. There is no indication in Tacitus that they were cavalry. The next mention of spathae is in the 5th century, by Vegetius, now as a weapon carried by infantry. The spatha remained in use in the Byzantine Empire and its army. In the Byzantine court, spatharios (σπαθάριος), or "bearer of the spatha", was a mid level court title. Other variants deriving from it were protospatharios, spatharokandidatos and spatharokoubikoularios, the latter reserved for eunuchs. One of the more famous spatharokandidatoi was Harald Hardrada.

The term "Roman Iron Age" refers approximately to the time of the Roman Empire in northern Europe, which was outside the jurisdiction of the empire, but, judging from the imported Roman artifacts, was influenced by Roman civilization. One source of artifacts from this period are the bogs of Schleswig, Holstein and Denmark. Objects were deliberately broken and thrown into the bogs in the belief that they could go with a deceased chief on his voyage to a better place. A cache of 90 swords was found at Nydam Mose in Denmark in 1858. They were in the form of the spatha and therefore have been classified as "Roman swords". They are dated to the 3rd to 4th centuries. Many connect the Nydam cache with the sword of Beowulf, who was supposed to be a contemporary.

When Germanic tribes began to invade the Roman Empire during the 3rd and 4th centuries they would come into contact with the spatha.