Illustrated Glossary of Antique Weapons (cont.)
Lingula, machera, stragule, doloni and sicca, with sources from Naevius, Caesar, Plutarch and Quintilian
The antiquarian arms-glossary continues, each drawn blade or shaft labelled and explained from classical writers. A lingula shaped like a bird's tongue is drawn from Naevius' tragedy Hesione; the long single-edged machera and the throwing-shaft stragule are cited from Caesar's Commentaries; the doloni, a weapon or a flail with hidden daggers, comes from Plutarch's life of Gracchus; and the small sicca is named for the ancient assassins, the siccari, after Quintilian. The identifications rest wholly on the transcribed captions rather than on any reading of the hand.
On this page
Blades and shafts: lingula, machera, stragule, doloni, sicca
The drawn weapons are the tongue-shaped lingula, the long single-edged machera, the throwing-shaft stragule, the sword-like doloni, and the small assassin's knife sicca.
Classical sources for the weapon-names
The names are traced to their sources: lingula from Naevius' tragedy Hesione, machera and stragule from the second book of Caesar's Commentaries, doloni from Plutarch's life of Gracchus, and sicca from Quintilian's ninth book of the Institutions.
Doloni as concealed daggers; the sicca of the siccari
Some hold the doloni to be flails in whose rod daggers are hidden. The sicca is a small knife used by the ancient assassins called siccari, who took their name from it.